Find Ancestors

Hi Rebecca! If you think that death record in 2002 is the right Lewis Bartram, you could order a copy of the certificate using the details up above. You can order on line here:

http://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/

It might give some info like his address when he died, or the name of a family member who reported the death.

It was also fairly recent, so it shouldn't be too hard to find a newspaper obituary if one was published. The library in the area should have microfilmed newspaper archives. This is what reference librarians are there to help with. Having the exact date of death from the death certificate would be useful.

Goodness knows where his family would be living -- he seems to have moved around a bit himself. But if you search the on-line phone directory

http://www.thephonebook.bt.com/publisha.content/en/search/residential/search.publisha

for Bartram in Polesworth, for instance, there are only a dozen, and you could always start by calling them.

Oh, how did I find all this? Searching every database at Ancestry where there might have been info, and also FreeBMD (which lets you search a little more specifically than Ancestry in some cases, e.g. to try to match up surnames of spouses for marriages before 1911). Births, marriages, deaths; Ancestry has a database of some old phone book listings. And for the birth of your grandmother, e.g., downloading the images of the General Registry Office index pages for the year you said she was born, and looking for her name in the list of Plants!

If you get your grandmother's birth certificate and confirm her parents' names -- well, it seems obvious they were the Plant and Osborne in that marriage, so you could go ahead and get the marriage certificate too. And the marriage cert should give their ages and their fathers' names, so then we can help you out with tracking the families back.

For Eleanor we can probably take a stab now -- do you have access to the censuses? I don't want to do it all for you, because the finding is most of the fun, and not just because I have so much work to finish in the next three days that I shouldn't be playing. ;)

Let us know what you get -- the death certificate, the marriage certificate -- and we'll pick up from there.

polsworth is in warwickshire apparantly on the borderline of leciestershire and staffordshire which i think is near burton so maybe it is him. Do you know any way of finding living relatives of his.
I have just found out the names of iris plants siblings
Audrey Plant
Olive Plant
George Plant
Gerald Plant
Dorris Plant
Colin Plant
But no lilly unless she died young or something because im getting all this info from my aunt my dads half sister.
Again thanks for any help
Rebecca xx

WOW How do you find all this ive been trying for weeks lol
Thank you for doing all this for me, the lewis is difficult because i dont actually know anything about him but that could be him i know he had at least 2 other sons apart from dad because my sister said my dad had had met them but was too late finding his dad.
My dad (brian PLant) has my grandma (iris plant) surname so im guessing that lewis would not be on the birth certificate. Her other children on in the name of Dawkins because she married.
I can ask my aunt if her grandparents were called albert and elanor she should know but it does sound right.
Plant was my grandmas birth name not marriage.
Iris died 1982 and she was born 16th of august 1927.
I will tell my sister what you found on lewis thats great thanks so much im rubbish at this lol i w2ill also find out if iris had a sister lilly im pretty sure my sister said that iris had about 6 siblings lol
Again thankyou so much for your help your great
rebecca xx

For that Lewis Bartram (who may or may not be yours), Ancestry has some old phone listings:


Name: Lewis G Bartram
Address: Ferriby
Exchange: Hull
Directory Title: Hull Apr
Publication Year: 1969
Directory County: Lancashire
Page Number: 14


Name: Lewis G Bartram
Address: 2 Epworth Vis Duffield Nl
Exchange: Derby
City/Town: Derby
Publication Year: 1955
Directory County: Cheshire, Shropshire, Stafford, Warwick, Nottingham, Leicester, Northampton, Hereford, Worcester
Page Number: 29


And aha, the Wiltshire connection in later listings:


Name: L G Bartram
Address: 114 Northend Gdns,Batheaston
Exchange: Bath
City/Town: Bath
Directory Title: Bath / West Wiltshire Sep
Publication Year: 1980
Directory County: Somerset, Wiltshire
Page Number: 33


Name: L G Bartram
Address: 114 Northend Gdns, Batheaston
Exchange: Bath
City/Town: Bath
Directory Title: Bath / West Wiltshire Dec
Publication Year: 1983
Directory County: Somerset, Wiltshire
Page Number: 35


So it's looking like him?

Edit - crap, Google maps said Polesworth was *Warwickshire*, not Wiltshire. Quelle coincidence there.

This could be a sister of your grandmother:


Births Mar 1922
Plant Lily
mother: Osborne
Barnsley
9c 499

Probably Eleanor Osborne's birth:


Name: Eleanor Osborne
Year of Registration: 1898
Quarter of Registration: Oct-Nov-Dec
District: Barnsley
County: Yorkshire - West Riding
Volume: 9c
Page: 214


And a choice of two for Albert:

Albert Plant 1893 Jan-Feb-Mar Barnsley
Albert Plant 1896 Apr-May-Jun Barnsley


assuming that's where they both came from.


