Fish surname Sawbridgeworth/Stanstead Abbots

[Sylvia]

I have just started to help my husband look into his Fish family from Hertfordshire. His gg grandfather was Thomas Fish b 1838 in Sawbridgeworth and Thomas' descendants had moved to Stanstead Abbots by the early 1900s.

We would love to hear from anyone who has links with this family

Kind regards

Sylvia

[Clive Blackaby]

His gg grandfather was Thomas Fish b 1838 in Sawbridgeworth and Thomas' descendants had moved to Stanstead Abbots by the early 1900s.

Hi Sylvia, and welcome to the Hertfordshire B-G Forum!

Did your family move, or did the boundary move??? In any event, they didn't move far - a bit like my lot really.

You might find this thread of interest:-

http://www.british-genealogy.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8284


I've not established any relationships with my own family, but in my notes I have:-
----------------------------------------
Hannah Fish b ca 1846, Widford, Servant in the household of Henry Thomas Blackaby, Baker, High St, Stanstead, Herts. (1861 Census)
----------------------------------------
Mary Fish b ca 1850 Sawbridgeworth, daughter of William Fish, Married Charles Blackaby (b ca 1844, High Wych) on 2-Jan-1869 in High Wych. (This is from 1881 census, and High Wych PR extracts on BIVRI)

In 1861, Mary was housekeeper to Joseph Whybrew (farmer) in Sawbridgeworth (Census info - and oh dear, I need to check that - it might be Charles who was JW's Housekeeper, my notes are ambiguous|oopsredfa)

I have records of the births and baptisms of Charles and Mary's 7 offspring if you are interested, but have not followed them up as yet - any relationship to my Blackaby family is fairly remote if any.

I do a bit of "Fish|oopsredfaing around" in Herts PRs |book2|, so I'll try to keep an eye open for you.

Kind Regards

Clive

[veldsmw]

Hi I have a John Fish born about 1720
he lived in Clewer and Windsor till 1777 when he died
he married an Elizabeth
cant find where he came from.
Does he have any connections with Fish in your area?

thanks
Walter

[Ed Bradford]

Hi Sylvia,
Clive has already pointed out the thread that I started which contained my Fish ancestor. I haven't been able to add anything to my file on that family since that posting. I keep hoping that I'll stumble on to something. Keep me in mind if you find any information at all.
..............Ed

[petercornish]

Hi Sylvia,
The 1841 census under reference HO107/434/9 F.14 P.22 records Thomas age 2 at Spellbrook, Sawbridgeworth with his parents John 35 and Ann 35 and siblings Mary 13, John10, Charles 7, Henry 4, and George 3mths. (Adult ages rounded down to nearest 5 in this census).
The 1851, HO107/1706 F.68 P.29 has Thomas living at Says Field, Sawbridgeworth and records John 49 bn Thorley, Ann 47 Little Hadham and one more sibling, James 6.
The IGI records a marriage at Little Hadham of John FISH and Ann SHIPP on 17Nov1821.
Hope this helps.
Regards ... Peter

[petercornish]

Hi Sylvia,
I searched the Sawbridgeworth and Thorley PRs but regret no trace of a baptism for Thomas FISH circa 1838. I did however find a baptism for John s/o Richard and Mary FISH on 23Mar1800 at Thorley.
At Little Hadham I found a baptism for Ann d/o Wm. and Mary SHIPP on 04May1806 (born 23Apr1806) also the interesting marriage entry for John and Ann which read ...
John FISH of this parish bachelor and Ann SHIPP otp spinster were married by banns with consent of James WATTS on 17th November 1821. Witnesses James WATTS and Mary CHAPEL. All four made their marks.

Regards ... Peter

[Clive Blackaby]

Hi Sylvia,
I searched the Sawbridgeworth and Thorley PRs .......
At Little Hadham .......
Hi Peter,
(and apologies to Sylvia for hijacking her thread and "going off topic") but does that mean you have ready access to Hertfordshire PRs???
{feel free to reply via email if you'd prefer not to give open details!!}

[Sylvia]

Hi All

Thank you Clive for the welcome and no problem about hijacking the thread for Parish Register access information!

Thank you also Peter and Clive for the Fish details from the Parish Registers, Census, etc. We have not found any links to the Blackaby/ Fish line as yet although we have found a few High Wych Fishes on the records.

Looking at the information you all kindly posted alongside the information we have found, it looks as though the most likely direct line for my husband's family is the one back to John and Ann Shipp. So our Fishes seem to be mainly from Sawbridgeworth (which seems to move between Herts and Essex), Thorley, Bishops Stortford and Stanstead Abbots.

Thank you Ed for pointing out the thread containing your Fish ancestor. We have read through it.

