Variations in GIB

One of my CARR-line surnames is GIB.  It didn't take any time at all to find that it could just as well appear in records as GIB or GIBB or GIBBS.  Well, that's when it appears...it seems to be fairly rare, or at least it is where I've been looking! (East Riding of Yorkshire, 1770s)

Recently I picked up my Genealogical Research in England and Wales, Vol. 1, and I decided to see if the "Surnames -- Given Names -- Dialect" chapter had anything interesting.  That's not a topic that ordinarily excites me...and I've probably never looked at that chapter before.  First, I was surprised when I came to the name GIBB, and secondly, I was surprised to see a whole half paragraph!

Some variations in the spelling of surnames caused by local pronunciation are somewhat obvious, but others are not. ... A family of Gibb from near Chard in Somerset is found recorded under the spellings of Geeb, Geep, Gabe, and Geab.  One interesting case is that of Betty Geab recorded in the 1851 census, whose death was subsequently registered and appears in the indexes at Somerset House under the spelling of Gabe.  Although her burial at the parish church of Merriott is written Elizabeth Gibb, it was not until every entry recorded in the week of her death at the local superintendant's register office was checked, that the spelling Gabe was discovered. [1]

I wonder if I've missed any of these variations in my research?  I think I would have made note of these, given how rarely I see any one-syllable word starting with G, but I will certainly pay more attention now!

Conclusions

• I found this book in a used book store in Utah several years ago.  I think older books about research ofter have a lot to offer.  And, re-reading them occasionally can be useful!
• I've added these unusual variations to my GIBB family group sheet so that I'm more likely to be reminded to be creative in my searching.

Source

David E. Gardner & Frank Smith. Genealogical Research in England and Wales, Vol. 1.  Salt Lake City: Bookcraft Publishers, 1956, p. 273. [The italics are as they are in the original; the color is my addition.]

First Friday Folder: Grice & Gibb

I chose this folder for review this month because I knew it would be pretty quick to check!  After all, I have to get back to analyzing and inputting all the new Richardson & Shaw data I got on my recent trip to Missouri....  On the other hand, Grice & Gib will be the ones I return to after I get all of Missouri sorted out.

The Couple
John GRICE and Sarah GIBB are my 4th-great-grandparents on the paternal side of my Carr line.  I have posted before about these surnames and geography and specifically about their marriage. [1]

There is a nice sequence of baptisms in the West Lutton / Weaverthorpe area for children of John & Sally GRICE, including my 3rd-great-grandmother Rachel (Grice) Ethell.  Two trees from solid family researchers had given me the marriage of John Grice and Sarah Gigs as 1808 in Yorkshire, with unsourced, online trees giving John's birth as 1754.

My early research found an 1823 Baine's Directory for Yorkshire with both a John Grice senior (farmer & grocer) and John Grice junior (wheelwright & farmer).  This and John's calculated age at the marriage worried me and made me think I should at least consider the idea that Sarah had married Junior or even that "Sally" and "Sarah" were two different women.

But, now having followed both Bishop's Transcripts and Parish Records [3] in the area for a whole lot of years, I agree that

• Sarah/Sally is one person,
• she married John Grice senior, and
• the Rachel Grice who marries Joseph Ethell is their daughter.

The tricky part is that Senior was a widower when they married!  Junior was one of at least seven children of Senior and Ann Simpson, who was buried 27 Dec 1807.

Senior was buried in 1833, after he and Sarah had another seven children.  Then, widow Sarah Grice married widower George IRELAND in 1834.  They had no children together.  They appear together in the 1841 census District 6, Weaverthorpe, Yorkshire [2].  Conveniently, Jane GRICE, the youngest daughter of Senior and Sally is with them, cementing the family groups I've formed:

The Folder
Given the time span, the folder is not swollen with census extracts.  But, it does need three family group sheets: Grice/Gibb, Grice/Simpson, and Ireland/Gibb.  I had only printed out one of those previously, so I fixed that omission today.

The folder also holds several sheets of info on "unknown" Grice's.  I think I will be able to label several of those after I finish with the parish records and sorting all the kids and grandkids.  I also have a few printouts from online family trees with clearly incorrect and/or incomplete info on this couple. 

The Plan

• after I "finish" all the work left from my wonderful Missouri research trip, I have to go back and finish reading/analyzing the parish records, land tax records, and church wardens' accounts for this area
• input all the data from that analysis
• try to see what I can find on the kids in the 1841 and later censuses
• verify Senior's birth/baptism and parents as much as possible
• look for Sarah Gibbs' birth and parents; I have a clue that leads me to Acklan and I'm excited to start looking there!

