Genealogy Chat

hi, does anyone have any ideas if there are any records of ownership of properties. i guess it would be mid 1800`s to about 1960.
my grandad, his father and all there siblings, cousins etc every month i believe, were given some money. i was told some or all of it was from property, left by my 3 x g/grandad.now we searched high and low for this gentlemans will/probate and wrote of to york about it. the reply was that no such person exists etc.i recently found on the national probate index, said probate of 3x g/grandad. it appears he left less than £200 of which 2 of his daughters were "executrixes". even though that was a reasonable sum back then, no way would it have stretched to multiple grand and great grandchildren up until 1960. so there has got to be something else.
apparently, these properties (in salford) were knocked down at that time for slum clearance.many thanks

The Land Registry only came into being with the Law of Property Act of 1925, and even then it was only in the post war years that compulsory registration came into force and records of ownership became commonplace. Prior to that title was by way of a bundle of Title Deeds for which there was no central register or record.

Indeed, my parents house bought in 1954 are still represented by the Title Deeds and will only be registered when the property is subsequently sold.

Even then, the Land Registry is only likely to hold details of the present and last owner. Sometimes there are details of previous ownership but not always.

If there was a compulsory registration then ownership would have passed to the council who would have paid the proceeds to however could prove ownership at the time. When did this take place and who was the new owner? It might be worth pursuing a line of inquiry there.

To put the £200 into perspective, my g-grandparents bought a 2 bedroomed house in Lancashire, 1912 for £31! So £200 could represent quite a bit of property.

thanks for that.
as i dont have any addresses for the properties, im not sure the land registry could help at this stage. but as you say the council may have a record, especially if they were bought off the owners for clearance. may have even been bought by the council..it was 1960/61 in salford - after my grandad died, it all came to light and it seems my mum was diddled out of her portion of the money. none of that matters now, the whole saga has been such a mystery, we are desparate to solve. i dont know who the owners would have been, apart from members of the family.2 of mums cousins ended up with everything, so ???? could have been their mother, who was my grandads sister. i will contact salford council see if they can help.
i was so surprised when i found my 3x gt/grandads will that no property was mentioned you see, as mum remembers very clearly all the details as told from her mum and solicitors etc.

mac, you are right, i wonder whether the properties could have been bought afterwards, with the proceeds of his will. my 2 x g/grandma and her sister were executors of the will, i have not been able to find the former on the probate calander(i think they were very poor) and her sister married a "famous"sea captain and did leave a will, but less than her husband left 12 yrs before. so i imagine that was his money and not the holden money. the plot thickens

Have you tried to find the solicitors records - they are quite often sent to the local archives offices, name searches on National Archives may give a lead. Also, the original will would not necessarily mention property, could just say I leave everthing to xyz, then I think the estate would be valued for inheritance purposes.

mac, i appreciate all the help you are giving me and excuse my ignorance in these matters. what you say sounds promising, but when you say solicitors do you mean those that were dealing with the matter in the 1960`s (mum might remember details) or further back? also you say the estate would valued for inheritance purpose. could there be any record of that.
i have the address he was living at when he died, also he remarried at some point. there is no mention of his wife in the probate so im assuming she died somewhere between 1861 (census record) and 1866. no joy looking for his wife mary like a needle in a haystack. also interesting that the 2 daughters were only executors, didnt mention they inherited.many thanks

You could try name searches (3x ggd & the executors) back in the old records - try National Archives searches. Lots of old solicitors records are held by local records offices - NA should have them recorded on thier database.

You could also try going back to the 1960s solicitors to see if they could give more information, but not sure what they would be allowed to let you have as many records are confidential.

thanks mac, i did have a quick look yesterday at the NA and also manchester archives online.going to take me a while me thinks. on my next trip up north may have to book myself in to the mancs archives. the staff there hopefully would be able to point me in the right direction - such a vast amount of records.
one more question (im sorry).as i mentioned earlier we did send of to the probate office for his will last year with no joy.some of the details we had were slightly "off" ie he had moved house etc. also what confused me was that, his address was, ardwick, manchester, lancashire. the records stated Lancaster. hence the reasons it may not have been found. if i reordered the will, would it give only the details i found on the probate index or would there be more information. thanks sara

Not sure what the will could contain. Don't worry about the Lancaster bit, a lot of records (including census) say Lancaster when they mean Lancashire.

You could also try searching the Lancashire records office online catalogue, (LANCAT) they also have searchable 19th century newspapers.

If you want to search newspapers you will need to register, its free, and you get a temporary membership number until your library card comes through. Doesn't matter where you live, you can join, it's a useful site as there are newspapers from across the country. www.lancashire.gov.uk/onrl

sounds like a useful site.i will give it a go, thanks. had a quick look , reading those old newspapers, so interesting and funny (esp the personal ads)

Have a look at Mayfield's thread about house deeds - doesn't answer this question, but is related.

will do, thanks

nudge!

nudge