Liverpool & South West Lancashire FHS - Forum

Hello everyone,

I am currently trying to compile our family history but have come to a complete dead end searching for my maternal grandfather John Eddleston. What I know of him is that he was born around 1882 or 1883, and was married on 12th August 1908 to a Bertha Goodlad, John's father is shown as James Eddleston (deceased) on the marriage certifcate. I have no details of him from birth up to his marriage to Bertha, where he lived as a child, his parents/guardians etc etc.

The 1911 census shows the family living in Pendleton, Salford but he states his birthplace as St Helens.

I have searched through a lot of records and followed a lot of false leads but have not been able to find the correct person. Eddleston seems to be a fairly common surname in the St Helens area.

Bertha Goodlad (Eddleston) unfortunately died in 1923 and John then married my Grandmother Florence Beatrice Rigby in 1924, on his marriage certifcate to Florence it shows his father's name as Edward Eddleson (deceased)! . They set up home in Bramhall, Stockport where I live. John died in 1962.

I wish I'd asked more questions at the time but family rumours seem to imply John was an orphan, and even found outside the seamen's mission in Hull as a baby! This we have not been able to verify!

One thing about Grandad that I do remember was that he was a conjourer and we have found that he attended the Royal and Ancient Order of Buffaloes Lodge in Widnes on occasions, and I have a card advertising the services of Prof J Eddleston (musician and shadowgraphist) with the address shown as 20, Cooper Steet, Widnes. I had always thought he had lived in Bramhall since marrying Florence (I am thinking these appearances were in the 1930s??).

I remember him being a master plumber, also his birthday is not recorded in any of my mother's diaries so I'm assuming no-one knew it!

I was wondering if anyone can help with the St Helens connection or the RAOB, did they keep records etc.

Any help/tips would be much apppreciated.

Thank you
Roy Smith

A difficult one, I wonder if there is any mileage in getting in touch with, Seamans and General Orphanages, Hull.

http://www.hullhistorycentre.org.uk/res ... homes.aspx

Hi welcome to the forum. It certainly sounds like he never knew his father, giving two different names.

Definitely follow up the link to the Hull Orphanages that Bertieone has posted, there may be records deposited in a Yorkshire Record Office, if we wished to look for a similar incident in Liverpool, it would be the Record Office for our first stop, however you may find either Ancestry or Findmypast have records for orphanages/institutions, I can't confirm for that area.

We have a few links, admittedly not many, for theatrical research that you might give a try viewtopic.php?f=14&t=15697&p=128122&hil ... re#p128122

There is also a website with a Contact link for the Royan Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes https://www.raobgle.org.uk/ again I wonder if they might be able to offer any suggestions.

It is rare that I would suggest the following, however if you discover that the little lad was indeed a foundling, then your last resort may well be a DNA test and hope that some close matches show up to give you some pointers.

I don't know if you are going to be able to read these easily online, if you have any difficulty let me know and I'll email them to you.

The reason I have looked at this child is the reference to Prescot Union, which would cover St Helens, they seem to suggest that his birth was 1880 and admitted to the Kirkdale Industrial School about 1884 from Prescot Union and within a couple of years has been returned to there.

Thank you so much Bertie and Mary, this is very exciting. I wonder if this could be him? If you could e-mail me the details of the entries Mary that would be great.
I wonder where the children came from prior to arriving at the Prescot Union, were they local children or did they come from all parts of the UK? Also where did they go after discharge. I would imagine they would have very little official documents (birth certs etc).

Perhaps he took his name from someone he boarded with?

This has set me off down a completely new avenue of research. Thanks so much.

Roy

These entries are for 1884-6 so he's not going to know anything about them, nor I suspect would he have known where he was up until then/who he was with.

Check out this site http://www.workhouses.org.uk/Prescot/#Post-1834 for background, but I think perhaps you might need to approach Lancashire Record Office for any records they may have https://new.lancashire.gov.uk/libraries ... rd-office/

Roy123 wrote: ↑

26 Aug 2020 20:50

I wonder where the children came from prior to arriving at the Prescot Union, were they local children or did they come from all parts of the UK? Also where did they go after discharge. I would imagine they would have very little official documents (birth certs etc).

A Parish were responsible for their own poor and therefore would sometimes transfer the needy back to their own parish, if that information was known.

If John was abandoned in Hull and I never dismiss a family story lightly, some particulars would have to be known for him to be transferred.

Thank you so much Bert and Mary for all your help. I can imagine a very difficult childhood for John.

Roy