Does anyone have any knowledge of what records exist for the Newcastle Workhouse in the mid 1850s? Perhaps a register of admissions or something like that?
As background: I am intrigued by an additional person who appears in the household of James and Elizabeth Wilson in the 1841 Census for Newcastle. He is called Alfred Carrick, age around 3 at the time. He is presumably the same Alfred (Downie) Carrick who appears in a list of long-term inmates of the Newcastle Workhouse in 1861 (having been there for 7 years owing to a learning disability) and who died in 1869.
I have not found any other links in the Wilson family to the names of Carrick or Downie. They could simply have been child-minding for friends or neighbours. It could be a recording error, carried over from a different household. Or, perhaps, it could be a clue to James's or Elizabeth's wider family. I know virtually nothing about Elizabeth (not even her maiden name) as she seems to have died before the 1851 census. And I know very little about James's life before 1819 (when he was about 33), except that he was born in Berwick upon Tweed.
I was hoping a register or admission document might contain some hint about any relationship to the family.
Many thanks for any pointers!
