Hi Bev, I don't have any answers for you but a few points which may help you to focus your research. >From the detail you have provided, I guess you have found the children's baptisms by browsing the images on Ancestry. Did you also notice there were 432 baptisms on the same day, 26th October 1845? Family after family which suggests the vicar was an evangelist and had rounded up all the 'defectors' in his parish! So it may be that the Rawlins's parents were not churchgoers and will not be found in any registers, anywhere. It is also reasonable to assume that there were no earlier children or they would have been included in that mass baptism and especially as it would have been normal to call the first born son after his father. From that it is reasonable to assume that if (!) the parents married, it was in 1838. So they should just have been caught in the 1837 Act. Between 1837 & 1839, the only Samuel Rawlins possibly married to a Mary (Snell) was in St Germans, Cornwall, which seems unlikely for your Samuel but you could send for the certificate to eliminate him (or! ask someone on the Cornwall list to do a parish register search for you?). Unlike births, marriage registers after July 1837 should be complete (reporting them to the Registrar was automatic), but the GRO index may contain errors. The entries in the church register were copied and sent to the Superintendent Registrar and then copied again to Somerset House where they were copied again to the index - all handwritten. Then they were copied again by FreeBMD transcribers so it is inevitable that errors occurred somewhere along that chain. Have you tried doing a BMD search using wild cards? Free BMD is not quite complete either. There are even more transcription errors with census records so try 1841 again, with wild cards. Otherwise it seems that the marriage took place outside England & Wales - or, if they did originate from Ireland, were they Catholics? But the marriage would still have been recorded at the GRO if it was in England & Wales. Because a birth has not been recorded in BMD's that does not mean the child was not born in England, because at that time it was not compulsory to report the birth - it was up to the Registrar to find them. You may have already noticed that St Barnabas was founded in 1826 as a daughter church of St Luke, Old St, which makes the Rawlins you have found in that parish more than the just "significant" that you suggested. They are certainly worth exploring further to see where the trail leads you to or from. Also, the only registers available for St Barnabas are from 1842. It may be the earlier registers have not survived (the church was heavily bombed in 1940) or, more likely, all BMD's were performed at St Luke's; making their records worth further research. Ancestry only appear to have digitised the registers up to 1812 but the LMA catalogue says they have the registers much later than that and on microfilm - but the microfilms have been withdrawn because of the Ancestry digitisation. Only the LMA can explain that one! The other records which may help are the poor rate records, electoral registers and workhouse records. Most of these are at the LMA, some have been indexed on Ancestry and a few are held at local history libraries such as Camden and Islington. Although the "working poor", as you describe Samuel, would be unlikely to appear in the poor rate and electoral registers, there were exceptions depending upon the particular circumstances. A surprisingly large number of people from a wide range of backgrounds went in & out of the workhouse, or received 'out relief', for short periods - temporary layoffs, pregnancy and illness being the most common. The Settlement Examination record often contained valuable information about the applicants background. Like you Bev, I get frustrated with the LMA web site. It is difficult to find, difficult to navigate and their catalogue does contain some errors, mainly due to a lack of clear identity of a record. Awarding the digitisation and indexing to Ancestry has added to the problem because of both the transcription and identification errors they have made. As I said at the start, I don't have any answers but I hope the above will be of some help in navigating your difficult task. Barry1936 On 26 Jul 2012, at 13:26, [email protected] wrote: > Message: 3 > Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2012 06:38:29 -0400 (EDT) > From: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [MDX] London Metropolitan Archives > To: [email protected] > Message-ID: <[email protected]> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > Hello again, > > > As I have posted, I am searching for information about the parents of my great great grandfather, Samuel Rawlins, who was baptized with is brother Alfred and sister Mary at St. Barnabas Finsbury in October of 1845. Samuel's birthdate was given as May 3, 1839, his brother was born in 1842 and his sister born in 1844. Samuel's father was also a Samuel Rawlins whose trade was "watch finisher". His mother's name was Mary (?). They were living on Rahere Street at the time of the baptism. > > > I have searched all online English Census records for these people to no avail. There do not seem to be records in the BMD for any of the children mentioned. I have often thought that these may not have been the only children in the family. > > The one US census record found for my ancestor (1880) states that Samuel Rawlins (Jr) was born in Ireland and his parents were born in England. Where in England is the question!! Samuel Jr left Ireland in 1867 for the US. He worked in the shipping trade for several years in the States before establishing permanent residence in 1875, Samuel obviously returned to England