Thomas WHITEHOUSE 1829-1909, Coalminer

Thomas WHITEHOUSE was the 4th of 7 sons by Joseph WHITEHOUSE & possible wife  Mary (Collins? Groves?-unverified). Thomas and second wife, Sarah, are my paternal 2nd great-grandparents  through my grandmother Harriet Bunn.  

Thomas was born about 10 July 1829 in Rowley Regis, Staffordshire, England, UK. The family moved to the Dudley area in the early 1840s, which was several miles away, likely for work in the coalmines. This region is a southern part of the major coalfields running through the middle of England. See image with sketch of coalmining in Dudley here with smokestacks spewing forth...

Thomas married an Elizabeth or a Sarah _____, likely in 1852 in Dudley - this has yet to be confirmed. So many Thomas Whitehouse men, so many Elizabeth and Sarah/Sara women, and Whitehouse surnames. More digging still to do.  A great example yet again that there could be a surprising number of same-named men with the same surname in the same place, marrying the same-named wife's first name, around the same time. Sigh. Sometimes research is a frustrating slog! Thomas's first wife died within a year, no children noted. 

As a widower, Thomas then married on 16 July 1854 to Sarah PRICE, whose first husband Thomas Shutt had died a year earlier in 1853 in a coal mining accident. Their daughter, Nancy Shutt, was born in June 1853, in Dudley, Worcestershire, England. So, both Thomas and Sarah were widowed at young ages. Thomas' step-daughter Nancy is seen as a Whitehouse child on all censuses.

On the marriage record, it states that Thomas was a "Furnaceman"; his father (deceased) was a Nailer, and Sarah's father was a Miner. See document below.

Thomas and Sarah had the following 5 children in the Dudley/Netherton region: 
    1.  Sarah Elizabeth [ancestor], b. 7 Nov 1858, d. 30 Sep 1928 in Barrow-in-
             Furness, Cumbria; m. 18 Aug 1879 to George BUNN b. 26 Apr 1857
             [search Bunn posts on this site]; 9 children 
    2.  Benjamin, b. Mar 1867, d. after 1901; m. Margaret Milray abt Sep 1890 in
             Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria; no children 
    3.  Henry, b. est 1869; m. Martha ___ est 1888; one daughter; not verified 
    4.  William (Billy), b. 1871; m. Florence (Flo) 3rdQ 1889; 4 sons known
    5.  Enoch, b. 1875; no further information on him to date - too many Enoch
            Whitehouse men in the region to clarify the 'right one.'

One should take note of the blank years between the 1st child and 2nd. Normally with few birth control measures, children would come every 1-3 years apart. So there appear to be at least 2 children lost. Perhaps miscarriages, perhaps illness, perhaps a record misfiled - no details found. as yet. 

On the 1891 Census, Thomas & Sarah are living still in Barrow, with Benjamin and his wife Margaret  and the two younger boys, William & Enoch, working in the Iron Works and  Steel Works. In the 4th Quarter of 1895, Sarah died, aged 60 years,; no information anywhere about how she died so young. 

The 1901 Census in Barrow shows Thomas, listed as aged 74, is living with Benjamin & wife, with their 3 yr old son William. Benjamin continues to be working at the Iron Works, and Thomas is also still working, this time as a "Shipyard General Labourer." A hard-working man all his life. Also, clearly the Iron Works and Shipyard were still going strong, providing good work/wages for the men. 

Finally, we find that Thomas died in the 3rd Quarter of 1909, aged 80, when compared with his baptism record of 10 July 1829. Ages found on censuses are always taken with a grain of salt, as one doesn't know who gave the information. On the 1901 census, for example, his daughter-in-law may have given the information as both men would have been working. 

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If any of these people are also your ancestors, I am happy to share what I have about their families and ancestors as well. You can best contact me at calewisATtelusDOTnet- as Blogger is not allowing me to reply to any comments on my posts.  

