Genealogy Chat

Hello

Wondered if anyone had any ideas on how to solve a long running family mystery please?

My great, great uncle WILLIAM DONNELLY went to Canada after his army service in WW1, and was never heard of again

Before and after the war, he was a merchant seaman. I've tracked down his seaman records (CR1) from Southampton Library, and they were stamped "deceased 1/10/22".

His last ship was "Kayeson" (Number 146232) which he joined at Newport (I assume Newport, Wales) on 20th September 1922. His discharge number was 1074042

However, I can't find any more details to get a death certficate - I've checked UK Maritime death indexes, and GRO Indexes but nothing matches

Wondered if anyone might have any ideas of where I could look?

Some details, in case it helps - William was born in Arklow, Wicklow Ireland on 17th January 1881 and the family moved to Liverpool in the 1880s. He went to sea in 1895, and joined the army in 1898, serving in South Africa and India. He went back to sea, and then enlisted in the Canadian Army in 1915. After being wounded at the Somme, he recovered in Canada, but was never heard of by the family again after the war ended. His father was James Donnelly, his mother Ellen nee Moore, and brothers Stephen Donnelly b1895 and Joseph Donnelly b1893

Many thanks
Neil

There are some records for the ship in Newfoundland - see here

http://www.mun.ca/mha/holdings/crewlist.php





Official_No: 146232

1922: E1
1923: E2
1924: E2
1926: E2
1927: E2
1928: E2
1929: E2

Worth asking them what sort of info might be contained in the records.

they do charge though I,m afraid I tracked down some Merchant Navy records being held by them for my grandad from the early 1900,s and they wanted money upfront to search and it wasnt cheap .

His attestation papersgives his birth as 17 Jan. 1884, Arklow, Wicklow, Ireland.

http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/databases/cef/001042-119.02-e.php?image_url=http://data2.archives.ca/cef/gpc002/294915a.gif&id_nbr=357821

Thanks very much for your help everyone - I'll have a look at Newfoundland and see if I can find anything there

Thanks for looking up his papers Margaret - I should have said that he fibbed about his birth as he would have been too old to enlist. Incidentally, I wrote off for his full army records from the Canadian National Library expecting a couple of pages, and eventually got about 150 pages of the most detailed papers I've come across in genealogy idetails of the action he took part in, his wounds, pay records, full medical records, postings and disciplinary records - it's a really good

Thanks again for everyone's help

Neil

Where was the Kayeson heading when he joined the ship?
If he died just 11 days later maybe it was just after reaching port, somewhere, so death might be recorded in Canada, ..or wherever they docked.


Gwyn

The E2 of the reference from the MHA at Newfoundland means that there is a ships log as well as a crew list. These were only kept when there was an event like a death on board, so it would be worth getting. They used to charge a minimum of 40 Canadian Dollars, but they are very helpful and efficient.

There will also be a record at Kew in the ledgers that were kept on births marriages and deaths at sea. These are original documents and the references for 1922 are, BT 334/78 for an index entry and BT 334/80 for the summary itself.

DaveatHove and Gwyn in Kent - many thanks for your help , I'll follow those up

n