sometime between 1871 and 1872 because there is another passenger record for him leaving Liverpool again in 1872 with a watch maker, James Marshea and his sister, Ellen, from Wolverhampton. > > Needless to say, James Marshea was the son of a Jeweler/Watchmaker, James D. Marshea who was born in Birmingham but grew up in Clerkenwell. James D. Marshea appears to have been a contemporary of my Samuel Rawlins Sr. and the two may have worked together. The Marshea family also traveled from town to town but can be tracked in the census records. > > It appears that my Rawlins ancestors traveled to Ireland and back again. I have examined all of the English online directories on Ancestry and on other online sites and find no trace of my family. I have also searched both FMP and Ancestry for birth, marriage and death records for Samuel Sr. and wife Mary. I spent four years working with a researcher in Ireland trying to find a "trace" of these folks. I do think I found a mention of my great great grandfather, Samuel jr. working in Belfast in 1858 in a pawn shop in article found on the new British Newspaper Archive site. Again, I have found no direct information on the family in the Irish sites online. I should say, I have ordered quite a few Birth, Marriage and Death records in hopes of making a connection. > > > I believe that my ancestor, Samuel Rawlins Sr., was one of the "working' poor in the 19th century. Owning no property, working for others, and probably traveling around quite a bit makes him difficult to track. One thing we do know, is that he waited to baptize his children in Islington. > > There are other Rawlins families in Middlesex and a few earlier records at St. Lukes Old Street for them which might have significance. I am just not certain. Perhaps there are other resources that can be checked at the LMA that would connect the dots? > > Information for this line of my family has come in bits and pieces. I am hopeful that one day, I will discover just who Samuel and Mary Rawlins were. > > > Thanks for listening again.... > > Bev W >

Hi Barry, I read the detailed email to Bev and after I decided to write you. I have church Records from Whitechapel with a gg-grandfather listed with two different wives a one on Queen St 1789 and then another in (At this pointe I am fed up with the horrible Lay out of LAMA. I have never had trouble in 12 years getting records before 1837 and no matter who answers in the Office all they can tell me about is the Birth, Marriage and Death records AFTER 1837. I don't think they even read the request.LMA is the biggest Mess on the net. Fed up in US Thanks for listening to me Therese Like you Bev, I get frustrated with the LMA web site. It is difficult to find, difficult to navigate and their catalogue does contain some errors, mainly due to a lack of clear identity of a record. Awarding the digitisation and indexing to Ancestry has added to the problem because of both the transcription and identification errors they have made. As I said at the start, I don't have any answers but I hope the above will be of some help in navigating your difficult task. Barry1936 -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Barry1936 Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2012 1:52 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [MDX] Rawlins (previously LMA) Hi Bev, I don't have any answers for you but a few points which may help you to focus your research. >From the detail you have provided, I guess you have found the children's baptisms by browsing the images on Ancestry. Did you also notice there were 432 baptisms on the same day, 26th October 1845? Family after family which suggests the vicar was an evangelist and had rounded up all the 'defectors' in his parish! So it may be that the Rawlins's parents were not churchgoers and will not be found in any registers, anywhere. It is also reasonable to assume that there were no earlier children or they would have been included in that mass baptism and especially as it would have been normal to call the first born son after his father. From that it is reasonable to assume that if (!) the parents married, it was in 1838. So they should just have been caught in the 1837 Act. Between 1837 & 1839, the only Samuel Rawlins possibly married to a Mary (Snell) was in St Germans, Cornwall, which seems unlikely for your Samuel but you could send for the certificate to eliminate him (or! ask someone on the Cornwall list to do a parish register search for you?). Unlike births, marriage registers after July 1837 should be complete (reporting them to the Registrar was automatic), but the GRO index may contain errors. The entries in the church register were copied and sent to the Superintendent Registrar and then copied again to Somerset House where they were copied again to the index - all handwritten. Then they were copied again by FreeBMD transcribers so it is inevitable that errors occurred somewhere along that chain. Have you tried doing a BMD search using wild cards? Free BMD is not quite complete either. There are even more transcription errors with census records so try 1841 again, with wild cards. Otherwise it seems that the marriage took place outside England & Wales - or, if they did originate from Ireland, were they Catholics? But the marriage would still have been recorded at the GRO if it was in England & Wales. Because a birth has not been recorded in BMD's that does not mean the child was not born in England, because at that time it was not compulsory to report the birth - it was up to the Registrar to find them. You may have already noticed that St Barnabas was founded in 1826 as a daughter church of St Luke, Old St, which makes the Rawlins you have found in that parish more than the just "significant" that