Roebuck Street in the 1921 census

 

By 1921 the make up of Roebuck Street had changed. There were 141 households Fewer people worked at Sandwell Colliery and many more at the carriage works. There were also a lot of people out of work. Families seemed to be smaller with most couple only having two or three children at home.

As far as the Hamilton were concerned in 1921,  at no 17 lived my grandparents Walter and Gertrude Lily. He was a turner at the carriage works. Their children at that stage were Arthur Dorothy, Alfred, Frederick and Joseph Sydney (my father). Also living with them were my grandmother’s brother Alfred Timmins, a butcher. According to my father he was an invalid who had been gassed in the First World War, and who didn’t live long after that. In 1939 the family were still there, with my father who had not yet joined the army being shown as a coachbuilder. My grandmother stayed in the house until the street was demolished in the early 1960s

Yet another Alfred, Alfred Hamilton, who I assume was my grandfather’s brother, lived at no 36. He also worked at the carriage works. He had two sons, Alfred and Walter. I think Walter must be my father’s cousin and friend Waller, as they were born in the same year. Waller famously refused to go down the pit as a Bevan boy and was sent to jail, after telling the judge that if it was so important then the judge should go down the pit himself. He later joined the army. I believe that in the 60s and 70s he also lived in Great Barr but I do not remember him. Number 36 isn’t listed in the 1939 register for some reason, so we don’t know what happened after that.

Number 66 was the home of my great grandfather Joseph, who was an engine winder at Sandwell Colliery. Here’s a picture of a winding engine now in the Black Country Living Museum J&C Stark Winding Engine © Ashley Dace :: Geograph Britain and Ireland. As far as I can make out an engine winder worked above ground and was responsible for the maintenance of the machinery. His father Samuel Amblett had been killed maintaining the winding machinery at Tipton Green colliery. By 1921 Joseph was 71, so presumably he had retired. Only two children are at home, Joseph Sydney (after whom Dad must have been named) and Phyllis Lilian. According to Dad she was a modern woman. In 1921 when she was 21 she was a bookkeeper and typist and according to my father, in the 1930s she rode a motorbike, and ran away to Tenbury Wells with a married man and kept a sweet shop. Unusually my great grandfather had owned no 66, and by 1939 my father’s eldest brother Arthur and his wife Minnie lived there. Dorothy (Auntie Dorrie) also lived there until she married in 1940. There was someone else whose record has been redacted.

In the 1950s we lived at no 85. It wasn’t one of the family houses and in 1921 William Bytheway lived there with his wife Ethel. He was an engineer at Turners Engineers in Birmingham. In the 1939 Register they had left.  Herbert Alford an inspector of castings lived there with his wife Winifred who was the manageress of a grocery shop.

And finally at no 102 were Ernest Hamilton, my grandfather’s brother and his wife Gertrude. He was a fitter at the carriage works. They were still there in the 1939 register, and I remember them in the 1950s when we lived opposite.

More on Naughty Uncle Jack

Jack continues to prove elusive, but we've found his death certificate which has given us a few more clues.
We now know that Jack died on 3rd February 1953 aged 54, of acute bronchitis and emphysema. But we know that he was born in October 1896 so he was 56 not 54. And he was still a watch maker, and his address was 27 Park Road Hampton Wick Twickenham.

The death was registered by his mother in law M L Hawkins of 68 Richmond Park Road, Kingston upon Thames.

My mother visited Jack in 1939. She always said he lived in Kingston upon Thames but the 1939 census shows him living at 147 High Street Uxbridge. Also on the census is his wife. Her name has been transcribed as Patricillia, which is absurd. Looking closely at the original it looks like Letitia M.
Her date of birth was given as 26th May 1911. I have not managed to find her birth registration or the registration of their marriage.

The Hawkins family were living at 68 Richmond Park Road in 1939, William Charles Hawkins ( no job, private means) born 1884, Mary L  Hawkins born  1885. (this is the woman described as Jack's mother in law in 1953 who is only a year older than him)  and three adult children Lettie born 1912, a nurse, Richard born 1916, an aircraft wing assembler, and Constance born 1917, who is at home. But I cannot find the family in Surrey or Middlesex in 1911.

Surely the Letitia described as Jack's wife and the Lettie, described as a single daughter are the same person. Were they actually married. Jack was divorced so there was no reason why they shouldn't be .
So the mystery still isn't solved.

IGI

I know that it's been a long time since I did any family history,  especially for the further back ones, but I was quite disappointed when I looked at IGI today. In order to do a search you have to create an account - it's still free, but they want far too many personal details. It's a shame, but I won't be using it.

More on the Mills Family

In the 1871 census John Saunders is living in Dudley with his wife, now called Mariam, his 6 year old son and Hannah Mills who is 17 and visiting

John Saunders married Julia Mills in Dudley in 1865, but she died in 1866. A John Saunders married Myra Mills in 1869. Is this our Miriam, and he re-married to Julia’s sister.