CLUES GALORE! Greatgrandmother Sarah E. WHITEHOUSE's 1858 Birth Certificate

I love receiving snail-mail. The clunk of the letterbox outside the front door as the mailman drops in something unknown and flops the metal flap back over it. The feel of envelopes, the stamps, the possibilities.

In late 2006, I received a large brown envelope from Dudley, County of Worcester, England, with FIVE certificates: 3 labelled "Certified Copy of an Entry of Birth", 2 labelled "Certified Copy of an Entry of Marriage." What wonderful treasure indeed for a genealogist! However, I was retiring at that time, going into hospital for surgery, and didn't really look at them beyond confirming the contents of that big brown envelope. As I later  wondered what next to work on in my family tree, I looked over each of those five documents, now scanned and filed. And in scanning, I looked in detail at each  record. At this point in time, they now are all scanned, labelled, and filed appropriately. My desk is almost totally clear of genealogy paperwork right now! Amazing.

Here is a copy of my paternal line Sarah Elizabeth WHITEHOUSE - Greatgrandmother's birth record - with  interesting information about her parents and her life.  (I made it X-large so that you could read more details.)  

When I teach Introduction to Genealogy classes for beginners, I always tease people by saying "There are at least 19 clues or questions to ask, on every document you find!"... because I've found that beginners only see two or three, and think they're done looking: "Yes, there's the parents and birthdate. Done."  I know I still have much research to do with these certificates in hand. And I will need to be ordering several more certificates as well - my list of "to order" items is growing. 

This birth registration document is very easy to read, with careful clear writing, birthdate of Seventh November 1858. We have her address (born at home) as Northfield Road, Netherton, Dudley, in the County of Worcester.  I had to look up more about the relationship of Netherton and Dudley to understand why there are two towns listed as if they were separate ones, in Worcestershire. More to learn.  The number in the first column "448"  is the number of the registration, not the house number, by the way.

There is her father's name Thomas Whitehouse. I do wish he had a more interesting name, like Linus or Beauregard, or something quite out of the ordinary. But my father's ancestor men were good solid folk with plain names: Thomas, George, William, John, James, Henry.

But then there is Sarah's mother's name, written as: Sarah Whitehouse late Shutt, formerly Price. Here we see that Sarah's maiden name is PRICE. And she was previously married, to a gentleman, surname of Shutt. I have a few clues to indicate his name was Thomas Shutt, and they were married only 1-2 years at most. However, I haven't been able to confirm this yet - I have a list of more records to order: another marriage certificate, his death record, plus more research still to do.

We have the father's occupation:  "Laborer at an Ironwork".  There is a reason this area was once termed the Black Midlands, due to the smoke/soot in the air which landed on the ground, trees, houses, people and - I am sure - on the laundry put outside to dry.  I'm trying to think how anyone kept clean when they worked such difficult dirty jobs as iron works jobs, or coal mining. I thought I might be able to discover which ironworks Thomas might have worked at. I assumed I'd find something quite specific about an Ironworks foundry near Netherton, or near Northfield Road. Perhaps. I was able to find the following on Wikipedia [scroll down on the page]:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Iron_Company :  

Netherton[edit]

The 'old ironworks' at Netherton (with two furnaces) were acquired from Attwood in 1825 as part of the Corngreaves transaction. The company remained in possession until c1852 when the works were sold to Noah Hingley & Sons. The company is also known to have worked coal mines here.

Brierley Hill, Dudley Wood and Netherton were all held under lease from the Dudley estate.

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Back to those certificates up above:  were you able to read the Registration date?  and the informant?

Note that Sarah made her mark X  The Mark of Sarah Whitehouse  Mother, Northfield road, Netherton/Dudley, on the Fifteenth December 1858.  This registration date is about 5 weeks after the birth of their daughter, Sarah Elizabeth Whitehouse. And I'm making an assumption that my greatgrandmother went to the office to register the birth herself, as her husband, Thomas, had to work.

