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You're very welcome! Hadn't seen a proper mysterious ancestor in a while so this one filled the gap nicely. ;)
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UPDATE
Well....the marriage certificate for Florence to Alphas PULLEN has arrived today.
Mixed result really.... It has 'unknown' for Florence's father.
Didn't anyone tell her?
She lived with him in 1891, for goodness sake !
She married in Whitbourne, Herefordshire in 1902 ( where Edward and his family were in 1901)
Was he at the wedding in his village, I wonder............
One bonus is that a Ruth SKERRETT was a witness ( possibly Edward's sister)
SO
I can link her to the family, I think, because it would be too much coincidence for all these pieces of jigsaw to fit, in different parts of the country, including Wales, unless this Florence getting married is the same person.
Do you all agree?
Gwyn
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'Course I agree. I made it up myself! Beating Fanny to it only by virtue of her desperate need to bathe. ;)
I think maybe "unknown" was a way of avoiding having a father with a different surname, although one wouldn't think "unknown" was much better! It could be that she really was never told that he was her father.
It could be that he wasn't, but it would be hard to explain him rearing the child of his parents' employee, and her apparently using his surname socially, otherwise.
I hadn't tried to trace her mother any further back -- she seemed to be the only person with that surname in the vicinity at the time of Florence's birth, so maybe she had no family who might otherwise have taken the baby in. No direct relation to you I guess, so not a burning question. ;)
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Thanks for your thoughts, Janey.
Florence was my, ....let me see, ..1st cousin twice removed, so not close, but if she was Edward's daughter we have a bloodlink so I am interested in 'tidying the edges'.
I checked back on her supposed birth mother's family on census records and I think that by the time baby Florence was born, her mother Elizabeth's own mother had died and her father remarried and lived elsewhere in Herefordshire, so they were unlikely to take in an illegitimate grandchild.
Still wondering if Florence was born at the home of Edward's grandparents., James and Ann WOOD, my 3 x G grandparents. The trouble is that it's such a small village that a birth certificate might only name the village rather than full address.....and is that where Elizabeth Wagstaff died too?
Might have to spend a bit more to close this story.......
Gwyn
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Well !
Today I received a copy of the birth certificate for Florence WAGSTAFF....and what a bonus....
The informant is shown as Edward H SKERRETT, father
I was hoping that perhaps one of the Skerretts was the informant, but to find it was Edward stating he was the father was a real plus.
Which leaves the question, ...Why did Florence not name him when she married?.......
but at least I can give her a definite place in my tree now.
Gwyn
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So there's that edge all tidied indeed!
Still possible that Florence herself didn't know he was her father - Florence probably never had a birth certificate. Or her paternity may have been for family ears only, if Edward's wife thought it scandalous, for instance. There always has to be something left unexplained, doesn't there? ;)
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Janey
You're right.
Florence might have been told that her mother died ( must buy that cert. I guess) and the really kind grandson of her employers took pity on the baby and decided to raise her........
Who knows ?
I'm off to 'walk around the village in 1881 ' and see who was living where, because although not born at the 1881 census address, I do recognise the house name where Florence was born on New Year's Day 1882.
Perhaps someone in the extended family looked after her until Edward married.
Many thanks for your help finding Florence for me.
Gwyn
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