Conclusions
It really pays to use multiple sources.  I'm pretty proud of the research I've done on this couple.  I wonder if I should try to contact some of the owners of those online trees?

Watch out, "Missouri pile," here I come!  I've got a thing or two to show you!

Sources & Disclaimer

[1] see those posts for additional source citations

[2] census image cropped from that at ancestry.com

[3] Weaverthorpe, Yorkshire, England.  Parish register 1682-1862, FHL # 1,068,415, Item 14-19

I do not and have never worked for nor received any special consideration for any of the entities listed above.

Lots More Marriage Records: Grice & Gib

I didn't intend to write a series, but here's another example (my first such post is here) of the need to use indexes, regardless of their format, only as finding aids leading to the original records.  Today's example is from  FamilySearch and its England Marriages, 1538-1973 database.

Index Results
Searching for a GRICE and GIB marriage, my 4th-great-grandparents, yields these two index results:

This one gives lots of info;  FHL film # 1,655,691 is cited.  The slight misspellings/transcription errors could be the first hint that something might be a tad askew....

The second search result gives less info, a bit of conflict in the location, and a marriage a day later:

It cites FHL # 990,896 as the source.  I really, really hope that anyone getting these search results takes the time to look at the source microfilms....

FamilySearch Issued a Warning
If you follow the links back from the image screens to those about the database itself, you arrive at the Wiki page for the English Vital Records Index.  It's a fairly detailed description of the record set.  The first section in this wiki is 'Known Issues with this Collection.'  I think FamilySearch made a good decision in making these records available online, even though they knew there were major problems. It's up to the genealogist to carefully evaluate any records and to do a thorough job before drawing conclusions.  In this case, the sources cited for my ancestors give a much more precise picture than the conflicting index entries.

Back to the Source
FHL film # 1,655,691 is Marriage Bonds,1806-1811 for the Church of England, Dean & Chapter of York.  The entire film is images of marriage allegations and marriage bonds.  The indexed "marriage date" of 17 October 1808 is really the date the allegation was made and the bond was pledged.  The "marriage location" was really the couple's cited residences at the time. Later in the bond, it says that John "prayed a License to Solemnize the said Marriage in the Chapel of Luttons Ambo."  It's good data to have, but it's no guarantee that a marriage ceremony occurred that day, if at all.

I was looking only in the Weaverthorpe area.  Without the FamilySearch index leading me to a film about the 'peculiar jurisdiction of the Dean & Chapter of York,' I am not confident that I ever would have found it on my own, even though I knew the jurisdiction existed.  I just wouldn't have looked for it.  This series of films begins with 1613-1704.  I wonder what treasures I could find if I look at more of them?!

and Back to the Other Source
FHL # 990,896 has Bishop's Transcripts: Item 1 for the Parish Church of Helperthorpe, 1631-1870; Item 3 for the nearby parish church of Weaverthorpe, 1631-1852.  The Helperthorpe item is much shorter and Helperthorpe residents all most exclusively.  The Weaverthorpe item includes residents of both areas and  seems to have all the burials for the area.    In Item 3, we find this record:

There are no page numbers -- just general chronological order.  The section is labeled Marriages 1808.  My photo is not that good, but the image was easy to read:

Octr 18th.  John Grice of this Parish, Widower, and Sarah Gib of the same Parish, Spinster, were married in Lutton Chapel by licence [sic]

In this case, the index seems to be accurate in giving October 18 as the marriage date and Weaverthorpe was the parish, but not the exact location.  A very small number of entries in this film specify Lutton Chapel as the location. 

Conclusions

• New online databases are wonderful, but there are problems.
• Not everything we need for better results in our research is online.  Microfilms still have great value.
• Having been led to these films by the FamilySearch website and now having read the source films, I've found details of John's first marriage, discovered his probable parents, and found that Jane remarried after John's death.  That totally unexpected discovery even led to finding her in the 1841 census.  Thank you, FamilySearch!

Research Diary: Weaverthorpe, Yorkshire

This post is a report on how my research on ETHELLs and GRICEs of my last First Friday Folder post is going.  Ah, the unexpected things I learn....

DAY1

Having reviewed my folder on great-great-great-grandparents Joseph Ethell & Rachel Grice, and feeling well-prepared for my research, I arrived at the local Family History Center and set myself up at a microfilm reader.  My goal was Item 3 of FHL # 990,896: Bishop's Transcripts for Weaverthorpe, 1631-1852, Church of England, Parish Church of Weaverthorpe in Yorkshire, England.  My first thought was 'How inconvenient that I'm going to have to scroll through 2 whole items to get to the one I need, drat!'

