Genealogy Chat

My maiden name was Gillett: my father, Leonard (dob 29/5/04 Sheffield) spoke very little of his background other than the fact that he was 'one of several children' and that he'd left home at 14 after a dispute with his father about entering the family business of Cutlery Manufacturers in Sheffield. I remember as a young child my mother was most upset when in the early 1950s the Salvation Army called to say his father had left him £8000 in his will and he refused to accept it! A few months ago, with enormous help from many kind people on GR I have been trying to trace my father's family and think I found his father as George (dob 1874 Preston) born to another George (dob 1839 Preston). I thought it quite amusing that father had been 'Yorkshire and proud of it' to learn he was basically from Lancs! but, they seem to be a family of jobbing builders, bricklayers, unemployed joiners and millworkers etc. Fine, but then I thought: £8000 was a lot of money in c1952 and if each child got a similar amount or more, he must have been more than a jobbing builder. Now, by chance, I have come across on familysearch.org a George GillAtt with an 1839 dob in Sheffield with a wife the same initial and children with same initials as early siblings of my Preston (?) gtgrandfather... this George GillAtt was a Cutlery Manufacturer in Sheffield. Now I'm thinking did an A get changed to an E somewhere down the line? So, being a novice at this research, and huge thanks to the many kind people who have helped and I'm sure some of it is still valid, but where do I go from here?

Not sure I follow you - are you saying George born 1839 in Preston is the same as George born 1839 in Sheffield? I think the fact there are two different birthplaces means they are two different people, regardless of spelling. Helen

Hi Helen: No, I'm just saying in view of the consistent snippets of info from my father + the inheritance, that the George from Sheffield seems more likely to be my gtgrandfather than George from Preston and that, for whatever reason, bad handwriting or family feuds, the A/E got changed but I don't know when. However, somewhere along the line my father's birth cert (which I have) definitely shows a George GillEtt (dob 1874 and married to Louisa B. Minor) as his father.

Ok, I think I understand better now. You "think" you found the right George in Preston and now you aren't so sure, as all the Sheffield info seems to link in better with what you know of your father. Thinking and hunches and likelihood aren't proof. If you obtained your father's birth cert it would have his mother's maiden name on it and you could then look up the marriage and see which George was her husband. If you are asking could Gillett be miswritten as Gillatt or vice versa, yes of course. In my own family tree I have a Mealing family who sometimes appear as Maling or Meling. I also have Chouns who turned into Chowns later on in the 19th century. Helen

Hi Helen: thanks for your interest. I will continue on the marriage cert. track and see how I get on. Dorothy