Genealogy Chat

Judith Thanks for that suggestion - very helpful :-)) It hadn't occured to me that she could do that, but later on she and John did take in lodgers as one of them married my grandmother, so that is a definite possibility. Why didn't I think of that??!! nell

Yes you are right, the line of promotion was engine cleaner, fireman, driver. Emma could possibly have kept the family (as did a couple of widows in my tree) by taking on cleaning jobs or taking in washing. Another possiblility is that she made a living by taking in lodgers and met John in this way. Perhaps John was by then working mainline trains (though cleaner to mainline driver in 10 years would have been rather rapid promotion), or transferred to work in London - it would be worth checking if the company which ran trains from Bootle area to London worked into a station near where Emma and Thomas were living in 1879.

Thanks. As John was a cleaner in 1871 I am inclined to think he was a railway driver, but he seems to have moved around quite a bit in the 1880s (he was actually born in Gloucester!!). By 1901 he was working as a night watchman. I just wish I had the marriage cert. At least he is not my full blood relative, but I am curious about what my gt grandmother lived on before she met him. I think my next port of call will be the LMA to see if she claimed off the parish. nell

In the second half of the 19thc and into the early 20th you could be an engine driver either on railways, farms, industry or even on the roads ie road rollers. The basic difference of course is static or moving. Even the operators of machinery at sewage and water pumping stations called themselves engine drivers. It started to change in industry when using one big engine to drive many macines through belts and pulleys metamorphosed into each individual machine had it's own motor. In agriculture the engine driver became the tractor driver. Clive Evans.

Nell Can't help specifically, but oh dear, the Engine Driver bit rang a bell! Family legend had it that my 2 x GGF was an Engine Driver. This tale was repeated endlessly and my father, who did not know his GGF, religiously collected anything to do with Railways, particularly anything to do with Patricroft, which is where he worked allegedly. Researching him, things did not ring true ...on his marriage cert in 1859 he is an Ag Lab. But by 1861 census he is an Engine Driver and again in 1871. By 1881 however, he is a shopkeeper. I couldnt believe that anyone would willingly give up what was an extremely prestigious job for a working-class man I spent endless pounds on Railways Sites, writing to Museums etc. The only useful info I got was that NO ONE got to be an Engine Driver on the Railways in anything less than ten years minimum - you started off cleaning the Engine etc and gradually worked your way up. There was NO 'fast track' (scuse pun!!!). Finally, thanks to a casual posting on here, all was revealed. Someone had found her relly on a census as 'Ag lab engine driver'. Someone else informed that Ag labs by the mid 1850s were using machinery and that an Ag Lab Engine Driver was better paid than the other sort. I think my 2 x GGF, who was a fibber anyway,allowed people to think he was a 'Railway Engine Driver' rather than a bog standard Ag lab.And after his death, his son who married above himself, reported his father as an 'Engineer' (LOL) Hope this is not the case with your rellie!!! Good luck Marjorie

My great-grandmother EMMA MOORE married THOMAS MATTHEWS in Islington in 1865. They had two surviving children, THOMAS EMMETS/EMMETT MATTHEWS b 1866 and my grandmother, ANNIE ELIZA MATTHEWS b 1876. Thomas was a dairyman and died on 1 May 1879. On 1881 census Emma reappears married to 2nd husband JOHN GARVIE in Greenwich. In the summer of 1881 Emma and John have a child, John born in East Molesey. They are still in East Molesey when their 2nd child William is born 1884, but by 1891 they are living in Stoke Newington. I can't find any marriage between Emma and John although I have been through the GRO indexes from 1879-1900. I want to know how and where they met. John's job was 'engine driver' which I assume is on a railway, as in 1871 he was a cleaner in Bootle. Any ideas? Thanks for reading this far!! nell

please see below