I am still compulsive enough that I at least write down the title of every item on a film and annotate my notes about whether or not I read an item.  First, I wrote down the film number and what my general goal was: birth and marriage data on Joseph, Rachel, and their children.  Then, I wrote out the title entry for Item 1 and my note that I was not reading this one at all: whoever even heard of 'Helperthorpe'?  I need Weaverthorpe and so there. 

But the compulsive me, while rapidly scrolling through Item1 on my to Item 3, did a random stop and read one page.   And, there was a GRICE!  This is not a super common surname so I figured I'd better check this out before I went any further.  I ran Google maps on one of the FHC's computers and found that, wonder of all wonders, Helperthorpe is only 0.8 mile from Weaverthorpe! 

I had broken one of the cardinal laws of genealogy: know your geography before you do serious research!  Fortunately, the Genealogy Elf had given me a GRICE on my random stop.  Otherwise, I probably would have sent the film back to Salt Lake without knowing what I had in my hands.

Quickly reading backwards just 3 pages from my random stop yielded 4 more GRICEs, but the year was much to early to be of use to me now, so I went forward to an intermediate section title page which said "Helperthorpe -- 1790-1807, 1802, 1809-1812." As 1790 was where I had decided I would focus my reading in Weaverthorpe, this seemed like a good place to start my notetaking for Helperthorpe.  I saw that Helperthorpe must be a pretty small place because there were only 3 baptisms and no marriages nor burials for the entire year from Lady Day 1790 to Lady Day 1791.  I also found a notation for one year specifying that the marriages and burials for that year were recorded at Weaverthorpe.  So, clearly, these two locations are linked and I must consider them both in my ETHELL / GRICE quest.

I read through to 1850 in Helperthorpe and found 15 GRICE entries (including 3 children of a Wilson/Grice couple.  I can't yet connect any of these to my lines, but I've just begun!

DAY 2

Before I left for the FHC, I went to the GENUKI website and ran Weaverthorpe through the church database.   I searched for all churches within 6 miles of Weaverthorpe.  I quickly got a list of 26 churches (18 Church of England and 8 Methodist of one sort or another).  Here's a snippet of those search results:

I'm already pretty confident that my GRICEs & ETHELLs are connected to Weaverthorpe and to Lutton.  Now, I see that if I had run this search earlier when I should have, I would have also known to search in Helperthorpe and Butterwick.

At the FHC, I scrolled ahead to Item 3 to read Weaverthorpe. [I had already run Google maps on Hornby of Item 2 and found that it was 60 miles away and I don't feel a need to read it yet!]    I started reading/notetaking in the third section, dated 1760-1775.

There are more GRICEs here, but the script is different and it appears to be spelled 'grifse,' which I think is GRISSE, a possible alternative spelling.  I was hoping I was making a good assumption when I found this marriage record:

Banns of Marriage between Richard Grice & Ann Kellington were published on Tuesday ye 12th ye 19th & ye 26th of May by Mr Geo Lawson Mininster. / The above Richard Grice, spelled Grifse in ye Baptismal Register of Lutton, Batchelor & Ann Kellington also of Lutton Spinster, were married in ye Chapel of West Lutton by Banns on Wednesday ye twenty ninth day of May in ye year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred & eighty two by me...

Wasn't that nice of the minister to specify the exact name he wanted!  Altogether, I extracted 14 more GRICE entries this day.  I still can't confidently claim any of them, but I am starting to form family groups.  Once I get to the 1830s, I hope to find the link I need.

DAY 3

Whoops! I woke up with the sudden realization that I wasn't looking for GIB/GIBS/GIBB/etc.  That's the surname of Rachel's possible mother.  I think I would have come to my senses if I had seen a GIB, but it bothers me that I hadn't actually include the surname in my goal statement.  The little research I've done before on Rachel has never found any GIB (etc.) families anywhere near a GRICE or ETHELL.  

Well, I'm eager to get on with reading the Weaverthorpe film, but I won't make it to the FHC today after all.  Life gets in the way sometimes....  But, I've sat here instead and reviewed all the notes I've made so far.  I'll try again on Thursday!

MEMO TO SELF

• Always run the church locations before reviewing any church records in England.
• Always look at a detailed map and see the nearby towns, too.
• Make sure the goals I specify for reading any film have all the surnames I'm looking for.

NOTE

There are no page numbers in either of the two Bishop's Transcripts used here.  All the records are in rough chronological order.  The film is unusually clear and easy to read for the most part.