A sinister discovery

This weekend I finally found myself with a bit of free time, mainly because my poor boyfriend had taken himself off to bed ill and hence he couldn’t force me to DIY. So, I turned to my family history for the first time in a while to do some proper digging.

I decided that I would focus my efforts on the family of Doris Ross, who was my grandfather Horace James Hancock’s first wife, before he married my mum’s mother Margaret Goulding. She’s not at all a direct ancestor of mine, but she died young, I’m not entirely sure how, and the couple didn’t have any children, so although I felt a little bit like I was intruding on someone else’s family, I knew that no direct line descendants would be researching her at least, and I’ve always been a little bit intrigued by her.

For one thing, Horace was born in Wales, and was supposedly a fireman in Brighton during the Second World War – however, his marriage to Doris took place in 1941, in Wakefield and it has never been clear how he came to be here. I had wondered if he only moved here after he met Doris, if she was local. As it turns out she was.

In fact she was incredibly easy to track down. Firstly, I was able to find her probate record, and thus confirm the death I had for her, in 1954, was correct. She was aged just 42, giving a birth date of 1912. This was a little frustrating, as it meant she wouldn’t appear on the 1911 census, but I was able to find a birth record for her, which gave her mother’s maiden name as Gillings. From this I was easily able to track down a Gillings–Ross marriage: Elizabeth Gillings married Claude Atkin Ross in 1908. And with a name like Claude Atkin Ross to follow the rest was a breeze. Finding his probate record, with Doris Hancock named as the executor neatly tied up the parcel, so I knew I had the right family.

I won’t bore you with all the minute details of the family tree. In brief, the family seems to be mainly upper working class and one branch originates in the tiny village of Lambley, north-east of Nottinghamshire, with other branches rooted more strongly in Wakefield and the surrounding areas. However, there were a couple of intriguing snippets:

First up, there’s the religion issue. The Ross line in particular seems to be somewhat undecided as to whether it is C of E or Wesleyan – in places, one sibling is baptised Wesleyan, and then the next C of E, which variation I struggle to understand. Claude Atkin Ross himself is baptised Wesleyan in 1909, a year after his marriage to Elizabeth. I can’t find any register at all of Doris’ baptism, but many of her siblings had Wesleyan baptism. I’d liek to find out more about why this might have happened.

Far more sinister though, is the family murder! The victim was Claude Atkin Ross’s aunt Emma Eliza Sheard, formerly Perkin, née Land  – sister of his mother, Nancy Hagar Land. I was first alerted to the murder when I discovered her probate record, which read as follows:

Sheard, Emma Eliza of 4 Chevet-terrace Walton, Wakefield, widow who was last seen alive in or about July 1941 and whose dead body was found on 17 December 1948 at the Sharlston West Colliery Walton. Administration Wakefield 18 February to Harry Bramley Norman clerk. Effects £654 7s 8d.

Of course, this immediately piqued my interest, and I Googled her to see if I could find out more:

One of Walton's dark deeds happened at Chevet Terrace back in the first half of the twentieth century. Winifred Mary Hallaghan of Chevet Terrace was arrested in 1949 charged with with the manslaughter of her great aunt, Emma Eliza Sheard. When the Second World War started, Winifred invited her widowed great aunt to stay with her and her husband at Chevet Terrace. It seems that Winifred thought that the old lady might be nervous on her own. However, things did not go smoothly and Mrs Sheard, it seems, was not an easy woman to live with. In 1941 there was a quarrel between Winifred's husband, Don, and Mrs. Sheard over an electric light bulb. The quarrel ended with Don Hallaghan telling the awkward aunt that she had to go.

Mrs Sheard did not go at this point, for there followed a further exchange of bad-tempered words, this time with Winifred. Mrs Sheard said that Don should be the one to go as he had been having a bit on the side with the woman next door. Although Winifred did not believe her great aunt, she was sufficiently angered to strike her. The old woman fell backwards, hitting her head on a sewing machine. Winifred left her great aunt lying on the floor. Later, when she returned, she found her still lying there, at which point, she dragged her great aunt to bed. It seemed likely that Mrs Sheard was already dead. On her way to tell her husband about the incident, it seems that Winifred noticed children playing around a capped pit shaft not far from her home. And so it was that Mrs Sheard up at the bottom of the shaft, toppled there by her great niece Winifred.

Later, Winifred sold a cottage that her great aunt owned in Neville Street, Belle Vue - by forging her signature - all the while Mrs Sheard's remains lay at the bottom of the shaft. It seems that she did tell her husband and her brother about the incident in 1946, but they kept 'mum', so to speak. It was in 1948, that the corpse was discovered by a colliery electrician. At Leeds in 1949, Winifred was sentenced to five years in prison for forgery and three years for manslaughter.

(from http://www.jss.org.uk/north/north.html)

I haven’t yet identified Winifred Mary Hallaghan – who would be a cousin or second cousin of Doris Ross. However, I can confirm that this is definitely the same family, as I have identified Harry Bramley Norman, executor of Emma Eliza Sheard’s will, as the son of Emma Eliza’s older sister Fanny Norman née Land.

