Kew, One Name Study Talk and Dr Williams Library

Wednesday 9 Apr

Shot out to Kew first thing this morning.

                                           National Archives - The Guardian at the Gate

Ordered two books, then looked at a film of WO 120/22, Records of the 1^st – 13^th Foot Discharged to Pension 1812 -1818, in case they had something different to what I already know  – and no John! No idea why, maybe I just missed seeing his name. I did find Noah FLOOD admitted to pension on 12 July 1814 – poor fellow, what agonies he must have suffered at school.

I also made a note of some of the fascinating letters noted in the ‘correspondence received from the War Office’ section of the Monthly Returns, like -

1845  Relative to New Zealand

1849  Relative to Capt. Henry BURTON for New Zealand

1850  Relative to candidates for Hudson’s Bay

1850  Relative to blank ammunition for local company

1850  Relative to small company being called out for exercises

1854  Relative to pensioners required as orderlies etc to proceed to Turkey

1854  Relative to pensioners required as Riggers in Woolwich Dockyard

1855  Relating to sick and invalid soldiers from the Crimea

1856  Relative to Lunatic Pensioners

1856  Relative to drill of local force

Others related to wives of soldiers, leave of absence, the Patriotic Fund, Clerk of the Malden Union, Income Tax, Fuel for pensioners, window blinds in this office, and last but definitely not least – the Belts of the local Company. 

Reading these slowed down my search considerably, but aside from the wonderful glimpse they give into the paperwork of the time, once I realised that they included named pensioners, naturally I had to continue to read them.

The next book I read was the London 2nd North Returns, followed by the London 1st North regions. And here I had some success. John was found - again in April 1854 - in Section One, Transfers From the District (second from the bottom).

1st Foot - /9d - 3 May 1816 - Pte - John CLAYHILL - From Taunton District. Transfer sent to 1st East London District (WO 22/59)

So this looks like he just passed through the 1st London area.

 At this point I ran out of time, as I was due at the SOG by 2 pm for a talk. So I put in an order for the 1st East book for tomorrow, and headed off to Goswell Rd.

Derek Palgrave is  President of the Guild of One Name Studies (Goons), and was giving a talk on - I thought - doing such a study. However it turned out to be about his PALGRAVE name, and some of the many things they did, and what had been discovered. If you could pick up the odd hint about how to do one yourself, you were lucky. It was not at all what I expected, and the handout he passed around afterwards was totally about the PALGRAVE family. 

So I could have stayed at Kew without missing a thing, but not having hindsight ... 

Current Reading: Aunt Dimity and the Village Witch - another family history type of story, has Nancy Atherton taken up genealogy, I wonder.

 Thursday 10 Apr

Spring is well and truly sprung in Burlington Avenue (the road to Kew). 

The 1st East District book for 1852-62 was very quickly read, and John is registered here, still in the month of April (WO 22/50)

      1st Foot - /9d - 3/5/16 - P - John CLAYHILL - [From] Taunton - [Paid To] 30/6/54 - Perm't

There is no further mention of him in this book, and I have no idea what happened to him next. He was in Haggerstone, near Hackney, in 1858 when Susan died. In the 1861 census he is living with Charles in London City. Maybe both these places were in that district? I reread that book just in case I had missed something, but still did not find him.

After browsing the catalogue under various search terms which came to mind, I had a quick lunch before leaving.

The afternoon program was a visit to Dr Williams Library, again organised under the auspices of the SOG. I arrived with half an hour to spare, so had a brief look around. They are not normally busy, but naturally because they had 45 already booked in for the tour, all sorts of other people chose that day to come in too.

This Library is devoted to records and books about Non-conformists - those who worship at any church other than an Anglican one. Baptists, Presbyterians and Congregationalists were the earliest break-aways, followed by Methodists, Unitarians, Quakers, Salvation Army etc.

In the early days Acts of Parliament prevented Dissenters from holding civil or military office, or attending university, so they went into trade, for example textile manufacturing and iron working, and were extremely successful - just think of the Cadbury and Wedgewood empires for a start.

They created their own academies to train church ministers, and later their own schools. The Religious Census of 1851 (a unique survey of all identified places of religious worship then in existence, including Nonconformist and Catholic chapels and Jewish synagogues as well as Church of England churches) showed that attendance at non-conformist places of worship was nearly as great as that at Anglican churches, in fact in the chief manufacturing areas, thanks to their focus on trade, they outnumbered the Church of England members.                                                                           

Librarian Fiona is from the USA, and had been at Dr Williams for about a year. We began with an introductory talk. Dr Williams (c1643 - 1716) started life as a Presbyterian, but later became a Unitarian. He was very involved in the non-conformist movement, and refused to return to the Anglican religion when Charles II was restored, so emigrated to Ireland. He returned to London in 1687 and became an advisor to William III on Irish matters.

He married twice, both times to wealthy widows, and was worth about $100,000 when he died in 1716. In his will, made in 1711, his prime concern was that Non-conformists have educated ministers, who could then pass on their knowledge and training, and to this end he set up schools, first for those entering the ministry, and later for the children of other non-conformists.

His Library was established 16 years after he died, and was a centre of dissent for over 100 years.     A register was set up for recording the birth of children who were not baptised in the Anglican church, which could then be used as a proof of birth for any occasion on which such was required, in the same way that Anglicans used their baptismal certificates. This has now become a great resource for genealogists who have dissenters in their ancestry.

The Library arrived at its current home - 14 Gordon Square - in 1890. The original purpose of the building had been as a Residence Hall for the Non-conformist university, which explains the warrens of corridors and small rooms all full of books. Dr Williams left about 7,600 books to start the library and 200 years later it had grown to 66,000. Today there are approximately 300,000. Roughly 5% of the collection is unique, and of another 18% there are less than five other copies extant.

I won't bore you with a description of the contents, suffice to say that it includes two Nuremberg Bibles, and over 500 portraits. 

Assistant Librarian Anna then showed us the main research library, and told us a little about what was in it. The most popular books are those dealing with the history of particular chapels and areas, and several of my group were quietly edging towards them as she was talking. The shelves are very high, and there is a gorgeous iron spiral staircase going up to the mezzanine floor, with more books. It looks very like some of the pictures in a large book that Lloyd gave me for Christmas, on the history of the Library, which had amazing photos on every page. 

Finally we were regaled with tea and coffee, and a large selection of biscuits, after which many stayed on to begin their research. I however having realised that it was a late night at the SOG, headed back there and worked my way through some of their Nova Scotia books, on the off-chance my SMART family might pop their heads up. However they are apparently not yet ready to be found.
One day ...