What was James Shackleford doing between 1861 and 1905?
QJames Shackleford was born in 1829 in Chertsey, Surrey, and is in the 1841 census there. In 1861, he was living with his sister Eliza and brother-in-law James Bailey, and gave his occupation as “seaman, Royal Navy”. Banns were called in 1862 in Queenborough, Kent, for James Shackleford, mariner, and Lucy Wilson. The record says “married at Chelsea” but there is no evidence of the marriage. James then appears in 1905 in New Zealand as ‘Richard William Bradshaw’, claiming to have fought in the Crimean and Zulu Wars. His 1918 death certificate gives his true name and parentage. What happened between 1861 and 1905?
Pamela McKirdy
AAncestors who adopt new identities can be difficult to trace, because a change of name often indicates that they didn’t want certain people in authority to find them for one reason or another.
Searching The National Archives’ (TNA’s) website, I can’t find any records of a seaman called Shackleford or Bradshaw of the right age serving in the Royal Navy – bit.ly/TNA ResearchRatings. However, service records for the Royal Navy only started in 1853, and it seems possible that he joined before this.
I searched for Richard Bradshaw among Royal Navy allotment registers and certificates of naval service at TNA and there were quite a few hits that you may like to explore further. Visit discovery.nationalarchives. gov.uk/advanced-search and limit your search to series ADM27 and ADM29. These records only cover a small proportion of naval servicemen, but you may strike lucky.
For his service in the Crimea, you could start by looking for both Shackleford and Bradshaw in the records of army medals at Ancestry ( ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1686), because he should have received campaign medals. There is no online database of people who fought in the Crimean War, but you could explore if he claimed an army pension using the appropriate guide at nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-yourresearch/research-guides-keywords since many of these records are available online.
However, not everyone was entitled to a pension, so consider investigating the muster rolls and pay lists for his regiment, which he says is the 17th Lancers. TNA has a comprehensive research guide at bit.ly/TNAResearchMusters that explains how you can do this, but note that it will require you to visit Kew in person.
Finally, you could explore New Zealand passenger list and immigration records to see if you can determine when he arrived there and, equally importantly, whether he came alone. For example, a lot of New Zealand passenger lists are available for free online via FamilySearch at bit.ly/NZArchivesPassengerLists.
Simon Wills