Devonshire

Mary Names Her Father

Mary KITCHING was born out of wedlock.

1839_KITCHINGmary_Bap

This is the only source I have found that names her mother as Charlotte. She usually goes by Esther.

In 1841, mother and child are together in the household of Esther’s parents, John and Martha née HINDSON. The first Victorian census was cavalier with ages and didn’t give relationships or birthplaces. Jumping to conclusions is unwise. Mary is at the bottom of the household list with her “twin brother” Samuel.

1841_KITCHINGmary_census

Samuel’s birth was registered in the third quarter of the year.

1839_KITCHENsaml_birth

The FamilySearch Tree represents the household thus:-

20200508_KITCHINGmary_FSTscreenshot

In Martha’s past, there are six other children. At her death on 18 February 1857, aged 59, the Malton Messenger said –

She was followed to the grave by 12 of her own children (9 sons and 3 daughters) 9 of whom were married, besides a large number of friends by whom she was much respected.

In “fourth daughter” Mary’s future, two husbands and the births of twelve children await.

She married Joseph SNOWDEN in 1857, three months after Martha’s death, and named her father in the marriage register.

1857_GREENLAYfrancis named_mar

“Blackburn” is a strange occupation. You are right if you guess it to be a clerical error for “blacksmith”.

When registering the births of her first six children, Mary gave her maiden surname as Kitching. For the seventh –

1870_SNOWDENkate_birth

And for her second child with Christopher POSTILL –

1884_POSTILLchris_Birth

Mary was 65-years-old when Christopher junior died at twenty-one. He left a son, another Christopher, who was caught in the 1939 Register’s net, thirty-five, unmarried and living in Scarborough with his Aunt Marion, her husband William DEVONSHIRE and their son Leslie. Christopher’s occupation is given as “Café & Speed Boat Proprietor”. That sounds rather racy – something to do with his genetic inheritance, perhaps.

But no, Francis GREENLEY made an honest woman of Esther a couple of years after Mary’s birth. Their first child stayed with the grandparents – and the couple went on to provide Mary with nine full brothers and sisters. Find them on the Shared Tree.

Landscape 118 · Church Ravine

8_20200508ChurchRavine1_4m

 

 

 

Geatches Tout

I have been keeping a dream diary for about a year. Last night I was a young man, not prospering financially but befriended by a rich landowner, a few years my senior. His name was Geatches TOUT. He spent most of his time and money designing, building, and competitively rowing single scull boats. He seemed to value my encouragement and limited expertise in this field (or river) of endeavor. All went well until he made an inappropriate advance that I rebuffed. I lost my luxurious accommodation in The Big House and was sent below stairs. Apart from one ancient retainer, the servants treated me very unkindly.

Geatches Tout possibly strikes you as a strange, made-up name, but it may ring a bell with Filey folk who read this post. Towards the end of the 19th century, five children of William TOUT and Elizabeth Spry GEATCHES had to live with the moniker. In order of arrival:- William Robert, Rhoda Bessy, Mary Medga (?) Jessie, Minnie Maud Charlotte, and Rosie Hettie.

Elizabeth Spry gave me the opportunity to add these young people to the FamilySearch Tree. I have carried a candle for Minnie for almost a decade, so she is obviously the spark for the dream name. The watery connection may be a coincidence, rather than obscurely psychological – but paterfamilias William was a Coastguard!

Three of the girls married. Young William died aged 21 and is buried in Filey churchyard.  I went in the rain at lunchtime to photograph his headstone, now sadly lacking its cross.

D234_TOUTwm_20180210_fst

His sister Rosie’s husband, Thomas HARRISON, also died quite young, just a few doors down the street from where I’m writing this. The young widow seems to have immediately taken herself and three children to Canada. FamilySearch has a record of the middle child, Mary Eleanor Tout HARRISON dying within months of arrival in North America. She was just fourteen.

From competitive rowing to professional cycling. Today’s Image shows that the work on “re-cobbling” the lower part of Crescent Hill is almost complete. On Saturday 5 May, riders in the  Tour de Yorkshire will pass this way.

On my stroll home this morning, I was pondering more of the dreams I have had recently when a flutter of paper caught my eye in West Avenue. A pair of dessicated wind-blown “leaves” from an old book. I had to smile at the title.

GoodWives

I found a true love late in life and today is the 4th anniversary of his departure to The Big Kennel. I talk to him every day. He was picked up off the street in 2001, when he was about a year old, and named Jude – because his origins were obscure. He was, like his two-legged namesake, something of a philosopher.This photo was taken in March 2009 when we had been living in Filey for about eight months.

20090312JudeMem1_6m

I noticed on FST that the Geatches Tout children’s GIDLEY forebears go back to Walter, born about 1500. The name in the pedigree that most appealed to me, though, belonged to Minnie’s great-grandfather, Robert MEMORY. Perhaps he was a Bad Husband – because his son took a variant of the Wife’s name, Elizabeth GETSIUS.

Families, eh?