Sarah would need to bundle up the baby plus her 5 year old stepdaughter against the December cold and wet, and walk to the office where the birth needed to be registered.   Then back they would have to go home again. I would like to find out how she might have gotten to the Dudley Registration office. Surely someone would have given her a lift... was there a railroad? a cart? Perhaps they were close enough to walk there. I'm abysmally ignorant about transportation options in the 1850s in England villages! I also wonder if it mattered to her that she was not able to write her name on the birth registration form at the office in 1858. I know so little about her. On later census records she is listed as having the occupation of "Nailer" which was piece-work, adding to their income.

I went back to look again at the 1856 marriage record for Thomas WHITEHOUSE and Sarah Shutt, finding Sarah's father's name as John PRICE, Miner.  There were extensive coal mines in and around this area, so that is likely what John mined. Sarah's first husband was also a miner, named Thomas.

Thomas WHITEHOUSE and Sarah Shutt PRICE had 5 children: 1 daughter - Sarah Elizabeth (my ancestor) and 4 sons. Thomas' father was noted as Joseph WHITEHOUSE (Dead), occupation, Nailer. Netherton was known as THE place for nailmaking, from the 1600s onwards into the early-mid 1800s.  Also on the marriage record, Thomas is listed as a Widower, occupation "Furnace Man." I have begun to search for his first wife, whom I believe may have been also named Sarah, 5 years younger than him.

I first found the records of a Thomas marrying a Sarah, and a Sarah marrying a Thomas for both first and second marriagesfor this couple, an interesting symmetry.  Perhaps not so unusual, as those were quite common names in this time. It is said that there are so many Bunn and Whitehouse families in Netherton that if you had a stone for each one, you could build a home with them! Several of the Bunn and Whitehouse individuals in my tree were born in Windmill End and in Darby Hand (Darby End), both tiny neighbourhoods near to Netherton.

I have a few photos of my greatgrandmother, Sarah Elizabeth WHITEHOUSE... she married George BUNN in 1879, and they soon moved up to the north-east of England, to Barrow-in-Furness, where iron foundries and ship-building opportunities abounded. They had 9 children, one died as an infant. 

George BUNN died 10 Nov 1919 aged 62; Sarah Elizabeth WHITEHOUSE died 30 Sep 1928 at the age of 69 years. I can't help feel they were both "too young" to die at those ages.  

Any and all BUNN & WHITEHOUSE relatives - please get in touch and I'm happy to email you the copy of any of the Bunn and Whitehouse certificates I have received to date.  And if you have additional details I'd be thrilled to receive them!! (contact information, scroll below)

(This post is an updated version of my original post in 2010.)

52 ANCESTORS, 52 THEMES: No 8, "Good Deeds?" - Thomas WHITEHOUSE 1829-1909

This year's challenge by Amy Crow is another weekly blog, but based on Themes. Last week, it was LOVE.  This No. 8 week's theme is GOOD DEEDS.  Well that was a bust - I couldn't think of, or find a story involving good deeds.  Sigh.  I'll just pick someone and move on, writing about my somewhat challenging ancestors!  

I have been digging through the collateral relationships of my BUNN & WHITEHOUSE ancestors, hoping for nuggets. My father's mother was a BUNN, and her mother was a WHITEHOUSE. An English acquaintance snorted on finding they lived in Dudley region: "If you throw a rock in that area you'll hit a Bunn, and if you throw three rocks you'll hit a Whitehouse".  Hmmm.  Sounds challenging to find my particular ancestors, doesn't it?! 

Let's look at Thomas WHITEHOUSE, my 2nd great-grandfather. As far as I can be certain, he was born 10 Jul 1829 in Rowley Regis, Staffordshire, but moved to Dudley (which was very near!) as a young man.  Although we know from his marriage and birth records that he had a father Joseph, and a mother Mary, I am not at all sure of his parents and siblings. Too many similar names in the same parish and region.

Thomas married for the first time in approximately 1851 to a Sarah (unknown). I have not requested this marriage certificate as yet. Unfortunately she appears to have died within 2 years, perhaps by illness or through childbirth complications.  