In the 1881 census William and Elizabeth Mills are living in Ladywood in Birmingham with the Saunders family. William, aged 79 is described as formerly whitesmith. At this stage John’s wife name is clearly written as Myra. I’m sure that I have the right family because Alexander Saunders was one of the witnesses at the marriage of Sarah Emily Mills to Joseph Hamilton.

By the 1891 census we know that Elizabeth Mills is living with Sarah Emily and Joseph Hamilton and I can’t find the Saunders family.

We must therefore assume that William died between 1881 and 1891, but there were an awful lot of William Mills of the right age died in Birmingham and the Black Country in those ten years, so without more to go on, I can do no more.

Thomas Cotterill great great grandfather

My next great great grandparent is Thomas Cotterill the father of Sarah who married James Timmins

There are several variations on the spelling name Cotterill throughout the original documents, and I have stabilised on this one. Like so many in our story Cotterill is a name almost entirely confined to the Black Country in 1881, according to the National  Trust surnames database http://gbnames.publicprofiles.org . It is very uncommon still in the south and north. The name derives from the Saxon word cotter which was a serf who held his cottage by labour service rather than by paying rent. There have been some prominent Cotterills in West Bromwich history including two mayors and the founder of the West Bromwich Building Society, but I can’t see a link between them and our Cotterills. There is also a Cotterill Street in West Bromwich.

For Thomas’ early life we have to back to before registration.  According to IGI Going backwards to before registration, according to IGI. Thomas Cotterill was born on 25^th May 1813 and christened on 24^th November 1813 at St Lawrence Darlaston. Thomas father was also Thomas Cotterill and his mother was Mary. Thomas married Hannah Tompkinson on 13^th March 1836 in Walsall.

I can’t find the family in the 1841 census but this is not unusual. On later censuses Thomas, his wife Hannah and their eldest son Isaiah were all born in Darlaston, while the rest of the children were born in West Bromwich. This suggests that the family moved to West Bromwich between 1838 when Isaiah was born and 1841 when Thomas Jnr was born. In 1851 the family is living in Hargate Lane West Bromwich

At the time of the 1861 census Thomas was listed as a coal miner and the family was already living in Stoney Lane, where they stayed for the rest of Thomas’s life.  Thomas was still alive at the time of the 1901 census and at the age of 88 was still describing himself as a coal miner. Living with him, still at No 8 Stoney Lane, were his married daughter Maria and her husband John Whitehouse. Thomas’ grandson George, now 22 is also still living with them. Thomas Snr died in 1902, at home in Stoney Lane at the age of 91.

An update on Ann Worrall

As I get going again, I've looked at my file on Ann and discovered that I had sent for a marriage certificate. It shows that she married James Timmins on 18^th July 1855, but if I have the right marriage they already had 6 children at that stage. We know that James’s wife Ann’s maiden name was Worrall because it is given clearly on the birth certificates of her children Cornelius and Eliza Jane. And the father’s name is given correctly as James. So I'm pretty sure that I have the right person and we shall never know why they married so late.

I'll leave them there and move on to next great great grandparent, who will be Thomas Cotterill.

Getting going again

I wrote about the really useful booklet from the Nuneaton and North Warwickshire Family History Society. I have just finished transcribing all the family tree information from there onto Ancestry into a new tree called janddhamilton. The previous tree had become corrupted for all sorts of reasons and we wanted to make sure that everything on there is known to us to be factual. So now back to where I left off some time ago, with the elusive Ann Worrall.

A family connection

We discovered the link between us and the person with the 2nd cousin DNA match. It turned out that my father and her grandfather were first cousins. Both worked at the carriage works but I had never heard Dad mention him. Even more interestingly, her mother and I were born in the same year, and both lived in West Bromwich and I had never heard of her either. How weird, but we shall now never know the answer. What a pity we didn't come across this person when dad was still alive.

A really useful tool

Julia's DNA test has really got us going again on the family history.

Some time ago at the Knitting and Stitching show in Birmingham we happened to talk to the people on the stand of the Nuneaton and North Warwickshire Family History Society. (www.nnwfhs.org.uk) Nothing to do with our family connections and nothing to do with knitting or stitching either. But there you go.

We bought from them what has proved to be a most useful publication - The Ultimate Portable Family History Record Book. This is the most useful layout for a family tree that I've ever come across, and I really recommend it. I've added in all the ancestors we know about, and now we can set about filling in all the gaps.

Ancestry DNA

Well this has been an interesting day.

Julia decided to have an Ancestry DNA test and today we looked at the results. We didn't find any near relatives we didn't know about, so we ploughed through about half of the not so near ones and found some useful clues for our research.

