Piecing together the family tree (1) - via the cooper from Carmarthen
DNA, documents, and lucky breaks
The TV schedules are full of detectives using forensic science to track down criminal masterminds. Tracking down family ancestry sometimes needs a similar approach - making the most of DNA matches, spotting the clues in documentary evidence - and sometimes getting some lucky breaks too! However, while CSI usually catch their criminals in the end, ancestry tracing can often end up in frustrating failure as the trail back into history runs cold amongst increasingly uncertain evidence. Nevertheless, I've managed to piece together a few more clues for my own Welsh - and now, fairly certainly, also Irish - paternal ancestry.
In this - and in further following posts - I am sharing what my investigations have concluded on various branches of my family tree, working back through history from my grandparents, Thomas and Isabella Powell-Davies. As I have set out in another post, they were both born in the spring of 1880 and were married in the town they were both brought up in, Pontypridd, in 1902.
Isabella's birth certificate shows that her father, Thomas Thomas, was a cooper - working for a brewery, according to the 1881 census for the address listed as Isabella's precise birthplace - 19 Tram Road, Pontypridd. This post describes what I now know about Thomas Thomas and his ancestors.
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| The signatures of Thomas Thomas and his father Jonah |
Thomas Thomas - my great grandfather: a cooper from Carmarthen
BIRTH SEP 1836 • Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire, Wales
DEATH OCT 1923 • Cardiff, Glamorganshire, Wales
CERTAINTY: 100% - confirmed by family documents
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| My paternal grandmother's birth certificate |
As Isabella's birth certificate shows, her father, my great grandfather, was a cooper. That's the occupation also given in the following year's 1881 census record, which also confirms that Thomas Thomas had been born in Carmarthen in the late 1830s. It's a frustratingly common name to try and trace in South Wales ancestry records but there's an 1861 census listing a cooper of the same age and birthplace, boarding in the Tumble area of Pontypridd, which I think is probably my great-grandfather. He must have been one of the many young men who left more rural parts of Wales to find employment in the rapidly industrialising Rhondda.
As this undated photograph in my father's old album suggests, Thomas Thomas ended up doing well for himself, and Thomas and Sarah Jane's sons and daughters received a good education. Isabella became a teacher and an excellent musician.
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| My only picture of Thomas Thomas |
Sadly, however, military records confirm that one of Isabella's brothers, Ivor James, was one of the many Welsh soldiers killed at Gallipoli. War histories indicate that his battalion was part of the 53rd (Welsh) Infantry Division that landed at Suvla Bay on August 9th 1915. When the Division was eventually evacuated in December, over 80% of its men had died. The record below shows that Ivor was killed just a day after the landing. His body was never recovered.
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| Ivor James Thomas, killed in action, Gallipoli, August 10th 1915 |
My Dad passed on to me a family heirloom that includes a precious bit of family history - Thomas' Thomas' indenture as an apprentice cooper in Carmarthen, dated 16th October 1853 - a document that provide a firm link to the occupation and birthplace listed in later census records:
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| Thomas becomes an apprentice cooper, October 1853 |
His baptism record - on 16th September 1836 at St. Peter's Carmarthen - matches the known name of his parents - and describes his father Jonah as being a "writer":
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| Thomas Thomas - baptised in 1836 - the address may be Quay Street |
Jonah Thomas - my 2nd great grandfather: a "writer" from Carmarthen
BIRTH 1806 • Carmarthenshire, Wales
DEATH MARCH 1872 • Carmarthenshire, Wales
CERTAINTY: High - apart from birth / baptism record
The indenture, as pictured above, is completed by three different signatures - John Morgan, the master cooper; Thomas - who can clearly sign his name; and his father, Jonah Thomas of Carmarthen - so that's my great-great-grandfather.
While there's always the risk of choosing an individual with the same name who is, in fact, just a namesake (a mistake that is too frequently made), I am confident that I have tracked down the correctly matching census records. These show that in 1841 Jonah was a "writer" (i.e. a scribe or clerk), married to Sarah, also from Carmarthen, both having been born around 1806:
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| 1841 census for Union Street, Carmarthen: Jonah Thomas, aged 35, "writer". |
By 1851, Jonah has become an "Attorney's General Clerk", the family now living at '111 Blue Street' - although Thomas Thomas seems to be staying with an aunt and uncle at No. 100. 'Blue Street' is still the name of one of the main streets in the centre of Carmarthen.
