November 2008 Archives

I'm showing again part of the 1851 Census for Glanypwll, Penmachno, where my great, great grandparents, William and Ellin Williams, can be seen at the bottom. Three doors away in the same terrace can be seen the names of Gwen Jones, Head aged 53, with her son Ellis Jones aged 22 who was a tailor. Also in the house on census night was Ellis Price aged 20 who is described as a visitor and was a smith by occupation. Was Ellis Price a friend or relative who was visiting on census night or was he a rent-paying boarder taken in to help the family finances? In many cases boarders are actually described as "boarders" on the census forms but it really depends on the accuracy with which the enumerators undertakes the recording of the information that he's been given.

I have received, through the generosity of one of the readers of this blog, a copy of William and Ellin's Wedding Certificate, where Ellin is down as Ellinor. On this Certificate William's father is shown as William Pritchard and Ellin's as David Jones, who is shown in the 1851 as living with them. William had therefore followed the Welsh tradition of taking his father's first name as his surname and became William Williams and he was the last of my ancestors to do this as keeping the father's surname was then becoming standard practice. In Blog 15 in September I quoted the gravestone where William Pritchard was buried and this shows that he died in 1830 aged 42 and that his wife was Gwen Pritchard who died in 1867 aged 80.

So how do I know that the Gwen Jones shown as living in Glanypwll in 1851 is William Williams' father and the widow of William Pritchard who is shown on the gravestone as Gwen Pritchard? It was because my grandparents kept important papers. Amongst my mother's papers I found copies of two editions of "Yr Eugrawn Wesleyaidd" (monthly journal of the Welsh Wesleyans) dated May and June 1897. William Williams had become a leading member and deacon in the Wesleyan chapel in Penmachno and these two journals contained tribute articles on his life following his death in 1896. These were invaluable to me in building up the family tree. I might have found these articles through painstaking research through journals but finding them with the family papers saved me dozens, if not hundreds, of hours of research work.

These articles relate how Gwen was left a widow with 7 children to raise when William Pritchard died in 1830 which would have put my great great grandfather aged 5 when he lost his father. Gwen reverted back to her maiden name of Jones on becoming a widow, or she might have always have been called Jones throughout her marriage, and she is down in the 1841 census as Gwen Jones. The extract of the 1841 Census shows her living in a house called Mynydd with three sons, Richard aged 18, William (my gggrandfather) aged 15 and Ellis aged 12. Richard and William are both described as quarrymen but there is no occupational description for Ellis. Gwen is down under occupation as "Ind" for "Independent means". This doesn't mean someone with a private income but a person we would today call "self-employed" and in Gwen's case she scratched a living bringing up 7 children as a stocking knitter.

The three sons are all called Jones in 1841 but by 1851 William has called himself William Williams after his father whilst Ellis is still Ellis Jones. The articles relate how the other sons left Penmachno to look for work leaving only William and Ellis in Penmachno and Ellis then changed his name to Williams so as to be consistent with his elder brother and he is recorded in censuses from 1861 onwards as Ellis Williams. A descendent of Ellis Williams came to a complete stop with her searches as she was quite naturally looking for an Ellis Williams before the 1861 census. It was only when I was able to tell her about the articles that the mystery was solved but the further back you go in researching your family history there is always a chance that you come up against this type of problem!

The 1841 Census Records shown that it was very elementary. The last column simply asks whether the person was born in the same county or not and in all those shown the answer was "yes".

The next Gwynedd Family History Society meetings are:

Bangor, 2 December (first Tuesday of each month) 7.00pm at the Quakers Meeting Hall, Dean Street: Wynne Roberts, "Aber Ogwen to Ogwen Lake"

Caernarfon, 27 November (last Thursday of each month) 7.00pm at the The Library, Lôn Pafiliwn: J Elwyn Hughes, "Byd go iawn Un Nos Ola Leuad"

Dolgellau, 8 January (second Thursday of each month) 7.00pm at the Royal Ship Hotel: BUT this night. "Noson yn yr archifdy / An evening in the Archives"

Llandudno, 8 December (second Monday of each month) 7.00pm at Capel Ebenezer, Abergele Road, Old Colwyn (please note new meeting place):
Members evening

Llangefni, 20 November (third Thursday of each month) 7.15pm at Capel Smyrna, Ffordd Glanhwfa: David Price "J J Dodd, A Victorian Painter"

Pwllheli, 21 November (third Friday of each month) 7.00pm at Capel Seion, Lon Dywod:
Elwyn Davies, "Cyfenwau"

In the conduct of the census these days we are given forms which we are expected to complete and these are then collected by an official. When the census was first conducted in 1841 many people could not read or write and therefore the information was collected by an enumerator visiting all the houses in a parish and recording the information. The information in the 1841 Census was fairly elementary and, whilst there have been changes over the years; the general pattern was set in the 1851 Census. As an example I show a typical page from the 1851 Census but I'm not sure whether people will be able to read all the detail.