Walter - unfortunately, we do not have any information about the John Fish be about 1720 but will bear it in mind if we come across anything that looks likely.

My husband is now busy entering quite a lot of Fish information into our software and as soon as he is a bit more into the swing of things, I will probably subscribe him to the B-G Forum while I continue to research my Staffordshire roots!

Best wishes

Sylvia

[Clive Blackaby]

Hi Sylvia,

I've got a file of (oh dear, sorry |blush|) Dead Fish & Shipps - abstracted from the National Burial Index. v1 including quite a few in Sawbridgeworth, Hadham etc.

Copyright restrictions prohibit me from putting this on the forum, but if you'd like to drop me an email through the site, I'll send it to you.

Clive

[suzannewozere2]

Clive at Leventhorpe school Sawbridgeworth mid 1970's-mid 1980's there were Sawbridgeworth Fish and Blackaby families still.

Shipp family in Bishop's Stortford and Takeley and Elsenham too.

[flowerpotmum]

Hi Sylvia
I have just joined BG and noticed your posts, as I think I am directly related to your husbands family of Fish. My Grandmother Annie E Fish was born in Ware 1892, Her father was Arthur Fish, mother Elizabeth Bird. His father was Charles fish, mother Martha Morris, and I think his father was John Fish married Ann. So Mary John Henry Thomas George and James are all siblings of my great grandfather. I would be extremely grateful if you could let me have any further information going backwards or sideways, as I cant find any parish records for the county on the genealogy website I have been using, and I'm not very computer literate. Which one was your husbands ancestor?

[cristol]

Hi Flowerpotmum |wave|

Welcome to Brit-Gen

If you need info on Hertfordshire families try

Hertsdirect.org (www in front)
Then choose
libraries and leisure - then heritage, then Hertfordshire Archives and Local Studies

this gives information for HALS and its collections and records including

Hertfordshire names online – which has details of a few “fish” marriages.

Another good site for help with Herts ancestors and locations that I have found useful is:-
Hertfordshire-genealogy.co.uk(www)

Hope you might find something interesting there.

Good luck with your “fishing”

Lesley

[WendyS]

Hi All.
I was quite excited to find this thread when googling for Hertfordshire Fish names.
After reading through the posts, I was also excited to find some names which I have in my tree also.
My grandmother Elsie Fish was the last in that direct line of Fish.
I have been having a wonderful (but exhausting) time scanning the Essex parish records and sighting the entries for many of my ancestors, but knowing that many went to, or came from Hertfordshire (from information from other Fish researchers), I can't find anything online to help me. Living in Australia is of little help going to libraries or the archives, and the LDS records have been exhausted.
Some information about my closer Fish relatives, in the hope someone here can tie them in with their records...
My grandmother Elsie Fish (1912 - 1992), married George Taylor (1911 - 1974) in Islington.
Her father was Albert Fish (1882 - 1913), and mother Eliza Smith (1880 - 1929).
They also had another daughter Beatrice, who died in infancy (1910 - 1911).
Albert's parents were William Fish (1846 - C1890) and Mary Godfrey (Cambridgeshire 1842 - ?)
All of these ancestors lived in the Enfield/Bethnal Green/Hackney area.
Is there any parish records available to look through online, similar to the Essex original images?
Many thanks in advance, Wendy.

[flowerpotmum]

Hi Wendy. My grandmother was Annie Eveline Fish b. 1892 married Eustace Vivian Walden in 1920. Her Fish siblings were Herbert, Arthur, Earnest, Alfred, Frederick, all born in Sawbridgeworth, and also Leonard, Ida, Florence, Edward, Claude, & Gladys born in Ware Herts. All born between 1883 and 1906. Their parents were Arthur Fish b. 1862 in Sawbridgeworth and Elizabeth Ann Bird b.1863 in Dunmow. His Fish siblings were Henry, Helena (Ellen), Josiah, Caroline, Walter, William, and John, all born between 1857 and 1875 in Sawbridgeworth. His father was Charles Fish. In 1855 he married Martha Morris b. 1832, and his siblings were Mary John Henry Thomas George and James all born between 1828 and 1845. Their parents were John Fish born in Thorley Herts. around 1806 and Ann Shipp born 23 April 1806 in Little Hadham Herts. Johns parents were possibly Richard Fish & wife Mary. I have not yet found any Fish relatives outside Herts. Ann Shipps parents may have been William and Mary. I haven't tried to find any parish records yet, but I will go back to Fish and Shipps, Morris and Bird when I have got back further with my research down other branches of the family.
Please do let me know if you find any link!!


