Genealogy Chat

Hello all,
getting desperate now. The plan is to look through local papers and scan obituaries.
q. Does anyone know a good website for newspapers.
q. I presume they wrote obituaries for 'common' people in 1834

thanks

Sorry, don´t know of any newspaper archives, but would think it highly unlikely that there would be an obit for anyone who wasn´t "known" in the community unless they had some special reason to be mentioned, such as the reason for the death or extreme old age.
Newspapers at that time were not commonplace & were very expensive. Generally, people didn´t buy them for their own use. They were available in coffee houses & other such places for general use. Don´t forget that the majority of the population at that time couldn´t read or write.

thanks Wisechild,
yes I see, they owned a lodging house and I presumed they would buy a paper, but did not take into account the scale of literacy. As I said, getting deperate. Do you know anything about taxes. They paid taxes so there must be a record somewhere, or maybe parish payments.

It's probably too early a period as Wisechild says for someone to have an obituary printed unless they were well known. What is always worth a try is to google, I found reference to several relatives in books written about specific places, depends on the rarity of the name though.

There are some land tax records available on Ancestry.

If they owned or leased property then I would expect they made payments of the 'Poor Rate'.

A list was made annually of all the ratepayers in the parish together with how much they paid and the list may be in Churchwarden's Accounts, Overseer's Accounts or there may be a seperate Poor Rates Book.

Try the relevant RO to see what survives.

Chris

If they owned a lodging house, they almost certainly paid rates to the local authority .
It would have been the Poor Law in those days.
You may be lucky & find that the rates books still exist in the local archives. I know that Birmingham has an excellent run of them.
Alternatively a trade directory for the place where they lived might exist.

If you want to share your dilema or post some details, we will gladly have a go for you.J

I have a sub to the British Newspaper Archive, don't mind doing a search if you give details (mightn't yield anything).

You can also do a free search yourself http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk (but can't view detail)

I shall have to revisit Dorchester records office. I was there a couple of years ago but was still investigating ancestors in general. Poor Rates or Poor Law eh?

thanks Marie.
Thomas Molton died 21st December 1834 Bridport , married to Martha

I want to verfy his age at death, probably 52 ish

Could this be him?

Dorset, England, Deaths and Burials, 1813-2001
Name: Thomas Moulton
Birth Year: abt 1782
Age: 52
Burial Date: 21 Dec 1834
Parish: Bridport

from Ancestry's parish records, but this was also available for free on FamilySearch https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/X8HV-6WB

Marie,
it could be, problem is that i have two Thomas Moltons.

one born in 1782 Winterborne Whitechurch Dorset
and one born in 1787 born i know not. where.

If i an confirm your Thomas b 1782 the trail back is easy to 1600s
the other one b 1787 is a mystery

I need something with both names and ages to clarify which one it is

Afraid there's nothing coming up in the newspapers.

thanks for you help people,
off to Dorchester Records Office

You're welcome, it was worth a try.

Forgot to add that there was no further info on the actual burial record. No address, occupation or spouses name.