Hi Jane
I never came across the children to Edward, Sky told me about Edward being the father to William, Sue the Empress of genealogy told me about William then Joseph then William then Rebecca then Rebecca then me, I may of left someone out but that's about it, I only can have a main line through the Woman, truthfully beyond Williams wife my gr grandmother a Hartley on the census born Hull well i never found out who her mother was, I found a record of a stated William Wiltshire travelling in a caravan of bright colours, inscribed on the caravan was Hartley Leeds, the Wiltshires would often use the name Hartley as an alias when trying to evade the police. My mother would plait her grandma's hair and her grandmar would talk about Scotland, she would tell my mother all about making baskets she told of the place she was born in a place she called Musselburgh, my mother would not of known of this place she was still young herself how on the census it says born in Hull well I often wonder why, i have read records and it is obvious they have no fear of telling lies, my gr grandma's name was Maria on the census but her real name she used was Mariah my mothers mother Rebecca was born in some open outside ground in Sheffield out of a wagon, I think her father was born Woodsetts Derbyshire and his father Yorkshire then Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire all at camp sites, I do not know about Edward, he I was told married a Smith girl, Lettia, I do not know how much Gipsy they have in them, Williams lot mix with and live with many Gipsies down through the years by the look of all the records that I have came across they lived in tents and caravans then houses, my mother would always speak with Romany words to us when we was young mixed with the cant i do not think she new the difference it was only when i came on the internet that i realised the truth yet still we new a good amount of the Romany my mother died before the internet and me meeting Sue from the south and long before i took a d.n.a. test. She never new of any of the things i learned.
Strangely it was me who may have found the secret about her own mothers death, my mother would often talk about how her mother was attacked and kicked bad, my mother was young and through out her life would have the darkness come over in these times i would talk to her for a certain amount of time and then she would pull out of it, she would tell how it took her mother a year to die and that she would comfort her these were long lasting bad times for my mother she tried and tried to find out who was responsible relatives told her for years it was a jealous woman, i found out old old George Gipsy Smith or his son (same name) was charged with attacking her one year before she died, it may be one of them its the same address and the same name George Smith Keswick street Sneinton.
We would visit in later years his son Gipsy George Smith and they would talk about being Cousins, everyone dead now let them all rest in peace, now through looking and tracing through records and listening to others George Oxby Smith was born in a tent, Staunton-on-the-Wolds, Notts 13 March 1868. died on 5 Feb 1947 at 4 Keswick Street Sneinton, Nottingham, a stones throw from where my mother was born. He was Baptised 18 Mar 1868. His father is given as John Smith, (johnny two wife's) mother Maria - Gipsies.
I think any family who Carry's within them the breed of the Gipsies belong from the Gipsies through their breeding, it doesn't mean your a Romany or a Gipsy. I did my d.n.a and found a surprisingly large amount of Romany people from Europe who share d.n.a with me and they have not a drop of English or Irish Scotland or Wales in them, it must come from hundreds of years back, the amazing thing is i match to a Romany from the cold lands of Europe, I can see through their profile which countries there from, then I match mostly to the Romany Gipsy peoples from several countries right across Europe, Richard Edmund's the writer on the Gipsies of these lands once wrote that it is the Woman who hold the ancient d.n.a more that the males.
Out of all my d.n.a matches in this land the Herons hold the most Romany Gipsy in them, I have matches to born and bred Herons and one of them go over sixty % in what Ancestry has now classified as European Romany ancestry, some of the European Gipsy's that i match to go over 90% the Smiths in England and Young's in America still have large amounts in fact all the main names that are mentioned by the old Gipsy scholar's are still in this day carrying in them the old Romany genes. I suppose the old scholar's were about right in there assertion's. You do find people with large amounts of Romany d.n.a that hold names not thought of as being a Romany Gipsy name, this is where people have fallen into the trap of classifying names as having a true reference to a Gipsy identity, it is far more complicated than such a simplistic analysis.
I was about right to when i said that this line of the Wiltshire's settled heavy in Newark you only have to look at the births that you mentioned, I am no expert though, I like learning of their lives. I will write what I find soon, most of names in stories i find well they all seam to tie in to what you have wrote. Look after yourself Jane I hope you are well………..michael