Hi All.
I was quite excited to find this thread when googling for Hertfordshire Fish names.
After reading through the posts, I was also excited to find some names which I have in my tree also.
My grandmother Elsie Fish was the last in that direct line of Fish.
I have been having a wonderful (but exhausting) time scanning the Essex parish records and sighting the entries for many of my ancestors, but knowing that many went to, or came from Hertfordshire (from information from other Fish researchers), I can't find anything online to help me. Living in Australia is of little help going to libraries or the archives, and the LDS records have been exhausted.
Some information about my closer Fish relatives, in the hope someone here can tie them in with their records...
My grandmother Elsie Fish (1912 - 1992), married George Taylor (1911 - 1974) in Islington.
Her father was Albert Fish (1882 - 1913), and mother Eliza Smith (1880 - 1929).
They also had another daughter Beatrice, who died in infancy (1910 - 1911).
Albert's parents were William Fish (1846 - C1890) and Mary Godfrey (Cambridgeshire 1842 - ?)
All of these ancestors lived in the Enfield/Bethnal Green/Hackney area.
Is there any parish records available to look through online, similar to the Essex original images?
Many thanks in advance, Wendy.

[Clive Blackaby]

Hi Wendy,
"HALS" have quite a lot of the Hertfordshire parish records indexed on line, though the original images have to be paid for.

www.
hertsdirect.org/libsleisure/heritage1/HALS/indexes/

Not wanting to teach a fish to suck eggs:wacko:, I assume you've TRAWLED :troll: all the BMDs and Censuses

[WendyS]

Thankyou Clive..and yes I have followed all of the 'usual' paths.
I did a search on HALS, entering various Fish names, and just the surname, and apart from 1 or 2 unkown names, mostly references to Fish named streets or fishing licenses came up. The majority of names were Fisher or similar.

FPM, yes we have the same members!
Their parents were John Fish born in Thorley Herts. around 1806 and Ann Shipp born 23 April 1806 in Little Hadham Herts.
John was baptised in Thorley 23 March 1800. He and Ann were married Little Hadham 17/11/1821
Johns parents were possibly Richard Fish & wife Mary.
You are correct. His father was Richard Fish 4th June 1767, and mother Mary Haggar C1768. Both from Thorley.
I have not yet found any Fish relatives outside Herts.
All of my Fish ancestors are from Hertfordshire, until we get down to William Fish (1846) born in Enfield, Middlesex. This is where my closer ancestors seem to have stayed. He married Mary Godfrey from Cambridgeshire.
William is the Great Great Grandson of Richard (1737) and Lydia.

Did you know one of the Fish boys (William) was sent to Australia as a convict? He was the nephew of Richard and Mary Fish.

Now, here's a teaser for you all. Does anyone here have a Margaret Fish, born 1660?
I was surprised that no one seems to have found/considered her in their search for the elusive John (our 'patriarch'), and she may be a key link.

Cheers, Wendy

[WendyS]

I am presuming you are stumped on Margaret as I am, but I scoured the Stansted Mountfitchet parish images again last night, and have come to the conclusion that Margaret's parents - John and ?, were living in the parish at the time. There is no record of their marriage. There is no record of any Fish burials, marriages or baptisms apart from Margarets. Therefore, they must have been married at a different parish, and moved on.
There are a few marriages for a Margaret Fish in the London area.

There was one interesting entry that may be worth looking into.
A marriage of Samuel Fish(e)(sr) and Mary Pledg(ae)r, 25/3/1654.
As we know, The elusive John Fish maried Ellen Bowtell, who was the daughter of Elizabeth Pledgar.
Could this be Ellen's Aunt?

Any thoughts?

What is most frustrating for me is that I don't know the surrounding parishes to work my way around, the boundaries of Essex, Hert, Middlesex etc, and the limit on what records are available to look at for free.

[Jan1954]

What is most frustrating for me is that I don't know the surrounding parishes to work my way around, the boundaries of Essex, Hert, Middlesex etc, and the limit on what records are available to look at for free.You may find the Hertfordshire page (http://joinermarriageindex.co.uk/pjoiner/genuki/HRT/) of GENUKI to be a good starting point. :smile5:

[Kerrywood]

I don't know the surrounding parishes to work my way around, the boundaries of Essex, Hert, Middlesex etc
English Jurisdictions 1851 (http://maps.familysearch.org/) lists contiguous parishes, and options for identifying various administrative boundaries.

Enter your parish of interest, and Search
Wait for the page to load (slow!) ...
Select the Options tab on the map
Select List Contiguous Parishes

Although it's geared to 1851, it does at least give you an idea of where else to look. :smile5:

[WendyS]

Fantastic! Thankyou very much.

