How can I trace my friend’s great grandfather?
QI’m researching a friend’s family, but have met a brick wall in tracing her paternal great grandfather, Tom Johnson. He was born on
15 July 1888 in Pontefract, West Yorkshire, son of William Johnson and Ann Knighton. I can’t find a marriage certificate for William and Ann, although it’s clear that Tom had a number of siblings. An elder sibling, Mannarah – an unusual name, was born in Barnsley in 1876. That information hasn’t taken me any further, although he appears in other family trees. Diligent searching of the General Register Office information has brought nothing.
I can’t trace William Johnson either. According to census returns,
he was born about 1841 in Whitchift, Yorkshire, but I haven’t found him yet! Andrew Tebbutt
AWhitchift may be the enumerator’s interpretation of Whitgift, near Goole. Tracing William via the censuses is difficult as his place of birth is also given as Hull in 1881, and while Ann is on the 1901 census, William isn’t – but Ann doesn’t say she is a widow. Was he working away from home?
On the 1901 census, an older child, Jack, appears with Ann and the others. He’s not in the 1891 census, but he is there in 1881, along with William (37), Ann (34), John W (14), Mary (11), Ernest (8) and ‘Manasa’ (4).
A search of the General Register Office ( www.gro.gov.uk) indexes, which show mother’s maiden name for births, confirms
that Mannaseh (b1876), George (b1881), Annie Maria (b1883), Tom (b1888) and Fred (b1892) all have a mother’s maiden name of Knighton. John William is listed under the surname Knighton with no maiden name in 1868, and Ernest, in 1872, is under the name of Knighton. Try the registrar’s office in Wakefield and Barnsley to see if a marriage was registered but not entered into the GRO indexes.
As for William, a check of Whitgift parish registers on findmypast.co.uk resulted in a baptism for William, son of George and Elizabeth Johnson, on 18 October 1840. There were other children baptised as well, but one Manasseh, baptised on 13 June 1846, the son of George and Elizabeth, suggests that this is the correct family. Carol Kerry-Green