Re-visiting old censuses

[BarbaraW]

Hello, I saw a poster yesterday had re-visited her docs with fresh eyes. So here goes with my puzzle and something that's been in the too hard tray for a number of years.

My g.grandmother Mary Ellen Brown was born at 10 Gerard Street on 6 July 1864 to Thomas Brown, rigger journeyman and Mary Ann Brown formerly Rice from her BC.

On the 1871 census Mary Ellen is shown as having an older sister Louisa Mary aged 11.

HARKER PLACE

Thomas born Ireland 37 Mariner unemployed
Mary Ann born Manchester 33
Louisa Mary born Liverpool 11
Mary Ellen born Liverpool 7
and so on with the other siblings

So if I go back to 1861 I should have Thomas, Mary Ellen and baby Louisa but if I go to 10 Gerard Street we have:

Thomas born Dublin, Ireland 31 Seaman
Margaret born Kingstown, Ireland 27
Louisa born Liverpool 1

I can't find any other families using the names Thomas Brown and Louisa in Lancashire.

Anybody have any thoughts on this please?

[Hilary]

It looks to me as if Thomas is married to someone called by Margaret by whom they have a daughter Louisa Mary. At some point Margaret dies and then Thomas remarries a Mary Ann.

Do you have the girl's birth certificates? I would suggest you need them to sort out who their mother's are and that will also help with trying to sort out when or if one of the mother's died.

[MaryA]

Well finding the baptisms might be a start and then perhaps discounting any enumerator's bad handwriting. Do you think these could be the children?

Eliza Maria Brown 17 Jun 1859 19 Jun 1859 St Joseph's Thoma Rice, Maria Anna Rice

Sara Anna Brown 29 Jul 1861 4 Aug 1861 Holy Cross Thoma Brown, Maria Anna Rice

Thomas Josephus Brown 7 Aug 1867 11 Aug 1867 St Joseph's Thomae Brown,
Maria Anna Rice

Anna Joanna Brown 1 Dec 1869 26 Dec 1869 St Francis Xavier's (Francisci Xavarii) Thoma Brown, Maria Anna Rice

Elizabetha Brown 21 Aug 1874 27 Sep 1874 St Francis Xavier's (Francisci Xavarii) Thoma Brown, Maria Anna Rice

There is also a transcription but if you look at the actual image it would appear to be Thos Brown & Maria Rice.
Maria Elina Brown 6 Jul 1864 17 Jul 1864 St Joseph's Thos Durice, Maria Durice

[MaryA]

Marriage SepQ 1857 Liverpool 8b 234

RICE Mary A BROWN Thomas Liverpool, St. Michael in the City Liverpool

[BarbaraW]

It looks to me as if Thomas is married to someone called by Margaret by whom they have a daughter Louisa Mary. At some point Margaret dies and then Thomas remarries a Mary Ann.

Do you have the girl's birth certificates? I would suggest you need them to sort out who their mother's are and that will also help with trying to sort out when or if one of the mother's died.

Ah yes I see that now!! With your fresh eyes, thank you Hilary. I will have to bite the bullet and buy Louisa Mary's BC.

[BarbaraW]

I don't *think* the family were Catholics Mary as we seem to be C of E through and through and I've never heard a whiff of that, but who knows. By the 1881 census they had the following children:

Louisa M 21
Mary E 16
Ann J 11
Samuel 9
Elizabeth 1
Robert 4

[BarbaraW]

It looks to me as if Thomas is married to someone called by Margaret by whom they have a daughter Louisa Mary. At some point Margaret dies and then Thomas remarries a Mary Ann.

Do you have the girl's birth certificates? I would suggest you need them to sort out who their mother's are and that will also help with trying to sort out when or if one of the mother's died.

Ah yes I see that now!! With your fresh eyes, thank you Hilary. I will have to bite the bullet and buy Louisa Mary's BC.

I've been thinking about this and it would make more sense to buy Thomas and Mary Ann's marriage certificate and if he says he's a widower then Bob's your uncle!!

[MaryA]

First place I tend to check when one of the parents is Irish is the RC records, sorry I missed Samuel, probably because mother was transcribed as Price, although the image could be read as Rice.

Samuel Brown 1 Mar 1872 30 Apr 1872 St Joseph's Thomas, Maria Anna Price

Strange that all the children's baptisms fit your family for exact dates and names. The parents marriage being in St Michael in the City, was not in an RC church, unless they had a blessing in a different church.