[suzannewozere2]

http://www.
stortfordhistory.co.uk/thorley/thorley_street.html

[flowerpotmum]

Hi Fish Seekers
I am spending a day in Sawbridgeworth beginning of May, to visit an aged Fish relative and find some of the places associated with my Fish ancestors. I would be happy to take photos of any buildings associated with your Fishes in Sawbridgeworth that may be of interest to you while I am there. Send me a private message with the address/details and I'll see what I can do.
Flowerpotmum

[Clive Blackaby]

What is most frustrating for me is that I don't know the surrounding parishes to work my way around, the boundaries of Essex, Hert, Middlesex etc, and the limit on what records are available to look at for free.

You might find Parloc software useful - it allows you to find a parish, and then list all parishes withing a chosen radius, as well as telling you the distance between two chosen parishes

You can download it free from www.
parloc.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/

[suzannewozere2]

Downloaded it but can't work out how to use it.

You might find Parloc software useful - it allows you to find a parish, and then list all parishes withing a chosen radius, as well as telling you the distance between two chosen parishes

You can download it free from www.
parloc.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/

[WendyS]

Yes, it looks potentially helpful, but rather messy to work around. I read the manual, but still rather complicated. I did eventually get some neighbouring names, but I think more from pot luck. I guess it's just keep trying until we get used to how it works.:willy_nilly:

[Clive Blackaby]

It's a fairly unsophisticated progam that has a gazeteer that you can search in a number of ways.

I'll give you a quick example.

At the top of the form, you have a yellow box "Enter search string here". Let's say you are looking at Sawbridgeworth:

Type sawb in the box, and click on "Find First".

Sawbridgeworth will be highlighted in blue, and you can see that it is a Parish (P) in Hertfortshire (HRT) England (ENG)
Its OS map coordinates are TL4815, 548E, 215N

Click "Select 1st Parish" to move Sawbridgeworth to the 1st parish boxes.

You could now type another parish - let's say you type stanst and click "Find First".

You'll see several possibles - we want Stanstead Abbotts, so click on "Find Next" twice so it is highlighted in Blue

Now click "Select 2nd Parish", and then "Calculate Distance and direction" and you'll see where Stanstead Abbots is in relation to Sawbridgeworth - distance and direction.
(This is probably easier to do on Google Maps with two obvious villages, but less so for Parishes within larger settlements, or where you have a choice of several similarly named parishes)


But here's the bit you are looking for:

Type 7 in the yellow "Radius around parish" box (That's in miles, and must be a whole number, not 6.1)
Now click on "Parishes within Radius" - you will get a list of all parishes within 7 miles of Sawbridgeworth.

You can copy the list to a file, print it out, or even plot them on a simple diagram (Click "Plot")


There are other things you can do once you've got the hang of it - there's an on-line manual that lists them all - select "Manual" from the top menu.

Hope this helps

[Clive Blackaby]

Once you have your list of parishes, try using Hugh Wallis's site to see which parish registers have been transcribed by the LDS. This is arranged by County (HRT = Hertfordshire - there's a list of these standard codes included in Parloc)

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~hughwallis/

Once you've found a parish register, you can search it direct from HW's site, and you will get ONLY the records on IGI which come from transcriptions of that register, cutting out all the things from other sources which are less consistent and reliable

[veldsmw]

Hi
We are trying to make sense of all the FISH families in the world.
Jamie Fish has had more than 40 families do their DNA tests so far. The results has been able to connect families that otherwise would not be possible to connect.
The DNA study so far is mostly on USA families with some connections to England.

We need to extend the study to include a lot more English Fish families and Scottish, Welsh and Irish Fish families.

Would you please consider joining our FISH FAMILY DNA Project. My Fish family comes form Berkshire England 1700 and our DNA tests and results are already completed.

Please see Jamie Fish’s DNA website and see how you can contribute.
http://www.
familytreedna.com/public/fish/default.aspx

We will be most excited to have you as part of our study.
All you need is a male FISH family member so we can do the YDNA test.

By participating in our study, you might be very pleasantly surprised by the results, which can help you narrow down where your family comes from and what other Fish family branches you connect with. The connected Fish families might help you break your brick wall as well, so lots of benefits for joining our study.

Thanks
Walter in London, England





I have just started to help my husband look into his Fish family from Hertfordshire. His gg grandfather was Thomas Fish b 1838 in Sawbridgeworth and Thomas' descendants had moved to Stanstead Abbots by the early 1900s.

We would love to hear from anyone who has links with this family

Kind regards

Sylvia

[Eanswythe]

Hello Sylvia,

I wonder from the date of your post if you are still looking for Fish and Ship families, or whether you have now got everything sorted out? I'm no Fish expert, but I have a large collection of Ship(p)s which is one of my direct lines.