In Dudley Worcester on 31 Aug 1856, Thomas married a young widow with a daughter, Sarah PRICE, (previously married to Thomas Shutt).  I have the Marriage Certificate for the couple, plus the birth record for their 2nd child, Sarah Elizabeth, my ancestor.  It was rather disconcerting to realize that Thomas married two women named Sarah, and Sarah married two men named Thomas. 

Thomas WHITEHOUSE, b. 10 July 1829, Rowley Regis, Staffordshire, married 31 Aug 1856 to his 2nd wife, Sarah PRICE, (previously married to Thomas Shutt), b. abt 1827. They had the following children (Sarah's daughter Nancy "Ann" used the surname Whitehouse in Censuses):
  1.  Nancy "Ann" (Shutt), b. Jun 1853 Netherton; m. "?Homer" (no records found to date)
  2.  Sarah Elizabeth, [ancestor], b. 7 Nov 1858 Dudley, d. 30 Sep 1928, Barrow; m. 18 Aug 1879 to George BUNN; 9 children
  3.  Thomas jr., b. Dec 1860 Dudley; d. as infant
  4.  Benjamin "Ben", b. Mar 1867; m. 1890 to Margaret "Maggie" (?Milray); 1 son known (William)
  5.  Henry, b. 1869; m. 1889 in Barrow to Martha (unknown); 1 daughter known (Blanche)
  6.  William "Billy", b. 1871; m. 3rd Q 1889, Florence "Florrie" Milray; 4 boys
  7.  Enoch, b. 1875; no other information added as yet.

I've only just realized while typing this list that there are about 6 years between #3 and #4 child, and I'm wondering if there was another child born in that time. Sometimes one needs to look with fresh eyes at the known details to see the unknown details! 

Thomas worked in iron foundries most of his working life as a "Furnace Man," as can be found on Censuses, in the "Black Midlands" - first in Dudley area, then up north in Barrow.  The family moved from Dudley/Netherton area in Worcester up to Barrow-in-Furness, at some point after 1881. Thomas, Sarah, Ben & new wife Margaret, William and Enoch are seen on the 1891 Census living at 39 Byron Street. Nancy and Sarah Elizabeth were out of the home at this, married.

At about the same time, just before 1881, my GILLESPIE family moved to Barrow from Northern Ireland, so clearly there was good work prospects in Barrow at this time. 

I don't have full death dates for either Thomas & Sarah WHITEHOUSE, although I can see Sarah died in Barrow in the 4th Q 1895.  On the 1901 Census in Barrow, Thomas is found, widowed, living with his middle son, Ben & wife Margaret, with their only son William.  

Thomas died in the 3rd Q 1909, aged 80 years.  I'm assuming he's buried in Barrow, but some of the headstones are missing, and I haven't found records of his burial to date.

With more digging in Parish Registers and other records, I may yet get more specific details on Thomas, the Whitehouse children, and also manage to specify Thomas' parents and siblings. 

If you have more information to share please do not hesitate to contact me via calewis at telus dot net, or in the comments below.  NOTE: my blog is not allowing me to do replies to comments at the moment.  Thank you so much for visiting! \

Women's History Month: Pattern of Children of My Female Ancestors

Lorine at Olive Tree Genealogy posted an interesting genealogical topic for Women's History Month, so here is my offering.

Instructions:

Make a list of your female ancestors beginning with your mother. Go back as far as you can. Now figure out how many children each female ancestor had. Did the females in your direct maternal line tend to have the same numbers of children each generation? Did they have more? Less? Were they prolific or are there few children born to each woman? Is there a pattern emerging?

I decided to go back 5 generations, and found no particular pattern other than there were more GIRLS born than BOYS!  I found that very surprising for some reason. The photo above on the left is my mother's line: she is the 2 year old Mary, in her mother Marguerite's arms; left is Clara, talking with her mother Hattie, aged about 97.