Oddly someone  (with whom with have a 4th cousin DNA match) had added about 200 photographs to the Hamilton family tree. Julia has messaged this person find out more. We have now been in contact and she has told us something of her family. So we are now on the hunt to find out how we are related.

Getting bogged down in great great grandparents

When I began procrastinating over the family history it was because I had allowed myself to get bogged down over Ann Worrall and James Timmins. I don't think I can get any further with her for now until I start looking and the next generation back, so this is what I know.

Ann Worrall one of my eight great great grandmothers was born in 1823 before registration started in 1836 and we therefore do not have a birth certificate for her. However later censuses show that she was born in Arley near Nuneaton in Warwickshire.

We know that Ann’s maiden name was Worrall because it is given clearly on the birth certificates of her children Cornelius and Eliza Jane. And the father’s name is given correctly as James. Ann Worrall appears to be a common name but I can’t find a record of an Ann Worrall marrying anyone called Timmins.

James and Ann had 7 children

George             1843 a whitesmith

Cornelius          1844 a whitesmith

Elizabeth           1847

James              1849 a whitesmith (our great grandfather James 4^th )

Eliza Jane         1851

Mary                 1854

Jane                 1856

It shows a distinct lack of imagination to call one child Elizabeth, one Jane and a third Eliza Jane

The family lived at a number of addresses in west Bromwich. In 1851 and 1861 they were in Thomas Street and in 1871 they were in George Street. In 1851 they had a married couple Thomas and Rebecca Morgan as lodgers. He was a stone miner. Rebecca may have been James sister. Her birth dates fit. In 1861 Thomas Worrall aged 11 months was staying with them. He was born in Willenhall and was presumably related. In 1871 their baby granddaughter Patience Jane Timmins who was born in Yorkshire was with them. Thomas Worrall doesn’t show in the area in the 1871 census and a 5 year old called Patience Timmins died in West Bromwich in 1876.

James died on 11^th March 1879 in Overend Street. He died from Phthisis Pulmonalis which is an archaic term for tuberculosis. Ann died of a cerebral haemorrhage on 8^th August 1884. At the time she was living at 5 Herbert street which appears to have been almshouses.

By deed of 1869 Ann Murdock of West Bromwich settled in trust land south of Herbert Street where she had recently erected eleven alms-houses and a boardroom for trustees' meetings to be called the Spon Lane Trust Almshouses. Each alms-house was to be occupied by a poor woman, though a husband and wife or two women could share one; no inmate was to be under sixty. A resident matron was to be appointed. The foundress also gave £100 for maintenance.

From: 'West Bromwich: Charities for the poor', A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 17: Offlow hundred (part) (1976), pp. 83-86. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=36171

 

Naughty Uncle Jack

It's been over four years since I last posted on family history. My sister and I are just picking up the threads again, and we've started with a difficult one.

My mother used to talk about her Uncle Jack, who was a favourite of hers, but there was a mystery. A couple of years ago my sister and I visited some Perry relatives who confirmed some of Mom's story. So we decided to try to find out what we could. We've drawn a lot of blanks but this is what we know.

What we know and what we don’t know.

John Percy Walter Morris

Born  October 1896 (Wordsley) Baptised 4^th November 1896

My mother always called him Uncle Jack. Written on the back of his war photograph is Johnny Morris.

Served in the 1^st World War. South Staffs Regiment. Got the basic war medals.

What did he do for a living after he left Stourbridge? He is a 14 year old errand boy in the 1911 census. At the time of his marriage he is a watchmaker and living at 10 New Street Stourbridge, the address of his father’s shop.

Married Nellie Westwood,  Stourbridge 1924. They were married at St Thomas Stourbridge. Nellie is a domestic living at 26 the Oak Kingswinford. The marriage is witnessed by his brother Frank and Eli Millward who lives at no 1 the Oak. Her father was a bricklayer and Eli a brickmaker. It seems that the Oak was a brickyard.

Divorced 1926. John Hennel was co-respondent. It seems the only way we can see the court record is to go to the National Archives in Kew The reference is J77/2292/1797

Moved to London Why? When?

Married again in London? Kingston on Thames? Richmond on Thames? Visited in one of those places by my mother in 1939.

Is there a child from his first marriage as my father suggested that we haven’t found yet? The Nellie Morris we found born in 1923 is not the right one. Her parents were James Morris and Alice Weaver.

Are there children from his second marriage?

Visited the Perry family in the 1950s, was clearly well off, though it was suggested that he was wanted by the police for something.

What did he do that he was wanted by the police?

Died Where? When?