you suggested. They are certainly worth exploring further to see where the trail leads you to or from. Also, the only registers available for St Barnabas are from 1842. It may be the earlier registers have not survived (the church was heavily bombed in 1940) or, more likely, all BMD's were performed at St Luke's; making their records worth further research. Ancestry only appear to have digitised the registers up to 1812 but the LMA catalogue says they have the registers much later than that and on microfilm - but the microfilms have been withdrawn because of the Ancestry digitisation. Only the LMA can explain that one! The other records which may help are the poor rate records, electoral registers and workhouse records. Most of these are at the LMA, some have been indexed on Ancestry and a few are held at local history libraries such as Camden and Islington. Although the "working poor", as you describe Samuel, would be unlikely to appear in the poor rate and electoral registers, there were exceptions depending upon the particular circumstances. A surprisingly large number of people from a wide range of backgrounds went in & out of the workhouse, or received 'out relief', for short periods - temporary layoffs, pregnancy and illness being the most common. The Settlement Examination record often contained valuable information about the applicants background. Like you Bev, I get frustrated with the LMA web site. It is difficult to find, difficult to navigate and their catalogue does contain some errors, mainly due to a lack of clear identity of a record. Awarding the digitisation and indexing to Ancestry has added to the problem because of both the transcription and identification errors they have made. As I said at the start, I don't have any answers but I hope the above will be of some help in navigating your difficult task. Barry1936 On 26 Jul 2012, at 13:26, [email protected] wrote: > Message: 3 > Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2012 06:38:29 -0400 (EDT) > From: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [MDX] London Metropolitan Archives > To: [email protected] > Message-ID: <[email protected]> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > Hello again, > > > As I have posted, I am searching for information about the parents of my great great grandfather, Samuel Rawlins, who was baptized with is brother Alfred and sister Mary at St. Barnabas Finsbury in October of 1845. Samuel's birthdate was given as May 3, 1839, his brother was born in 1842 and his sister born in 1844. Samuel's father was also a Samuel Rawlins whose trade was "watch finisher". His mother's name was Mary (?). They were living on Rahere Street at the time of the baptism. > > > I have searched all online English Census records for these people to no avail. There do not seem to be records in the BMD for any of the children mentioned. I have often thought that these may not have been the only children in the family. > > The one US census record found for my ancestor (1880) states that Samuel Rawlins (Jr) was born in Ireland and his parents were born in England. Where in England is the question!! Samuel Jr left Ireland in 1867 for the US. He worked in the shipping trade for several years in the States before establishing permanent residence in 1875, Samuel obviously returned to England sometime between 1871 and 1872 because there is another passenger record for him leaving Liverpool again in 1872 with a watch maker, James Marshea and his sister, Ellen, from Wolverhampton. > > Needless to say, James Marshea was the son of a Jeweler/Watchmaker, James D. Marshea who was born in Birmingham but grew up in Clerkenwell. James D. Marshea appears to have been a contemporary of my Samuel Rawlins Sr. and the two may have worked together. The Marshea family also traveled from town to town but can be tracked in the census records. > > It appears that my Rawlins ancestors traveled to Ireland and back again. I have examined all of the English online directories on Ancestry and on other online sites and find no trace of my family. I have also searched both FMP and Ancestry for birth, marriage and death records for Samuel Sr. and wife Mary. I spent four years working with a researcher in Ireland trying to find a "trace" of these folks. I do think I found a mention of my great great grandfather, Samuel jr. working in Belfast in 1858 in a pawn shop in article found on the new British Newspaper Archive site. Again, I have found no direct information on the family in the Irish sites online. I should say, I have ordered quite a few Birth, Marriage and Death records in hopes of making a connection. > > > I believe that my ancestor, Samuel Rawlins Sr., was one of the "working' poor in the 19th century. Owning no property, working for others, and probably traveling around quite a bit makes him difficult to track. One thing we do know, is that he waited to baptize his children in Islington. > > There are other Rawlins families in Middlesex and a few earlier records at St. Lukes Old Street for them which might have significance. I am just not certain. Perhaps there are other resources that can be checked at the LMA that would connect the dots? > > Information for this line of my family has come in bits and pieces. I am hopeful that one day, I will discover just who Samuel and Mary Rawlins were. > > > Thanks for listening again.... > > Bev W > ************************************** Send your List messages using **PLAIN TEXT** and always **TRIM AWAY** superfluous old messages in replies. **MEANINGFUL Subject Lines - who, what, where, when, with SURNAMES in CAPITAL letters** List Admin can be contacted at: [email protected] ------------------------------- 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