How can I find Emily’s father?
Q My grandmother, Emily Mabel Doris Page, was born on 30 November 1891 and she married Frederick Edmund Wigmore in 1915.
On the 1911 census Emily was living with her mother, Harriet, and siblings Florence Gertrude, Joseph Richard and Frederick Walter – all born in the London area. Harriet is shown as being born in 1861 at Egmanton, Nottinghamshire, but that’s as far back as I can get.
I cannot seem to find any birth records for Emily and her siblings, or find out who their father was. Were they baptised under a different name? I seem to be going around in circles. Judith Tozer
AUsing the census indexes on ancestry.co.uk, I found Harriet and her four children in 1901 living alone in East Ham with no father present. Harriet and Florence also appear in St Giles in 1891, but again there is no father present.
Searching birth, marriage and death indexes for each of the children, I found an entry for a Frederick Walter Page registered in Q4 1898, West Ham. Cross-referencing this with the General Register Office (GRO) index at www. gro.gov.uk, I discovered that the mother’s maiden name was given as “Parker”.
I applied for a copy of the birth registration, which shows that the mother was Harriet Page, formerly Parker. The father’s name was “Joseph Kay Page, valet”. Harriet was the informant, suggesting that she was either married or the father should have been present. I also obtained a copy of Emily’s marriage certificate from Q3 1915, showing that her father was “Joseph Kaye Page (deceased), soldier”.
In the 1911 census Harriet is noted as “widow”, whereas in 1901 she is listed as “wife”. Assuming that Joseph died between these two dates, I carried out a search of the National Probate Calendar ( probatesearch.service.gov. uk) and found an entry for Joseph Kay Page, who died on 3 January 1909. Probate was in London, 4 March, to ‘Harriett’ Parker.
From this very limited research it would appear that Page and Parker were not actually married, which would explain why your searches for a marriage record have been unsuccessful.
Further searches on this premise find the following entries in the GRO indexes for Emily and her other siblings: Florence Gertrude Page Parker (Q1 1889, mother Pearson); your grandmother Emily Mabel Doris Parker (Q1 1892, mother Pearson); and Joseph Richard Page Parker (Q3 1895, mother Page).
My reading is that ‘Parker’ was probably Harriet’s birth surname, and that she probably married a man named ‘Pearson’ but did not marry Joseph Kay Page. Searches in the 1881, 1871 and 1861 censuses find Harriet Parker, born in Egmanton, Nottinghamshire. Her father appears to be Richard Parker, which would provide the middle name for Joseph junior, after receiving his own father’s first name. Geoff Young
It would appear that Page and Parker were not actually married, explaining why you can’t find a marriage record