Genealogy: Another mystery

[dimity_blue]

I've been doing quite a bit of genealogy this week because it's absorbing and stops me thinking about how stressful everything is. I doubt I'll ever figure out just what was going on with this but it's curious.

My Grandad's great-grandparents were Thomas (1813-1858) and Catherine. They had 7 children together before Thomas died in July 1858. Catherine was remarried 4 months later to a man called George.

My first thought was: "4 months?!" with a huge side-eye. Then I found out Thomas died of liver disease - gastritis. Which didn't exactly persuade me Catherine's rapid remarrying was anything but suspicious.

But wait! There's more!

George was born around 1830, so he was some years younger than Catherine. That's not the interesting bit. What is interesting is Catherine's age.

Catherine was:

21+ in 1842 as her marriage certificate states she's full aged. So she was born 1821 or earlier.
36 in 1858 according to her second marriage certificate. Born 1822.
Aged 35 in 1861 according to the census. Born 1826.
Aged 50 in 1871 according to the census. Born 1821.
Aged 78 in 1891 according to the census. Born 1813.

I've double and triple checked because Catherine is such a common name but she was living with at least one of her and Thomas's children every time, and his surname was an uncommon one. I also rechecked Catherine's ages but I didn't misread them.

Interesting, am I right?

Comments

[thisbluespirit]

Four months isn't all that rapid for a woman with children to provide for. It was hard to survive alone, both for men and women and where one partner dies the other often remarried quite quickly because of necessity, although, of course, there was also no divorce, so perhaps Catherine was relieved at the release to marry someone she preferred! Some women did manage, of course, especially when the children were old enough to help support them & they'd do charring or sewing.

(I told my Dad once he was slacking as his paternal ancestors went through at least 2 or 3 wives each on a regular basis! XD)

The age thing isn't that unusual, either. *shakes fist at own contradictorily-aged ancestors* People often round up or down a bit on censuses (or whoever fills it in doesn't necessarily know exactly how old the person is. Indeed, pre-birth registration, the person themselves might not actually be certain of what year they were born). It's also pretty common for them to add on years as they get older - exaggerating their great age! Some ancestors are impressively consistent, others are all over the place.

Do you have her on the 1851, because the earlier in someone's life, the more likely it is to be accurate, but all the 1841 census ages are supposed to be rounded up to the nearest 5 (although they're often not).

I'm glad you've got something to keep you going through all of this!! ♥

[dimity_blue]

I know ages (and names!) can vary on censuses, but I haven't seen them go up and down so much before!

I like to think of Catherine hurriedly trying to remember what age she claimed to be in the last census, then shrugging and choosing a number at random, thinking it didn't really matter anyway. Only to genealogy enthusiasts, Catherine!

[thisbluespirit]

Yeah, it depends, but I've definitely got a few who were generally erratic and suddenly got very old later as well! It does make it more tricky to find baptisms. In Catherine's case, I'd assume the earlier two are more likely to be reliable, and there's only 5 years difference there. You could definitely do with the missing 2 censuses for comparison data, though! XD

I've got one person whose age is fairly constant, but either her husband had terrible handwriting/spoke incomprehensibly to the enumerator, because her name was Matilda, but she was randomly called Lydia on one census & Amelia on the next. (She caused me no end of trouble because she also was listed twice on two different censuses, but is still actually the same person. Her father just liked listing all his children regardless of whether or not they were actually home that night, I think! I spent a lot of time checking up on mysterious other wives and other Matildas only to conclude, yep, just one person called Matilda!)

[dimity_blue]

You must have been going mental over that one! I wish people thought ahead and kept their stories consistent.

I still haven't found those missing censuses either.

[thisbluespirit]

I was a bit, but the good (?) thing about it was that it was pre-all censuses being online, so I'd find one or two and get an anomaly, solve that, get a new anomaly - I think if I'd got those conflicting results all at once online, I'd have just imploded or something. But she was just one person and she was definitely called Matilda! I just assume some terrible handwriting/mumbling happened when the enumerator called! XD

I still haven't found those missing censuses either.

That's always so annoying. They must be there, you know they have to be there and YET. Where are they hiding? What have they been transcribed as??? (why do we do this again? Oh, yes. It's fun. lol)

[dimity_blue]

= I just assume some terrible handwriting/mumbling happened when the enumerator called! XD=

Haha, yes! I once had a Lilian become William for one census. I was all, "Where's this Lilian come from? Where's William?"

Do you talk to your relatives/the records too? "Is that your burial record?" "Why was this census taker employed? Look at the state of his handwriting!"

I also had trouble with a street name. I couldn't find Clury Street anywhere and, even if it had been demolished, you'd think there was some record of it. No, it was Olney Street. Laces Street is one I'm still struggling with. There's a Lace Street, but my one has a definite S on the end. If I could make it into Thomas Street, it'd be better but it doesn't seem to be that.

=What have they been transcribed as???=

That really is the question!

[thisbluespirit]

Haha, yes! I once had a Lilian become William for one census. I was all, "Where's this Lilian come from? Where's William?"

LOL, perfectly natural mistake to make! Er, um.... 0_o

Laces Street is one I'm still struggling with. There's a Lace Street, but my one has a definite S on the end. If I could make it into Thomas Street, it'd be better but it doesn't seem to be that.

Oh, that is frustrating!

Do you talk to your relatives/the records too? "Is that your burial record?" "Why was this census taker employed? Look at the state of his handwriting!"

Oh, yes! Or, now I'm doing it at home I do; they frown on talking to the microfiche/film reader in archives quite a bit. People would look at you. But, yes: I FOUND YOU!!! ♥ ♥ ♥

Or, less fun: WHERE ARE YOU, I KNOW YOU'RE DAMN WELL SOMEWHERE. *glares at screen as headache grows*

:-)

[dimity_blue]

=Or, less fun: WHERE ARE YOU, I KNOW YOU'RE DAMN WELL SOMEWHERE. *glares at screen as headache grows*=

Yes! I soooo relate (ha!) to that one.

I was trying to find birth records on the GRO for babies born to Mrs. McGowan (née Tritton). I thought it'd be easy but I fear there's a lot of misspelling going on that's blocking me.

[thisbluespirit]

Ha, yes, the new GRO index is a godsend, but its search functions are so frustrating and limited! When the spelling variation thing is being a problem I sometimes try using FreeBMD to search on the old index using its phonetic search option, and then I can check out the likeliest looking ones on the GRO - or if there are too many, at least it gives me more possible variant spellings to try!

[dimity_blue]

Thanks. I use the FreeBMD occasionally, especially for marriages. Do you find their phonetic search is better than the GRO's? I've found the GRO's to be rather ridiculous.

[thisbluespirit]

Oh, yes, definitely more helpful than that! Or at least, certainly quicker and simpler to do the search. Depending on what the surname is, you'll still get a lot of obviously irrelevant entries, but you can get up more than 3 years at a time which makes it easier to just scan through for ones that look worth following up on the GRO.

Plus, there are some odd things that are either missing from the new indexes or have been mistranscribed this time around instead of last, so if you're failing to find something, FreeBMD is definitely good to check up on that.

[dimity_blue]

Thanks. I definitely find the GRO's search function frustrating,