Genealogy Chat

Christine Re: blind and baskets - I found Richard's wife was also at the same place in 1871, the School for Indigent Blind, in Southwark. They taught the pupils to read braille and basket-making was a skill which they could use to earn their own keep. My husband has an aunt who was married to a blind man and he made baskets for all the women in the family as presents. Obviously back in Victorian times baskets were used more often than they are now. nell

My great grandfather was Elphege Tocqueville but appears on the 1891 (the only census he was around for) as Alfred Tocqueville (which was helpfully mistranscribed as Longueville.)

Intrigued by a resonance with someone in my tree... There's a John BOOTH who was blind as a result of a mining accident. He became a basket maker in later censuses. It's obviously a skill which doesn't require sight - but a good sense of touch and a feel for porportion, I suppose. He was useful as a double-check that I'd found the right family, too. By the way - I read the newer thread and wondered, like Olde Crone, whether 'Dennis' spoken with an Irish accent might have been interpreted as a more-familiar 'James' by an enumerator. The McCarthy-to-Carter change could be a new marriage (to someone with a very similar age & employment - but then likely to be in the existing acquaintance-circle for someone needing a protector-supporter) or could be, as suggested, an Anglicising of the name: taking the middle of 'Mc Cart hy' and adding 'er' on the end. Clearly not intended to help future family-tree researchers! Christine

nell, that was me who nudged up your thread, i was trying to put a funny message on but it didn't take, i will try again,; When i was looking through my notebook today i came across all my web addresses that i have scribbled down over the months to see if there was any i needed to use now, the following(if they take this time)are not real sites (i hope) so don't try to google them, www*moeisafreak*co*uk/ www*deadpeoplesmell*co*uk/ www*mymumlikesdeadones*co*uk/ www*ancestryisaloadofdodos*co*uk/.....hope these work or this message will look odd....MOE! HOORAY! it worked, these were hidden in my notes by my 14yr old who gets upset coz i won't let her use the computer LOL

nudgette

Moe Have faith. When I started this seriously about 3 or 4 years ago, I had no useful contacts at all. I went to my e-mails to e-mail Ann/Barbara so she could see how she'd helped me, and there was an e-mail from a chap I shall call Chris, who is the son of Eileen, the woman who did the Carter tree in the first place. I found him in a roundabout way from another kind person on GR and had e-mailed him saying that I had his mother's family tree and she'd said she wasn't sure about any of the Carter family from James backwards, not susre she'd found the right James' birth etc. I wrote to tell Chris that too late I'd found out why Eileen couldn't trace him. His reply was that although he wasn't interested in research himself, he was glad to receive any info I find later and will pass it on to his sister, who has the family papers. Yess!! nell all excited, and its not even my tree, its my husbands!

This makes me feel better, all of my notebooks with scribble on will one day make sense!.......MOE!

The story so far. Couldn't find birth of husband's gt grandfather Charles Albert Carter in 1866. Fiona looked for Charles' parents and siblings in 1861 census and found the right names, ages and places of birth, father's occupation cooper, but surname McCARTHY. I felt this was the right family when Fiona gave info about son called Richard McCarthy who was blind. 1871, 1881 and 1891 censuses have father as James Carter, a cooper, with wife and ages and place of birth consistent. Ann/Barbara from GR e-mailed me back in June that she'd found James and Elizabeth, right ages and place of birth on 1901, but that James was a grocer. I'd filed this away and now dug it out, got onto Ancestry to check image, and knock me sideways, who is living at the same house number, in a different household but RICHARD McCARTHY - right age, birthplace, blind, working as a basket maker, and he is married!!!!! So this definitely confirms to me that James Carter started off as Dennis McCarthy. Now wondering whether everyone except Richard changed their names and why if they had to, they didn't choose one less popular!!!! nell

Those of you following my Carter/McCarthy saga, read on...