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  1. #1
    Super Moderator Sue Mackay's Avatar
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    Default DOWNIE Birth in Marseilles 1819

    Hi Pottoka

    Seeing your various helpful replies to people searching for French baptisms, can you tell me if that website you mentioned (if you gave a link to it I can't immediately find it) would be any good for tracking down a British Subject born in Marseilles in 1819?

    I 'did' my father's family the hard way (pre computers) in the late 1980s and rather left my great great grandmother's origins as something I would never know, and concentrated on the male line. I am now revisiting a lot of this old research and realising I can possibly get further.

    She was born Amelia DOWNIE (according to her children's birth certificates) and on the 1861 and 1871 census returns her place of birth is given as Marseilles, with BS for British Subject. Age at death and census returns indicate she would have been born in 1819. I looked in the Overseas and Military Births on FMP, but no joy.
    Sue Mackay
    Insanity is hereditary - you get it from your kids

  2. #2
    pottoka
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    Smile Amelia from Marseilles

    Hello Sue,

    I'm sorry not to have replied until now, but I have only just seen this post. But there is obviously some sort of divine coincidence working here as today I also received six French certificates for someone else and I'd been waiting for them for ages!

    The site is genealogie.com; no link possible as it is a paying site! I have been lucky with a couple of families by putting a post on their "mains tendues" forum where each department has a thread with volunteers who go to the Archives départementales - this would be the County Library in England, where all the registers are collected together and filmed, but I don't know anything about how such things are organised in Australia. They take photos and send them to an email address. I'm registered so can do that if you like.

    It's also possible to write to a Town Hall and ask for a birth certificate (un acte de naissance) which is free in France. The only problem there is that you have to know which Town Hall to write to as they only have their own registers, as a parish would.

    I don't want to be overly pessimistic, but Amelia could have been born near Marseilles and given Marseilles on the Census as being the nearest biggest town. Still, it's better than ancestors who just put France! So, not to be defeatist, we can start with there.

    Do you know her father's first name? It would help as the French are sometimes a bit pernickety and demand lots of information. Can you give me her husband's name so that I can have a squint at her Census returns? Did she get married in England, France or Australia? Are you looking for her marriage certificate as well?

  3. #3
    Super Moderator Sue Mackay's Avatar
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    Default

    Hi Pottoka, love the frog smilie!

    We can eliminate Australia altogether as I am based in South Wales, not New South Wales

    I'm afraid I don't know anything about Amelia's family. I only know her maiden name from the birth certificates of her children.

    She married John CHANDLER, my great great grandfather, but I haven't got a marriage certificate. Their first child was born in Marylebone on 10 June 1838 so they probably got married 'somewhere in London' just before civil registration. Strangely enough this very morning I have broken down a huge brickwall concerning John, who was a plumber and glazier. John and Amelia appear on the 1841 and 1851 censuses together in Norwood. Their last child was born in 1856 and John just disappeared. Amelia lived until 1875 and is on the 1861 and 1871 census for Norwood, but not marked as a widow. I have been trying to work out what happened to John for 20 years, and just this morning found a snippet in the Liverpool Mercury for August 1858:

    Notice was on Monday communicated to the Metropolitan Police that Mr. John Chandler, plumber, Norwood, had embezzled large sums of money and decamped. His body was immediately after found in the River Lea.

    - a black sheep!

    But I digress.

    Amelia appears on the census returns as follows:

    1851 HO107/1575 f523 p2 aged 32 b France, British Subject
    1861 RG9/367 f92 p23 aged 40 b France, Marseilles BS
    1871 RG10/693 f26 p5 aged 49 b British Subject, Marseilles, France

    Have just noticed from my old notes that she was 24 in 1841, so she could actually have been born any time between 1817 and 1822 depending on which census return you believe. Not looking good this, is it? I can see why I concentrated on other lines when I started this lark
    Sue Mackay
    Insanity is hereditary - you get it from your kids

  4. #4
    Super Moderator Sue Mackay's Avatar
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    Default

    Should have said that her death certificate says she was 56 when she died on 12 December 1875, which is why I had born c 1819 on my database.
    Sue Mackay
    Insanity is hereditary - you get it from your kids

  5. #5
    Name well known on Brit-Gen
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    As she was a British Subject, perhaps it is worth looking at the Bishop of London's copies of foreign baptisms, marriages and burials (International Memoranda). These cover Anglican chaplaincies in Europe and overseas. There is some information here. It might be worth emailing Guildhall Library, in case the staff will take a look for you?

    Kerrywood

  6. #6
    Super Moderator Sue Mackay's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kerrywood View Post
    As she was a British Subject, perhaps it is worth looking at the Bishop of London's copies of foreign baptisms, marriages and burials (International Memoranda). These cover Anglican chaplaincies in Europe and overseas. There is some information here. It might be worth emailing Guildhall Library, in case the staff will take a look for you?

    Kerrywood
    Thanks once again Kerrywood. I can definitely feel a trip to London to Guildhall Library and Colindale coming on
    Sue Mackay
    Insanity is hereditary - you get it from your kids

  7. #7
    pottoka
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    Unhappy Sorry!

    I couldn't find a blushing frog, so this is one covered in a rash of embarassment, instead. I don't know what to say, apart from that I'm very sorry that I misread your place of residence!

  8. #8
    Super Moderator Sue Mackay's Avatar
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    No problems. I've been doing so much digging today on lines I last dealt with years ago that I'll probably end up in Australia anyway
    Sue Mackay
    Insanity is hereditary - you get it from your kids

  9. #9
    pottoka
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    Quote Originally Posted by Sue Mackay View Post
    No problems. I've been doing so much digging today on lines I last dealt with years ago that I'll probably end up in Australia anyway
    And it sounds as though you're getting results! Well done on tracking down John Chandler, especially so far from home. Does that mean you can find a death registration for him, too? It's interesting having a black sheep - but I pity Amelia!

    I have discovered that the Archives for the Bouches du Rhône are online, so it might be possible to find Amelia that way. However, so far, I have only managed to get the births of 1819 (for example) without an index, so it would mean trawling through the births in Marseilles for the whole year. Rather Herculean, I fear.

    I will look into that further. Otherwise, it is possible to contact the Town Hall by email apparently (they usually ask for a letter), and it takes about 10 days for a reply.

  10. #10
    pottoka
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    Parlez-vous français, Sue?

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