Just in case you want to do any of this yourself, I won't start in on the 1901 census for now. ;)

What the heck -- here's your grandmother's birth registration details:


Jul-Aug-Sep 1927
PLANT Iris
mother: Osborne
district: Barnsley
9c 394


And that means that this marriage in the list I gave above is her parents:

Marriages Sep 1921
Plant Albert
Osborne Eleanor
Barnsley 9c 451

But of course you want to order the birth certificate to be sure. The marriage certificate will give you the parents' fathers' names.

Oh -- your question:

"I know that iris plant had 3 children after my dad but i think there may be another one is there any way of finding out how many children a women has had."

Short answer: no.

However, once the transcribing gets done -- this will likely be some months more -- it will be possible to search easily for the births of children named Plant in Burton registry district, during the relevant period, whose mother's surname was Plant. There'd be no guarantee any or all of them were your dad's siblings, but it would give a starting point.

At present, it would mean downloading and reading the images, four per year, for 10 years or whatever after your dad's birthdate, and reading through the Plant births in each quarter looking for mothers named Plant. Not impossible, just somewhat time-consuming. You could take out a trial or short-term membership at Ancestry, for instance, to do that. Someone could do it for you ... but it's a bit of a pain in the bum. And you'd really want to check it yourself to make sure you found every possibility.

Now as for Iris -- there's no birth showing at present for Iris Plant in 1927. Before I go downloading images -- that was her birth surname? Not a previous husband's surname, for instance.


Just in case anything rings a bell, these are Plant marriages in Barnsley after 1920 that have been transcribed at present:


Marriages Sep 1921
Plant Albert
Osborne Eleanor
Barnsley 9c 451

Marriages Jun 1922
PLANT John W
Trueman ?
Barnsley 9c 623

Marriages Sep 1922
PLANT George
Hazelwood Mabel
Barnsley 9c 569

Marriages Mar 1924
Plant Thomas H
Robshaw Mary
Barnsley 9c 353

Marriages Jun 1924
Plant Herbert
Davies Martha
Barnsley 9c 473


When did your grandmother die? It must have been before 1984, because there is no death recorded after 1984 for an Iris Plant born in 1927.

Now I'll give you a chance to answer some questions and think about this so far. ;)

The only similar-looking birth that is in the transcriptions at the moment is this:

Births Dec 1924
BARTRAM Lewis G
mother: Best
Derby
7b
902


It's not a very common name, so could that be him?

There's no marriage showing so far for Bartram & Best, to see who his parents were. The birth certificate would name them though, if you think that's him.

He's also the only birth (showing so far) for surnames Bartram & Best.


This looks like the record of that death of that Lewis Bartram (assuming for now that he's yours):

Name: Lewis George Bartram
Birth Date: 4 Oct 1924
Death Registration Month/Year: Dec 2002
Age at death (estimated): 78
Registration district: Eastyorks
Inferred County: Yorkshire
Register number: ER1E
Entry Number: 248


That death certificate could give you information about a family member who was living at the time of his death (such as the person who reported the death), for instance, if you're interested in knowing that.

Okay, Plant was your dad's mum's birth surname, and your dad was registered in that name:


Apr-May-Jun quarter 1949
PLANT Brian
mother's surname: Plant
district: Burton
vol. 9b
page 142


The thing is, since he doesn't have his dad's surname, there won't be any info on that certificate to assist you in that regard.

So his dad's name was Lewis Bartram(?) from Polsworth, which I'll assume is in Staffordshire. ... Well, google maps says there's no such thing. It asks whether I mean Polesworth, Wiltshire. Do I?

Hi Rebecca. It's hard to search for things in the years you need, because the project to transcribe the index of births, marriages and deaths:

http://www.freebmd.org.uk

hasn't got quite that far yet.

Do you know the date of your parents' marriage?

With that, it would be easier to find the registration details -- with those details you could order their marriage certificate -- the certificate would tell you their fathers' names and their ages when they married.

Now at this point things are not quite clear.

Was your dad's mother Iris Mildrid (Mildred?) Plant as her birth name, or was Plant her husband's surname?

Related question: was your dad's father Lewis Bartrum(?), or Lewis B. Plant?

I think I can sort that out easily. I'll take a minute and look for your dad's birth registration ...

Just thought i would add we are all from the staffordshire area burton upon trent thanks rebecca xx

Ive started researching my family tree but ijm finding it quite difficult as most people on my dads side are no longer alive so i cant ask questions. Im looking for any info on my grandma
Iris mildrid Plant born 1927 Barnsley
my dad Brian plant born 1949 Burton
and my dads dad is really difficult because all i know is his name was Lewis Bartram or Bartrum and he lived in polsworth
My dad never met him so no one really knows anything about him i cant ask my dad because he died in 2004
I know that iris plant had 3 children after my dad but i think there may be another one is there any way of finding out how many children a women has had.
Thankyou for any help you can give me with this
thanks rebecca xx