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| Jonah and Sarah Thomas - my great-great-grandparents - in the 1851 census |
In the 1861 census, the Thomas family is living in Nelson's Alley, and in 1871 'Spring Gardens' - where Jonah (now a widower) is still recorded as an attorney's clerk. This is the address given as his final abode when Jonah dies in 1872 and is then buried in the churchyard of Saint David's, Carmarthen on March 2nd, aged 68. However, I have found no record for his grave marker in the website for the charity maintaining the cemetery.
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| Jonah Thomas, aged 68, buried at St. David's, Carmarthen in 1872 |
Saint David's was apparently built to provide services for Welsh-speaking Anglicans so, although the indenture is in English, does this mean Jonah was also a Welsh speaker (certainly some of Isabella's music books that were passed down to me are in Welsh) ? However, that's just one of many unanswered questions. Where exactly was he born/baptised? Where did Jonah receive his education so as to become a clerk? Can his family tree be traced back further with any degree of certainty? Sadly, I haven't been able to up to now. A 'brick-wall' has been quickly reached.
Sarah Beynon - my 2nd great grandmother
BIRTH 21 JUL 1806 • Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire, Wales
DEATH 1869 • Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire, Wales
CERTAINTY: High - ancestry records match with other known facts
An 1869 burial record in the same St. David's churchyard for a Sarah Thomas, also of Spring Gardens, must be that of Jonah's wife, my great great grandmother. However, while there are three recorded grave markers in the churchyard in that name, none of them give a date of death that aligns with this burial record:
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| Sarah Thomas, aged 62, buried at St. David's, Carmarthen in 1869 |
While Sarah was a common first name, Jonah Thomas was less so. That means that, as a 'lucky break' for my ancestry search, only one marriage comes up in the records for this pair of names. The banns for this marriage - on April 9th 1829 at St. Peter's Carmarthen - confirm that Sarah's maiden name was 'Beynon' - and she signs her name too:
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| Confirming that my second great grandmother was Sarah Beynon |
However, with the maiden name known, along with the approximate birth year from the census records, the baptism record - for St. Peters, Carmarthen on 10th August 1806 - could then be tracked down too. Helpfully, and unusually, it also provides both the date of birth - 21 July 1806 - and the names of both parents - David and Phoebe - too:
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| Sarah Beynon - born on 21st July 1806 |
Phoebe Beynon - my 3rd great grandmother
BIRTH About 1782 • Camrose, Pembrokeshire, Wales
DEATH JUN 1859 • Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire, Wales
CERTAINTY: High, thanks to supporting census records
This far back into history, without other supporting evidence, it is usually impossible to track down the correct records to extend the family tree further with any certainty. A record of a marriage taking place between David Beynon and a 'Phoebe' around 1800 would have been a big help - but I haven't found one.
However, 'Phoebe Beynon' does, by chance, appear in some of the census records already mentioned. That name is recorded in the 1841 census as living with Sarah and Jonah (and also with what would be her grandson, Thomas Thomas, who is also listed in the record, aged 4). Phoebe's age is listed as 55, giving her a birth year of around 1786. Could that be Sarah's mother, living with her daughter and son-in-law?
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| The next page of the 1841 census that has already recorded Jonah Thomas |
A closer look at the 1851 census, where Thomas Thomas is recorded as a 'nephew' staying further along Blue Street with his aunt/uncle, again shows that he is, once again, living in the same household as a 'Phoebe Beynon'. Perhaps grandmother Phoebe and grandson Thomas got on well together ?
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| The 1851 census for Jonah and Sarah's neighbours on Blue Street |
The record also states that Phoebe, my third great grandmother, was born around 1782 in Camrose, near Haverfordwest in Pembrokeshire. While I don't have enough information to trace her roots there with any certainty, I can trace her burial record - once again in St. David's churchyard, on 5th June 1859:
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| My third great grandmother, Phoebe, buried at the age of 77 in 1859 |
But the puzzle isn't yet solved. Phoebe Beynon is clearly listed in that 1851 census as a 'mother-in-law'. If so, she isn't just Sarah's mother but must also be the mother of the 'Maria Thomas' listed in the 1851 census. Sarah and Maria must be sisters.
According to the 1851 census information, Sarah's sister would have been born as 'Maria Beynon' around 1813 in Arlington, Devon. Could that possibly be correct? Well, the database of English Births and Baptisms does indeed show that a 'Maria Beynon' was born to parents called David and Phoebe in that year - on 16 December 1813 to be precise. So the various records do indeed back each other up.
How it came about that the two sisters were born in different counties, indeed in different nations - and how it was that Phoebe travelled from Camrose to Arlington and then to Carmarthen - is another mystery that will remain unanswered.
But that's as far as this branch of the family tree can be reliably traced ...
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