Hi Listers, Does anyone know where Melcombe Regis was, its somewhere near Weymouth, or can anyone have a look at the directories around 1851, for JAMES DUKES, who was a coachman in 1870, maybe he was in 1851. Thanks Annette.

On Sat, 3 Mar 2001 23:32:52 -0000, you wrote: >Hi Listers, >Does anyone know where Melcombe Regis was, its somewhere near Weymouth, or can anyone have a look at the directories around 1851, for JAMES DUKES, who was a coachman in 1870, maybe he was in 1851. >Thanks Annette. > Hi Annette Melcombe Regis is/was what most people think of as Weymouth today! I can say that as I live over the water on Portland :-) Apologies for "in" joke! They were two separate towns either side of the harbour and such was the rivalry between them at times, especially over the harbour rights, that it is said that they lobbed cannon balls at each other from time to time! However, times changed and the two boroughs had their heads knocked together, and eventually they combined to form the Melcombe Regis and Weymouth Corporation or some such. If you look at the census for 1881 along the sea front and the streets behind you will find that this area is classified as Melcombe Regis ie the area to the North of the harbour Weymouth was the area to the South and West of the harbour including Chapelhay and the brewery etc. Regret I don't have a census index for 1851 for Weymouth - only the Bridport and Lyme Regis area. You might be best advised to ask on the Dorset List: subscribe address: DORSET-L-request@rootsweb.com where I'm sure someone should be able to help you if your man was enumerated in either town then: you should also include Wyke Regis in your search area as this parish was, I believe, senior to Weymouth at the time and spread down into areas that are now considered to be a part of Weymouth. You might also like to note that one of the alternative spellings for Dukes down here, amongst others was possibly Jukes: probably something to do with the accent ie if you don't come up with anything for Dukes it might be worth trying Jukes just in case! Although, if he'd completed the census form himself this shouldn't be a problem! Regards Paul Portland