Maternal Line:

3^rd Greatgrandmother Sabra ORMSBEE      5 – 1 boy,   4 girls

2^nd Greatgrandmother Hattie GRAVES        3 –    ……   3 girls

Great-grandmother Clara TERWILLIGER      3 – 2 boys, 1 girl                          

Grandmother Marguerite KUHN                   6 – 2 boys, 4 girls

My Mother Mary GILLESPIE                       3 – 1 boy,   2 girls

Paternal Line:

2^nd Greatgrandmother Eliza MORRISON      4 – 3 boys, 1 girl

Greatgrandmother Catherine ARMSTRONG  4 – 3 boys, 1 girl

(other) Greatgrandmo Sarah WHITEHOUSE  9 – 3 boys, 6 girls

Grandmother Harriett BUNN                         6 – 2 boys, 4 girls

This makes 43 children total, with 17 boys, 26 girls

As for me:

I had 4 children:  2 boys, 2 girls; and with 6 grandchildren, I have 1 boy, 5 girls!

I'm not finding anything else unusual about these women.  In about 1879 or 1880, my Paternal line moved in one group of 3 generations including my Greatgrandmother Catherine & her mother-in-law Eliza, from Northern Ireland to north-west England for work reasons. My Maternal line lived in New York state and NJ state for a number of generations - I stopped at 5 generations, but can go back on a number of lines another 5 generations.  In 1912 my Grandmother Marguerite moved with her husband to BC Canada  where all the children (but one) were born.  She travelled back and forth across the continent with her 5 living children a number of times to visit with her relatives and many friends in New York state and New Jersey as well.

My Maternal line (up to the 1930s) were relatively wealthy, husbands were entrepreneurs and business builders; whereas my Paternal line was quite a bit poorer - individuals were very good at school but had to leave early to work.  The Paternal line brothers all did quite well in BC Canada, immigrating here in 3 groups: 1907, 1911, and 1914.  There was little travel back to England, although my grandfather's only sister did come out to visit several times from England.  

Try this analysis on your own family tree and ask questions about any patterns you might see, about their child-bearing:  ages of mothers at 1st and last child?  sexes?  twins?  any unusual gaps?  ages of those babies who died young (under 2)?  Think about other activities or events either locally or internationally that might have impacted on your "mothers".  

If you have any questions or want to follow up on any of the information in this post, do contact me either by replying with details in the Comments section, or through  calewis at telus dot net   (you know what to substitute there).  

CLUES GALORE! Greatgrandmother's 1858 Birth Record

I love receiving snail-mail.  The clunk of the letterbox outside the front door as the mailman drops in something unknown and flops the metal flap back over it.  The feel of envelopes, the stamps, the possibilities.

A dozen years ago or so, I received a large brown envelope from Dudley, County of Worcester, England, with FIVE certificates:  3 labelled "Certified Copy of an Entry of Birth", 2 labelled "Certified Copy of an Entry of Marriage." What wonderful mail indeed!  However, I was retiring at the time, going into hospital for surgery, and didn't really look at them beyond confirming the contents of that big brown envelope. Today as I wondered what next to work on in my family tree, I finally scanned each of those five documents.  And in scanning, I looked in detail at the records. They now are all scanned, labelled, and filed appropriately. My desk is almost totally clear of genealogy paperwork right now! Amazing.

Here is a copy of my paternal line Greatgrandmother's birth record, with  interesting information about her parents and her life.  (I made it X-large so that you could read more details.)  

When I teach Introduction to Genealogy classes for beginners, I always tease people by saying "There are at least 19 clues or questions to ask, on every document you find!"... because I've found that beginners only see two or three, and think they're done looking:   "Yes, there's the parents and birthdate. Done." Of course, I know I still have much research to do with these certificates in hand.

This document is very easy to read, with careful calligraphic writing. We have her address (born at home) as  Northfield Road, Netherton, Dudley, in the County of Worcester.  I had to look up more about the relationship of Netherton and Dudley to understand why there are two towns listed as if they were separate ones, in Worcestershire.  More to learn.  The number in the first column "448"  is the number of the registration, not the house number, by the way.