I wonder whether Doris, who married Horace at around the same time as her great aunt disappeared, knew about it – after all, this could have been a quite distant branch of the family, or a very close one. Her father, Emma Eliza’s nephew, was still alive, but his mother had died in 1934, so he may not have had much contact with her family. If they were close, I wonder how they felt about this tragedy?

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On the criminal element

I begin with a caveat, otherwise you might get something of the wrong idea: Thus far in my family history, my ancestors appear to have been generally decent, law abiding citizens (with the exception of Sarah Ann Semley, possibly).

However, I have begun investigating my newly identified Wallinger branch, and it would seem they are a BAD lot!

My 2 x great-grandfather Thomas Wallinger was born to parents William Wallinger, ag lab, and Alice (maiden name unknown) in Hanslope, Buckinghamshire in 1844. Alice was William’s second wife, and he would marry again in later life to Harriet Hensman. Eleanor gave William a son, George, and Alice went on to give him five more sons.

Two of Thomas’s brothers, Benjamin and Thomas (the elder, in memory of whom my Thomas was presumably named) died young, but some of the other Wallinger boys, it seems, were not the best behaved!

I’ve already talked a little about Thomas, who left his wife Charlotte for the much younger Sarah Jane Newby, with whom he had a son, my great grandfather Walter. The year after Walter was born Thomas was summoned to court for debt, and he died shortly afterwards. I still don’t know what happened to Sarah Jane and Walter. Until Walter married in 1929, his life is a mystery.

Thomas’s brother William was married to Rosannah Cook, with whom, presumably, he had his daughter Clara, in Yorkshire. On two censuses William is in jail, in London in 1871 and then in Surrey in 1881. As yet I’m not sure what he was convicted for.  I can only assume that he had abandoned his family. Rose ,as she appears on the 1861 census, completely disappears after this point. His daughter Clara, born 1860, is not present either, and nor does she appear again until 1891 when he elderly father is living with her and husband George Surby.

More shocking and intriguing though, is Peter Wallinger. In March 1845, at the grand old age of ten, he is convicted of arson – on ‘stacks of [illegible]’ – and sentenced to transportation for fifteen years. At this time transportation meant to Australia. This isn’t an area of genealogy I’ve encountered before, but initial searches don’t reveal any trace at all of Peter Wallinger following his conviction, either in Australia or the UK, so what happened to him is, for now, something of a mystery.

With more Wallinger brothers still to investigate, who knows what else they got up to?!

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S is for Semley

Semley is by far the most important S in my tree, though the recent discovery of the Sawkins line may change that, and there is of course the as-yet undeveloped Swift branch. We have come across the Semleys briefly in previous posts D is for Depledge and I is for Irish.

Sarah Ann Semley is my 3 x great grandmother (my father’s father’s mother’s father’s mother). She was born in 1844. In 1867 she married the Irish mason James Thompson.

Sarah Ann was the daughter of Thomas Semley and Mary Depledge. She was the eldest of eleven children: Mary Semley (b. 1846), Elizabeth Semley (b. 1848), Eliza Semley (b. 1850), Fanny Semley (b. 1855), John Semley (b. 1858), Martha Semley (b. 1860), Mary Semley (b. 1862), Thomas Semley (b. 1865), George Semley (b. 1868) and Annie Semley (b. 1870).

Thomas Semley and Mary Depledge were married on 4 September 1842 at St James church, Thornes, Wakefield. On their parish marriage record Thomas described himself as a farmer. His father’s name is given as George Semley, and he is also a farmer.

George was born in 1794 and married Ann Tummons. Besides Thomas they had eight other children: William Semley (b. 1817), John Semley (b. 1820), Joseph Semley (b. 1822), Edward Semley (b. 1824), Mary Semley (b. 1826), Henry Semley (b. 1829), Ann Semley (b. 1833) and Charles Semley (b. 1835).

The most interesting thing I have found relating to my Semley ancestors is a record from the spring court sessions held at Pontefract on 5 April 1858. The page gives the name of the accused, the offence for which they were tried, their sentence or whether they were discharged. Towards the bottom of a page of thirty names appear three Semleys: George, Ann and Sarah Ann. they were accused of larceny (i.e. theft), like the majority of those on the page. However, George and Sarah Ann are the only accused in the list to be found not guilty. Unfortunately Ann Semley was convicted and sentenced to six months in prison.

Without further information it is impossible to say how George and Ann fit into my tree – are these my 5x great grandparents, now in their sixties, or two of their children or grandchildren? However, I have found no evidence for the existence of a second Sarah Ann Semley in the area at this time, so there can be little doubt that Sarah Ann Semley, found not guilty, is my direct ancestor, aged just fourteen at the time.

I intend to explore particular story further, though how much more I will be able to uncover I have no idea...

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