Being a Big Softy

 

In genealogy, the best we can usually hope for is a provable set of birth and death records and, if applicable, marriage and as many children as possible. Anything else is a bonus and provides a welcome insight into our ancestor's lives.

Today I was researching the family group for my 3rd great-grandaunt, Pamela Watts. She was born about 1801 at Bottisham, Cambridgeshire and baptised on 16 September 1804 at Holy Trinity, Bottisham. On 21 December 1819, she married George Pettit at Holy Trinity. George was born about 1797 at Bottisham Lode, a nearby hamlet. They were both Baptists. So far, so dull, but I have a good set of parish and census records to back all this up, so I'm a happy chappy.

I was down in Cambridgeshire in 2003 and dragged my daughters around the graveyards of Holy Trinity, St James, and the Baptist Chapel, taking notes and photographs. Our time was limited so we did the best we could but it was nowhere near enough as practically everyone in these yards is related to us in some way. In 2018 a chap called Thomas Hunter Brown took more pictures and recorded more information from the Baptist Chapel, he posted this information on findagrave.com. Thank you. Some of the stones relate to Pamela's family.

Pamela and George had eight children as far as I can make out, and five of these died before Pamela died herself. The grief of a mother seeing her children die before she does is something I can't imagine or even want to contemplate.

Although George died before Pamela, his stone was erected by his eldest son, Jeremiah, a police constable with the Metropolitian Police Force. I feel I need to point out that Baptists are fond of appending words of endearment to the usual gravestone information. Using a / to denote a new line, his inscription reads:

Sacred to the memory of / GEORGE PETTIT / Who died May 3 1866 / In his 69th year. / Vain are the titles of an hour, / Vain are all riches, fame, and power; / All, all is vain-this lesson learn, / Man to his dust, must soon return. / Erected by his Son Jeremiah.
View it here

For her son John, Pamela erected the stone and so the words are hers. The stone is unreadable in parts but as far as I can make out it goes something like:

Sacred to the memory of / JOHN PETTIT / Who died January 8 1861 / Aged 20 years / These four stones record the parental / Affection of PAMELA PETTIT / A short but sweet companionship on earth / And in token of .... / ... sweeter companionship in Heaven
View it here

I'm afraid the next two had me welling up. Daughter Ann married a John Kefford and she died aged 33. It reads:

Sacred to the memory of / ANN KEFFORD / The beloved daughter of / PAMELA PETTIT / Who died March 31 1865 / Aged 33 years / Farewell ye friends and children dear / I am not dead but sleeping here / I parted with you all in love / And hope to meet in heaven above
View it here

Frances married Robert Cornwell and she died shortly after their marriage and giving birth to a child. She is buried with the 5 week old infant.

Sacred to the memory of / FRANCES CORNWELL / The Beloved Daughter of / PAMELA PETTIT / Who died November 1 1862 / Aged 20 Years / Also her infant aged 5 weeks / Wipe off your tears and weep no more / I am not lost but gone before / Remember this and bear in mind / You have not long to stay behind
View it here

I really should used to seeing deaths, but the loss of half your children is indescribably harsh.

Pamela herself lived until she was 67.

Badger's Burblings

In genealogy I am currently re-writing my book and working my way through the Watts family. Specifically I am researching an Australian branch and a family of ten children. Many of the sons ended up in the Second Australian Imperial Force during the Second World War. As a Brit I am obviously aware of the allied efforts in Europe, in a general sense as my father was in the Royal Navy at the time. However, I had very little knowledge of the Australian, and New Zealand, battles against the Japanese in the Pacific arena. Two of the boys ended up fighting in Timor and New Guinea and ended up as Prisoners of War. On their release and return to their home, neither of them married and they lived with their widowed mother until she died leaving them just each other. In the book I can't comment on how they might have felt, but I'm just glad not to be them.

One of my daughters bought some books and posted her purchases on FB. Looking at the post I suffered book envy as Peter Robinson has a new book out and, somehow, I completely missed it. Anyway, It's ordered now and I shall soon be devouring another Inspector Banks mystery. Unfortunately, I got carried away with my shopping and also ordered Simon Collins' new album Becoming Human and a collection of Bob Seger's hits. Seger is an artist I've not listened to much before, but I sometimes listen to the Sonos station Rock Road Trip and they play quite a bit of him, so he's got under my skin. I guess it's a form of marketing, but I'll take any opportunity to uncover a new (to me) artist.

