Genealogy Chat

For many years I have searched for a record of Henry's parents.

I have sat in Record Offices and trawled through parish records and have an Ancestry sub.

With various new records now available, I wondered if anyone could offer any clues, perhaps FMP ?

Many people have trees linking him as the son of Thomas SHEATH and his wife, Jane, but when I contact, nobody can tell me where they found the information ( on another tree, I suspect? )

. Henry SHEATH married Harriet HATCHER, April 1837 in St Marys, Southampton. No SHEATH witnesses. They had several children in Southampton before Harriet died there in 1860, and Henry died 1880. Census details show him born Beaulieu, Hampshire c. 1813. He was a blacksmith.
In 1802 in Beaulieu, a Thomas SHEATH married Jane. They had several children baptised there, - with a gap between 1810 child and one in 1816...... but nothing for Henry. Thomas was a blacksmith.
By 1841, Thomas and Jane had moved to the Isle of Wight with son George, another blacksmith, and later died there.
So I have nothing to link Thomas and Henry although I strongly suspect that they are father and son. Any thoughts, anyone?

No baptism on FMP

Did Henry have children named Thomas and/or Jane?

I see that in 1851 Henry was a Smith's Labourer..............following in father's occupational footsteps?

By 1861, he had become a Smith

It's a pity he didn't re-marry............ ;-) ;-)

No sign of children Thomas or Jane - assuming all their children were registered and not too badly transcribed.

They had:
Ellen Mary 1839,
George Henry 1840,
William Charles 1843 (SEAF on GRO/FreeBMD),
Caroline Amelia 1846,
Henry 1850 (SHEAF on GRO/FreeBMD)
Fanny 1852
Harriet Mary 1853
Edward 1857


Harriet also had a daughter before marriage - Eliza Jane 1835.

Thank you for your searching Erika and ArgyllGran.

Yes, if only Henry and Harriet had married later in 1837..... ;-)

Thank you for the registrations for William Charles and young Henry with incorrect surname spellings. I don't think I had those recorded.

I also looked for a later baptism for Henry b. Beaulieu in Southampton parishes without success, but thinking that he may have known he was not baptised as a child, so was baptised before marriage.

I also followed the children found baptised of Thomas and Jane in case they changed names somewhere along the line and merged into my Henry, but that was another fruitless search.

.....a lot of clutching straws while searching this family. :-|

It is unusual for the names of Thomas and Jane not to be given to any of Henry's children, if they were their grandparents.... but then we have the coincidence of occupations, so I'm still uncertain and would like to be able to prove his parents one way or another, but may just have to accept that they remain 'unknown'.