Genealogy Chat

I recently ordered a marriage certificate of a relly, Isaac Harvey, lived in Nailsea Somerset. According to some research my auntie did, he married Ann Hill, and their first child was born 1840/41. So I found on free BMD marriage for Isaac Harvey in 1840, in the district of Bedminster, which is the district that Nailsea came under. I am confused now as the certificate arrived and it is forIsaac Harvey, but his wife was Ann Challis, and they married in the Parish church of Bedminster, and their address(both of them) was listed as Ashton Rd Bedminster-not Nailsea as I was expecting. The fathers name John Harvey was correct. My Isaac was a coal miner in later years, his occupation on the marriage cert was 'engineer'- could he have been a mine engineer in his younger days, or would this have required more education( he could not sign his own name) I am confused as to whether this is the right person, and perhaps my auntie had the wrong bride's name(she wasnot clear on her sources for this info, which is why I wanted to check.) I have checked the parish records for Nailsea at that time and there is no Harvey marriage, so it is possible they married somewhere else, and could have been living in Bedminster at the time, would the parish records for Bedminster have more info- e.g- birthplace of the bride & groom? Anything that might link them to Nailsea????? Currently there are too many queries for me to think this is the right person- what do you think??????

You could order their first child's birth cert, which will give you Ann's maiden name. Was she old enough to have been married previously, and was her father's surname listed as Challis on her marriage cert? Parish records probably won't list the birthplace of the parties, but they may say they are 'of this parish' or 'of parish X' - but again that doesn't mean they were born there! Do not be too put off by the addresses as people moved around more frequently than we realise - and after all, it is in the correct registration district! Whilst I don't want to rubbish previous research, unless you have been shown some sort of evidence that Ann's name was Hill then it seems likely that you are on the right track after all.

Hi there, I think the best course of action is to find the birth of their children. If they are registered on the GRO, this will give you the mothers name and maiden name. If they are not registered on the GRO, then try searching the same parish records you have tried only looking for baptisms. You might get lucky, some parish records do include the mothers maiden name. Mary

Thanks to you both, I have not yet found their children on FreeBMD, I might risk a fiver on 1837. just to see if I can find them. So far no luck on the parish records either, which is surprising as their son was called Hezekiah, so it was not a common name!!! Maybe they were born in Bedminster too!!!

Just to let you know, I sent off for their son's birth certificate- guess what- mother is Ann Challis, so thisis the right one. Just shows, people were not always married where you thought htey were!!! Thanks for your input on this.