I've also taken a punt on pre-ordering the forthcoming D&D Adventure Begins game. I was massively into D&D back in the day and had the original Basic through Immortals sets. This is back when Games Workshop was a single store on Tottenhamcourt Road and I travelled to London especially to buy the AD&D Dungeon Master Guide from the first shipment that came into the country. So sad. Anyway, I'm trying to gently ease my grandsons into the idea of RPGs. My daughter and I had a discussion, at cross-purposes, about this. She was thinking board games and I was thinking pen 'n' pencil. I tried one of my grandsons on Warhammer (WFRP) and he walked away after the character generation as it wasn't what he expected. After clearing up the confusion, I realised that my daughter was recalling us playing Heroquest. I still have it, in the original (battered) packaging, although I did paint all the figures inside. Such a geek. They don't make it anymore. It was replaced by Advanced Heroquest, and they don't make that anymore either. Both are available as collectors items for about £180! I should have kept the box in better condition. I did some research on what D&D type board games are now available, which is how I stumbled across the Adventure Begins. When that arrives, and our bubble next comes together, we'll give that a bash. Meanwhile, I've dispatched my copy of Heroquest for them to try out.

Tea last night was a smoked haddock risotto out of my Masterchef cookbook. It used cider but the bottle I bought was too much so Mrs Badger and I split the remains into two small glasses and it was really delicious. Neither of us has drunk cider in its normal form for years so this was a nice surprise. For anyone interested, it was a Morrison's own. Ah, the risotto. It was flipping amazing. Restaurant quality I would say, very impressive. Of course the recipe served four and we ate it between the two of us, so we were a bit full afterwards, but happy tummies!

Albert Watts (1880-)

The General Register Office has recently made available some additional information on the deaths and birth indexes. Previously, the microfilmed versions did not contain an age at the time of death prior to 1868 or a mother’s maiden name on births prior to September quarter 1911. The GRO now have a searchable database that fills these gaps.

For me this means re-working the births and deaths that fall within these dates. The deaths weren’t too onerous, I had just over a thousand of them, and even though the age at death was advertised as being in years and some of them were clearly in months, it wasn’t a big job. I only found one record that I had wrong, so I felt very pleased with myself about that. The births are a much bigger task, 5,393 of them, so I’m currently working through them as a ‘back burner’ project. When I get time in-between other research, I spend an hour or so whittling them down. I’m down to about 3,500 at the moment.

In addition, the birth indexes now show the full range of forenames where previously initials had sometimes been inserted. This extra information from the GRO is throwing up some interesting research insights. Albert Watts (1880-) is my second cousin three times removed on my mother’s side. His parents were Nathan Watts (1830-1898) and Elizabeth Randall (1840-1916) and I had his birth index record - Albert Watts, volume 3b, page 551, Mar quarter 1880, Newmarket district; mother's maiden name Randall. The 1881 and 1891 census showed him at home with his parents at Bottisham Lode in Cambridgeshire where he was born. I haven’t located Albert in the 1901 census, but I’ve found him in 1911:

1911 RG 78, RG 14 PN 9118, registration district (RD) Cambridge, sub district (SD) St Andrew the Less, enumeration district (ED) 18, schedule number (SN) 26
Albert Watts	Head	31	Mar	Grocery	Lode, CAM
Amy Watts	Wife	30	Mar	Assisting in business	Haverfordwest, PEM
Edna Watts	Daur	8			Ware, HRT
Married 9 years, 1 child, 1 living, 0 dead

This has given me his wife and daughter’s names and approximate birth years and locations. I also have an approximate marriage year. However, to date I had been unable to locate any marriage of Albert Watts to an Amy around 1902 or birth of an Edna Watts around 1903. The best fit that I had so far found for Edna was a Constance Frances E Watts born in 1903 at Ware. I was hoping that the E was for Edna and that the GRO website would prove this one way or another.

Assuming the birth locations to be correct I searched the GRO website for any female WATTS in the Ware district in 1903 plus or minus 1 year and found:

WATTS, Constance Frances Edna mmn BOWLER GRO Reference: 1903 M Quarter in WARE Volume 03A Page 680

Eureka! This also gave me Amy’s surname and a better chance of finding the marriage. A search of the FreeBMD website for the marriage of Albert Watts to someone with a surname of Bowler between 1901 and 1902 found the following record:

Marriages Sep 1901 Greenwich 01D 2029

BOWLER       Florence Maria A

HILL               Sarah Elizabeth

RICE               Richard Edward

WATTS           Albert

So, next I had to hope that the A in Florence Maria A Bowler was Amy. A search of the GRO website for a female BOWLER in the Haverfordwest district in 1880 plus or minus a year turned up:

BOWLER, Florence Maria Amy mmn DARKER GRO Reference: 1880 S Quarter in HAVERFORDWEST  Volume 11A Page 879

Case solved. Thank you GRO.