I put George KILLINGBECK and Ellen WOODS on my To-Do list two hundred days ago so contributing their stone to the FamilySearch Shared Tree is long overdue.

George was born in Filey and is buried here. He had to journey over 250 miles to find Ellen, a Berkshire girl. They married in London in 1874. I have not discovered Ellen’s whereabouts in the Census three years earlier but George is enumerated at Sandhurst Lodge, working as a footman to Baroness FEVERSHAM, (Lady Louisa STEWART). For a while, then, he was a mere twelve miles from Ellen’s home village.

Within a year of marrying, the couple had settled in Filey and widow Sarah Woods was living with them in Chapel Street (in 1881) and Station Road (1891). Their first child, Elizabeth, died in infancy but their four other children married and had small families.

George worked most of his life as a carter and it is sadly ironic that the only newspaper account of him I found featured a brief appearance at the coroner’s inquest into the death of his mother – knocked down in a Filey street by a horse and cart. (His father, John, had been killed by an express train, a short distance north of Filey Sation.)

I have some details to add to the Shared Tree – and have put several more family stones on The List. I hope it won’t take months for me to upload them to FamilySearch.

Measure of Man 66 · Flamborough Lights