Family Historian User Group

I'm hoping those of you more familiar with English census records can shed some light on this household entry from the 1871 Census.

The page in question is:
RG10; Piece: 2133; Folio: 57; Page: 40

At 31 Queen Street, Stoke Damerel, Devon, there seem to be two families.

The first is:
Family 253
Mary A Turpin age 33 Mother
George W Turpin age 12 Son
William H Turpin age 10 Son
Frederick R Turpin age 5 Son
Thomas Turpin age 1 Son
(all born Devonport)

Seems straightforward enough. But next I find:

Family 254
Mary Hore (age 49) Wife Married born Allington, Devon, England
Charles E Elliott (age 16) Son born Devonport, Devon, England

Grace Hore (age 13) Daughter-in-law born Essenford, Cornwall, England

This makes no sense to me, that a 13-year-old unmarried child with the same name as the adult should be listed as 'daughter-in-law'.

Presumably Mary is Charles Elliott's mother, she has remarried, and her husband is named Hore [Hoare?] and he is Grace's father, and Grace is Mary's step-daughter. But where is Mary's husband?

I find it odd that Mary is listed as 'Wife' not 'Head'. Might that be a clue that her husband simply got skipped when the enumerator was filling out the form?

I know that in the US, the original sheets as filled out by the enumerator were copied and the copies were filed at the National level. When I see families like this, I can sometimes find missing family members listed on addendum pages at the end of the records for the census district.

I'm guessing that since the Turpins were all born in Devonport, as was Charles Elliott, there might be a connection between the families there.

My next step will be to look in FreeBMD for possible marriages, and census records from 1861/1881, but if anyone can suggest other means of finding information about these families, I'd be grateful.

(I confess I am thoroughly spoiled now by having access to the newspaper published in one of the towns I'm studying in the US. I've been able to construct a large branch on one of my husband's lines from the marriage announcements, obituaries, and news items just from the newspaper. It's a pity we don't have access to that kind of resource for all our families.)

Jan

ID:3904

in law is often used as an alternative for step as in step-daughter.

I have often come across a family where the husband is not present and the first name in the household is the 'wife', in some cases the husband was a seaman and was probably at sea on the night of the census. My husbands great-grandmother was 'wife' on 2 different censuses while her husband was living in the next town with another woman.

Irene B

In the 1861 census (RG9/1524/57/8), Grace Hore aged 3 is living with her mother Ann, a tailor's wife aged 32, in the village of Hessenford near St Germans in Cornwall. In 1867, Ann Hore, aged 42, died at St Germans (1867/q3 St Germans 5c 27). In 1870 William Hore married Mary Elliott at Stoke Dameral (i.e. Devonport) (1870/q2 Stoke Dameral 5b 589). Ages don't quite match and more work would need to be done, but it seems like a possible solution.

[Edit] Oh, and in 1861 (RG9/1451/28/1) Mary Elliott, widow aged 40 born in East Allington, is living in Devonport with her children including Charles E.G. aged 5 born in Devonport.

Thanks very much for the lookups, as I have not had much free time to follow up on this, and have been unable to reach FreeBMD when the servers were not busy.

If I recall, I had looked at the 1861 Census record for Mary Elliott and child Charles E.G. before, but at that time I had no access to the 1871 Census. Due to the large leap involved when going back from 1881 to 1861, and the discrepancies in ages, etc. I probably saved the 1861 data in my lot of 'that's interesting, let's look at it later' items. But I'll double-check and make sure I have them on hand for more review.

If everything fit perfectly, genealogy wouldn't be as much fun, right? [wink]

P.S. Charles Elliott later marries into my husband's family, and is one of the people who comes to the US for a while and then returns to England later on. I already have the later census records for him -- from both countries -- but I haven't searched for his mother yet.

So many lines, so little time! [oops]

Jan