Dear Joan, You are a genius!! Thank you, thank you, thank you! I thought I had tried all the variations of Joanna, but certainly I never thought of Joe Hannah. I find Ancestry.com is a nightmare to find census information on, despite all the opportunities to insert vital details. Either the person you are searching for appears at once, which is wonderful, or you have to trawl through hundreds of names often bearing no relation to the name you want, which is very frustrating. I am certain this Joe Hannah is my ggg grandmother, as her last daughter was Hannah & is the right age. Perhaps the Juliana Brearley death is her too. Re-checking my emails I see that you sent me the deaths information last October, and I did nothing about it. Sorry about that. I had dismissed the John Brearley dying in 1846 as I assumed the age was incorrect. In 1841 he is listed as 55, & the census takers were told to round down ages to the nearest 5 years, but as he is the only John Brearley/Brierley dying in that period I presume he is mine. I thought Juliana was too far from Joanna to be realistic too. Just goes to show you should always keep an open mind (and learn to count properly!). Mille grazie again. Liz Coreglia Antelminelli

Hi Liz, I looked at the ages again and I am wondering if the 2 youngest children could actually have been grandchildren? It has happened to me several times, when an older daughter had an illegitimate child, which was then raised by grandparents. Certainly, if Joanna is listed as being 45 in 1841, she could well have been nearer to 50, with age rounded down. Perhaps William's birth certificate will prove me wrong. Lets hope so. There was a Hannah BREARLEY birth in March 1838 in Bolton If you e mail Bolton R.O. with as many details as you have (father's name and occupation etc,) they would tell you if it is the correct one or not. There is a death for a 7 year old William BREARLEY in June 1848 again in Little Bolton. Again, worth asking Bolton R.O. it. Cheers Joan

You may to care to use the website www.findmypast.com which although you have to pay for the downloads if you don't have a subscription seems to find things that have been misspelled or generally 'lost' on Ancestry. I didn't realise this until recently and using this website has knocked down quite a few brick walls for me. Meg -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Elizabeth Wilde Sent: 21 January 2008 16:54 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [ENG-LAN-BOLTON] Joanna BRIERLEY Dear Joan, You are a genius!! Thank you, thank you, thank you! I thought I had tried all the variations of Joanna, but certainly I never thought of Joe Hannah. I find Ancestry.com is a nightmare to find census information on, despite all the opportunities to insert vital details. Either the person you are searching for appears at once, which is wonderful, or you have to trawl through hundreds of names often bearing no relation to the name you want, which is very frustrating. I am certain this Joe Hannah is my ggg grandmother, as her last daughter was Hannah & is the right age. Perhaps the Juliana Brearley death is her too. Re-checking my emails I see that you sent me the deaths information last October, and I did nothing about it. Sorry about that. I had dismissed the John Brearley dying in 1846 as I assumed the age was incorrect. In 1841 he is listed as 55, & the census takers were told to round down ages to the nearest 5 years, but as he is the only John Brearley/Brierley dying in that period I presume he is mine. I thought Juliana was too far from Joanna to be realistic too. Just goes to show you should always keep an open mind (and learn to count properly!). Mille grazie again. Liz Coreglia Antelminelli ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message