[BarbaraW]

Well if this is them then I am totally lost as not only is this my first Irish ancestor but would be the first RC too.

[MaryA]

My thinking is that Louisa is Eliza in the baptism, but if you are planning on ordering her birth certificate you will be sure if the mother's maiden name comes back Rice, otherwise we can look again.

[Hilary]

Those baptisms look good to me.

Maybe Thomas just got confused with the census forms!

[BarbaraW]

I am now totally confused. Are these names in Latin? I don't have ANY knowledge of catholic registers or records whatsoever, those names don't look very much like mine to me. Where can I look this up further to see what you both see.

BTW thanks to you both for your help, I've been doing this on and off for over 20 years now but this is the first time I've hit this kind of brick wall.

[MaryA]

Yes, in their infinite wisdom or not - the parish priests in RC churches always latinicised the first names of the babies they were baptising. These entries are all on the database for Liverpool RC baptisms on Ancestry. When checking the baptismal registers for RC, I usually search by surname primarily and with a small abbreviation of first names, eg Mar* for Mary as this will often have been changed to Maria, Mariam or perhaps even something else.

The names of the baptisms I have given do match the approximate dates from censuses of the children you are searching for, but I couldn't find an entry for Robert.

[BarbaraW]

I've looked at that Roman Catholic marriages in Liverpool site which says they cover every single church but no sign of Thomas Brown marrying Mary Ann Rice.



http://www.liverpoolhistoryprojects.co. ... marriages/

[Blue70]

There is also a transcription but if you look at the actual image it would appear to be Thos Brown & Maria Rice.
Maria Elina Brown 6 Jul 1864 17 Jul 1864 St Joseph's Thos Durice, Maria Durice

The birth date on this St Joseph's RC Liverpool baptism that Mary mentioned is spot on and it does look to me like the parents are Thomas (Brown) and Maria An(na) Rice. The fathers' surnames are left off so we have the father's first name and then the full maiden name of the mother. In this case the priest's handwriting has trailed off so we have a squiggle instead of the na after An. Maria Anna is the usual latin for Mary Ann.

St Joseph's RC Liverpool



James Kearney and Mary Ward look like the names of the godparents



Blue

[MaryA]

Marriage SepQ 1857 Liverpool 8b 234

RICE Mary A BROWN Thomas Liverpool, St. Michael in the City Liverpool

The parents marriage being in St Michael in the City, was not in an RC church, unless they had a blessing in a different church.

Sorry I thought my explanation was clear. If http://www.lancashirebmd.org.uk/ gives the name of the church then it is a C of E.

It seems that they married in a C of E church, then had all the children baptised in RC churches, strange as it sounds.

[BarbaraW]

Marriage SepQ 1857 Liverpool 8b 234

RICE Mary A BROWN Thomas Liverpool, St. Michael in the City Liverpool

The parents marriage being in St Michael in the City, was not in an RC church, unless they had a blessing in a different church.

Sorry I thought my explanation was clear. If http://www.lancashirebmd.org.uk/ gives the name of the church then it is a C of E.

It seems that they married in a C of E church, then had all the children baptised in RC churches, strange as it sounds.

Well my daughter did that, got married in *his* church and their 2 children were christened in *her* church.

Sorry Mary I don't know many churches in Liverpool except the main ones, where was this St Michael church located?

[MaryA]

This is as it is now http://www.stmichaelinthecity.com/

As I mentioned in your other post there may not be records for this as I something is ringing bells telling me that many were destroyed but I'm not 100% sure of this. The RO staff will tell you when you visit next week, perhaps you will be able to update us about this afterwards.

[Bertieone]

I think the crew have been spot on with their findings so far.

Margaret, the supposed wife of Thomas Brown, 1861 census was possibly a relation to Ellen Kiernan, nee Matthews, married to James Kiernan who the Brown family are lodging with.
Ellen and Margaret being born in the same place, perhaps sisters. James or Ellen Kiernan appear on a few of the Brown/Rice baptisms.

The 1858 baptism of James Kiernan, St Francis Xavier, parents, James Kiernan, Ellen Matthews,
Godmother, Mary Ann Brown. I think this would prove Margaret was a mistake and not a former wife and the Catholic baptisms found do belong to Thomas and Mary Ann, married at St Michael's

[Bertieone]

A date to narrow the search,

Liverpool Mercury, 1857,