There is her father's name Thomas Whitehouse. I do wish he had a more interesting name, like Linus or Beauregard, or something quite out of the ordinary.  But my ancestor men were good solid folk with plain names: Thomas, George, William, John, James, Henry.

But then there is her mother's name, written as:  Sarah Whitehouse late Shutt, formerly Price.   Here we see that Sarah's maiden name is PRICE.  And she was previously married, to a gentleman, surname of Shutt.  I have a few clues to indicate his name was Thomas Shutt, and they were married only 1-2 years at most.  However, I haven't been able to confirm this yet - I have a list of more records to order: another marriage certificate, his death record, plus more research still to do.

We have the father's occupation:  "Laborer at an Ironwork".  There is a reason this area was once termed the Black Midlands, due to the smoke/soot in the air which landed on the ground, trees, houses, people and - I am sure - on the laundry put outside to dry.  I'm trying to think how anyone kept clean when they worked such difficult dirty jobs as iron works jobs, or coal mining, and such. I thought I would be able to see which ironworks Thomas might have worked at. I assumed I'd find something quite specific about an Ironworks foundry near Netherton, or near Northfield Road. I was able to find the following on Wikipedia [scroll down on the page]:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Iron_Company :  

Netherton[edit]

The 'old ironworks' at Netherton (with two furnaces) were acquired from Attwood in 1825 as part of the Corngreaves transaction. The company remained in possession until c1852 when the works were sold to Noah Hingley & Sons. The company is also known to have worked coal mines here.

Brierley Hill, Dudley Wood and Netherton were all held under lease from the Dudley estate.

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Back to those certificates above:  Were you able to read the Registration date?  and the informant?

Sarah made her mark X  The Mark of Sarah Whitehouse  Mother, Northfield road, Netherton/Dudley,  on the Fifteenth December 1858.  This date is about 5 weeks after the birth of their daughter, Sarah Elizabeth Whitehouse.  And I'm making an assumption that my greatgrandmother went to the office to register the birth herself, as her husband, Thomas, had to work.

Sarah would need to bundle up the baby plus her 5 year old stepdaughter against the December cold and wet, and walk to the office where the birth needed to be registered.   Then back they would have to go home again. I would like to find out how she might have gotten to the Dudley Registration office. Surely someone would have given her a lift... was there a railroad? a cart? I'm abysmally ignorant about transportation options in the 1850s in England villages! I also wonder if it mattered to her that she was not able to write her name on the birth registration form at the office. I know so little about her.

I went back to look again at the 1856 marriage record for Thomas Whitehouse and Sarah Shutt, finding her father's name as John Price, Miner.  There were extensive coal mines in and around this area, so that is likely what he did.  Thomas' father was noted as Joseph Whitehouse (Dead), occupation, Nailer. Netherton was known as THE place for nailmaking, from the 1600s onwards into the early-mid 1800s.  Also on the marriage record, Thomas is listed as a Widower, occupation "Furnace Man".  I have begun to search for his first wife, whom I believe was also named Sarah, 5 years younger than him.

I first found the records of a Thomas marrying a Sarah, and a Sarah marrying a Thomas for both first and second marriages an interesting symmetry.  Perhaps not so unusual, as those were quite common names in this time. Eventually I believe I found the most likely pair: Thomas WHITEHOUSE marrying Elizabeth [no surname listed].

I have a few photos of my greatgrandmother, Sarah Elizabeth WHITEHOUSE... she married a George BUNN, and they soon moved up to Barrow-in-Furness where iron foundries and ship-building opportunities abounded. There are so many Bunn and Whitehouse families in Netherton that if you had a stone for each one, you could build a home with them! Several of the Bunn and Whitehouse individuals in my tree were born in Windmill End and in Darby Hand (Darby End), both tiny neighbourhoods near to Netherton.

Any and all BUNN& WHITEHOUSE relatives - please get in touch and I'm happy to email you the copy of any of the Bunn and Whitehouse certificates I have received to date.  And if you have additional details I'd be thrilled to receive them!! (contact information, scroll below)