lost marriage

[Angelaj]

Hi
I can't find the marriage between John Dennis (Denes, Dines) and Mary. I've got them on the 1841 and 1851 census living at the same address in Ampthill, Bedfordshire, however their children were born in Hendon (1823), Friern Barnet (1826, 1828, 1832) and Ampthill (1837). They must have moved about a fair bit but I don't yet know why. Both John and Mary were born in Ampthill, according to the census. I've looked for their marriage but can't find it in any of the above places. I know I can order the birth certificate of one of the later children to get their mother's maiden name, but I'd still like to find the marriage and cut down on certificates. Can anyone help?
Angelaj

[Colin Moretti]

How will you know that you have the correct marriage if you don't know the bride's maiden name, given that you don't know where the marriage took place?

You don't say where you've looked; do you mean you've checked the parish registers or just the IGI? If the latter it's quite possible that you wouldn't find the marriage, for example I don't think that there are any marriages for Hendon in the IGI (at least, there are none listed in Hugh Wallis's IGI batch number website).

What was John's occupation? That might explain the frequent moves.

Colin

[Angelaj]

Hi Colin,
At the moment I've only been able to check the IGI but I'll be able to take a look at the Ampthill PRs next week hopefully.
Good point about recognising the marriage. John and Mary's son was chr. John William Odell Dennis. I have a suspicion that John married Mary Odell. There was a Mary Odell chr. 1800 Ampthill which would match Mary's dates on both censuses (censees ?). But this is just an educated guess, Odell is fairly common as a surname in parts of Bedfordshire so there might be a connection with either parents to the name.
John was an ag. lab. so no clues there for the movements.
Angelaj