I recently read a blog post that asked where the reader’s
sixteen great great grandparents came from.
Mine came from seven English counties, two Australian States (then
colonies), Scotland and Wales, so were from all over the place. This led to me to wonder about how these
people and my other ancestor couples came to meet and have children. With Valentine’s Day coming up, I thought it
would be nice to share some of the stories I know.
To get into the right mood, here is the oldest wedding photo
of direct ancestors that I have – Walter George Charley and Constance Mary
Macdonald. They both lived in the same
part of Melbourne, Australia. A piece of
lace from this wedding dress was sewn into a wedding dress worn at a family
wedding last year.
I have written before about my great grandfather James JesseBlake who wrote his life story. He
described how he met his future wife, Eliza Todd. One Sunday morning, James left London to
visit a friend in country Kent. One his
way home, he went to a church in Greenwich to have a look. A church service was just starting so he
decided to stay for it. There was a
young lady, Eliza, sitting nearby who couldn’t find the service in the prayer
book, so he gave her his book. After the
service, he walked her back to the ladies school where she was a servant. A couple of weeks later he went back to the
same church service in the hope of seeing her again, which he did and he was then
also introduced to Eliza’s mistress.
Soon after this, they met each other’s families. They married a few
years later. It is rare to have this
much detail about regular people, in most cases the only option is speculation.
I do have some ancestors who were related in some way prior
to their marriage and so must have been well known to one another. I previously told the story of Priscilla Goodyear who married her brother-in-law John Camp Shephard. A couple with a similar story from the
Akeroyd side of the family are George Newsome and widow Hannah Talbot nee
Blakeley, married in 1800. George
Newsome was a widower whose previous wife was Hannah’s sister Jane. At the time of both the Goodyear-Shephard and
Newsome-Blakeley marriages were within prohibited degrees of affinity, which
means they shouldn’t have been allowed to marry. Now marrying a sibling in-law is legal in
England. In both cases, the couples were
married some distance from where they lived and so would not have been known to
the minister who performed the ceremony.
It is not just in-laws who married. I have at least two sets of first cousins who
married, while this seems a bit odd to modern sensibilities, it was not unusual
in the past and was never a prohibited degree of relationship under English
law. Oscar Kirby, born in Wales, married
his cousin Harriet Partridge, from Gloucestershire, in Stroud registry office
in 1878. They married in the registry
office because they were Plymouth Bretheren.
James Rideout and Caroline Bennett were also cousins, both
from Tollard Royal in Wiltshire, where they married in 1821. I have written previously about James and
Caroline’s fathers, Ambrose and Jasper, who were literally partners in crime.
Another story that may make for uncomfortable reading is
that of Thomas Rowley and Elizabeth Selwyn, parents of Eliza Rowley. Thomas was an officer in the NSW Corps and
travelled to Australia, arriving in February 1792. On the same ship was a convict Elizabeth
Selwyn. Apparently, the officers got
first pick of the convict women. Thomas
and Elizabeth’s first child, Isabella, was born in November 1792, 9 months
after they arrived in the colony. As
they stayed together until Thomas’ death in 1806, although they weren’t able to
marry, it must have worked out okay.
On a happier note, in my early days of family history
research, my grandmother, from Yorkshire, told me about how she met my
grandfather, who then lived in Hertford, on a Mediterranean cruise that she had
gone on as a twenty-first birthday present from her uncle. My grandfather gave her a Spanish doll that
she still had. When she told her parents
about the doll, they knew it was a serious relationship, at the time well
brought up young ladies did not accept gifts from men. They wouldn’t have met if it not for that
cruise.
In many other cases, my ancestors lived in the same village
or same corner of London, so probably knew each other growing up. In some of those cases, they had gotten
themselves into situations where they had little choice but to marry when they
did, with the first child arriving a little too soon.
Whatever the situation, most of my ancestors found
themselves married for many years, I hope happily, like this ancient couple,
Harry Smith and Louisa Jenkins. I don't know how they met but they were married for 55 years.