More about George Timmins

This from Mandy Tedstone

The Question about George Timmins, West Bromwich Albion footballer...He was in fact related to us. His Father Cornelius Worrall Timmins b,1844 Married to Lucy Stephens was the brother of our James Timmins b,1849 which makes him Cousin to Lily (Gerty)

James Timmins (1821-1879) (James the 3rd)

Last year I began a project to work backwards filling in all the gaps in the direct ancestors. After a gap of a year I am taking that up again. I had reached the great great grandparents, of whom there are 16, and had already posted Samuel Hamlet and Sarah Whitehouse, and William Mills and Elizabeth Webb on the paternal side. James Timmins (the 3rd) is the next on my list.

James was born in 1821 before registration started in 1836 and we therefore do not have a birth certificate for him or for his wife Ann Worrall. However later censuses show that he was born in West Bromwich.

 

The IGI shows only one James Timmins christened on 8^th July 1821 in West Bromwich. His parents are shown as James Timmins and Jane Timmins, and I have them living in West Bromwich in 1841.

 

I haven’t found James the 3^rd  and Ann on the 1841 census, which isn’t unusual, and its possible they weren’t married by then as their first child was born in 1843,. There is a Timmins family living in Thomas Street in 1841 and as the household head is also called James and is a bayonet maker (a precursor of spring maker), we can guess that this is his parents and siblings. Where James was that night we shall never know. He could have been missed off by the enumerator or staying somewhere else where they didn’t bother to include him.

 

There is a bit of a mystery. On James 4^th’s birth certificate his father’s name is given as George . Is it possible that James 3^rd was also known as George? It’s unlikely as he had a brother called George.

We know that Ann’s maiden name was Worrall because it is given clearly on the birth certificates of her children Cornelius and Eliza Jane. And the father’s name is given correctly as James. Ann Worrall appears to be a common name but neither Find My Past nor IGI has a ecord of an Ann Worrall marrying anyone called Timmins. However I have found a marriage record for an Ann Worrall in 1841 in Warwickshire, although it doesn’t suggest a husband’s name (sod’s law). I have sent for the certificate, so we’ll see if it’s the right one.

 

Like several of his sons and grandsons James was a whitesmith. In the 1851 census he is described as a spring balance maker and in 1861 as a whitesmith.

 

James and Ann had 7 children

 George             1843 a whitesmith

Cornelius          1844 a whitesmith

Elizabeth           1847

James              1849 a whitesmith (our ancestor James 4^th )

Eliza Jane         1851

Mary                 1854

Jane                 1856

 

It shows a distinct lack of imagination to call one child Elizabeth, one Jane and a third Eliza Jane

 

The family lived at a number of addresses in West Bromwich. In 1851 and 1861 they were in Thomas Street and in 1871 they were in George Street. In 1851 they had a married couple Thomas and Rebecca Morgan as lodgers. He was a stone miner. Rebecca may have been James sister. Her birth dates fit. In 1861 Thomas Worrall aged 11 months was staying with them. He was born in Willenhall and was presumably related. In 1871 their baby granddaughter Patience Jane Timmins who was born in Yorkshire was with them. Thomas Worrall doesn’t show in the area in the 1871 census and a 5 year old called Patience Timmins died in West Bromwich in 1876.

 

James died on 11^th March 1879 in Overend Street. He died from Phthisis Pulmonalis which is an archaic term for tuberculosis. Ann died of a cerebral haemorrhage on 8^th August 1884. At the time she was living at 5 Herbert street which appears to have been almshouses.

 

George Timmins who played football for West Bromwich Albion

Some people in the family think that George Timmins who played for West Bromwich Albion was one of my grandmother’s brothers. This is not so.

Lily Gertrude Hamilton (nee Timmins) ( 1890-1969) had seven brothers, one of whom was called George.

Thomas            1867-1948

Harry                1876-1940

Albert               1877-1882

Arthur               1876-?

George             1881-?

Albert J             1884-?

Alfred               1886-1924

This George appears on the census in 1901 living with his parents in Overend Street and working as a whitesmith. He does not appear in the 1911 census, (by which time both his parents are dead) but I can’t find a record of his death. He may have moved away from West Bromwich.

Gert’s father James was born in 1848, so was a contemporary of George Timmins the footballer. He worked at Salter’s as a whitesmith.  His parents James (also a whitesmith) and Ann had 7 children including a George who was born in 1843 and was – guess what, a whitesmith.

George Timmins the footballer was born in West Bromwich in 1858. The West Bromwich Strollers club was formed in 1879 by a group of young men from the Salter's. Initially they played cricket at Dartmouth Park but in 1882 they decided to form the West Bromwich Albion football club. George who worked at the factory, joined the club. He played in three consecutive FA Cup Finals at left half, leaving in 1891 to join Old Hill Wanderers. He worked at Salters, as did our ancestors, and therefore he was probably a whitesmith, so he was probably also related in some way, but Timmins is a common name in West Bromwich, and unless someone really wants me to follow him up, I'm only really prepared to spend the money on certificates for the immediate family.