On the top you will see that this is taken from a census of the Parish of Penmachno and in particular for the village of Penmachno in that parish. In some parishes there could have been more than one village. If you go to the full records you will find that the parish is divided into a number of Enumerator Districts dependent on the size of the parish. The first column gives the sequential number of each dwelling house that the enumerator visited. The second column gives the name of the house or street (usually with a number). This page shows five houses in Glanypwll and there is a sixth house on the next page. This was a terrace of houses which were renovated in 2006 and will hopefully still be standing in another 150 years. When I was a child living with my grandparents in Penmachno I remember that we used to visit someone living in Glanypwll and what stands out in my memory were the toilets. These were built at the end of the terrace over a small stream, so they had a water toilet which was far superior to that at my grandparent's small farm which was a hut with a seat with a bucket underneath whose contents had to be buried periodically in a field!

Before the bridge was built to cross the river Machno the main means of crossing the river was by means of a ford near to Glanypwll. When first built this terrace was therefore on the main route from Lleyn to the markets in Denbigh and Rhuthun, i.e. the main highway in its day.

The third column shows the name and surname of the persons staying in the house on the night of 30 March 1851 and the fourth column gives the relation of each person to the Head of the Family. The last entry on the page shows the name of William Williams, the Head of the Family who was my great, great grandfather; Ellin Williams, his wife and David Jones, his father in law. From this I can see that Ellin's father was David Jones. Against other entries in the fourth column you can see "son" or "dau". The fifth column is headed "Condition" which means the marital status. The "U" means unmarried.

The sixth and seventh columns give the age of each person, the sixth for males and the seventh for females. From this I can see that William is 25 which gives me the clue that he was born around 1826 which I can use to try to establish his date of birth. Ellin was 20 and therefore born around 1831. This information is consistent with the record on grave B007 in the St Tudclud Memorial Inscriptions published by the Gwynedd FHS which show that Ellin died aged 34 on 1st March 1865 and that they were then living at Bryn Madog. The census will show where people were living at the census date but to find any movements between these dates you have to go to other records.

The eighth column shows the "Rank, Profession of Occupation" which shows that both William and his father in law were quarry men and Ellin was a quarry man's wife. The ninth column is headed "Where born". All except one person on this page were born in "Caernarvon Penmachno", i.e. this column shows the county and the parish. This is important information in tracing your ancestors as it give you the clue as to where to search for a person's birth details.

The census data gives a wealth of information to help you trace your ancestors and is an important part of the jigsaw that you are trying to complete. In Blog No. 7 back in March I showed the Birth Certificate of William and Ellin's first son, William my great grandfather, who was born in Glanypwll on 29 November 1851. Unfortunately most of the 1861 Census records for Penmachno, as is the case for many other parishes, are missing and I can't find William and Ellin so I can't tell when they might have moved to Bryn Madog where Ellin died in 1865.

Gwynedd FHS Library will be open on the afternoon of Saturday 15 November
The GFH Society meetings for the next 4 weeks are:

Bangor, 4 November (first Tuesday of each month) 7.00pm at the Quakers Meeting Hall, Dean Street: David Kent, "Welsh Highland Railway Update"

Caernarfon, 27 November (last Thursday of each month) 7.00pm at the The Library, Lôn Pafiliwn: J Elwyn Hughes, "Byd go iawn Un Nos Ola Leuad"

Dolgellau, 13 Tachwedd (second Thursday of each month) 7.00pm at the Royal Ship Hotel Brian Paul, "Bywyd Samuel Holland"

Llandudno, 10 November (second Monday of each month) 7.00pm at Capel Ebenezer, Abergele Road, Old Colwyn (please note new meeting place):
Neil Sutton, "Mercy Ships".

Llangefni, 20 November (third Thursday of each month) 7.15pm at Capel Smyrna, Ffordd Glanhwfa: David Price "J J Dodd, A Victorian Painter"

Pwllheli, 21 November (third Friday of each month) 7.00pm at Capel Seion, Lon Dywod:
Elwyn Davies, "Cyfenwau"