Southerly: Who was George Hildebrand Alington—and why did he give away his “Girl child 23 months old”?
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My son's paternal family has links to McCreanors. I'll ask the family historian if he knows of this husband Frederick.
It would be great to have some photos.
By the way, David, genealogical research can get addictive.
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Dianne Mitchell, in reply to
From the Tree on Ancestry owned by a McCreanor descendant…a very well researched tree by all accounts…sources cited etc.
Eliza Ann WEBB born 22 June 1864 in High Portpean, St Austell Parish, Cornwall, Eng.
The daughter of Thomas WEBB (1831-1871) and
Susan Best MARTIN (1834-1821 died in NZ)Eliza Ann WEBB aged 17yrs married William John David WINTER on 4 May 1882 at madras St, Chch, the home of the bride’s mother.
ETA: It's very common for women to use their maiden name...or even their mother or grandmother's maiden name when registering children born between marriages. It's also very common to find a name of the reputed father to be included in the child's name. Guess this is what makes genealogy so addictive...always looking for that last piece of the puzzle.
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Dianne Mitchell, in reply to
Eliza An was 17-18yrs old…I’m sure it’s just a typo on Ngaire’s tree…she has it as 28yrs.
Ngaire's tree looks to be very well researched.
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Testatrix of the trade…
Did I mention how much I love that freestyle ‘hellfire and redemption’ This is the last Will and Testament lettering!The way the two ’is’ shapes set up a resonance at the next ‘s’ and then in the middle it goes all ‘pebble-in-pond’ at Will…
The ‘lightning bolt’ cap ’T’s are very swish swashes, too…… a brush with death indeed
life’s an obituary
and then you die!Please pay on the way out
I’ll be here all week,
tell your friends;- )
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Interesting that Eliza called her daughter by George Hildebrand.....Hilda.
Now that makes me wonder if her other 2 children (while not with William Winter) may have the fathers' names included.
she may have wanted these children to be found and identified...as women in her situation often did in those days. -
Dianne Mitchell, in reply to
Maybe in the frame of one of George H's paintings?
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http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=TC19080323.2.13.2
Link to suicide in March 1908, in Christchurch of Frederick KENNARD. More tough times for Eliza possibly.
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UPDATE
Eliza (as Webb, aged 31) had a son:
* 1895 - 1980 Berty Alfred Forster Webb
born 21 January 1895, he may have been adopted
- hope to get feedback on this through readers ...Berty Alfred FORSTER (born 21 Jan 1895) died 23 Jan 1980 aged 85 & is buried Area L, Lot 179, RSA area at Otahuhu, Auckland. His headstone reads "10581 Dvr B.A. Forster, Field Artillery, died 23.1.1980, aged 86 yrs, 1st N.Z.E.F."
When he enlisted his is next of kin was listed as Mrs E. Forster (mother) of Nelson Crescent, Napier South.
Forster then, is probably the name of his father.
Berty married Violet May RUSSELL (1896-1975) on 15 March 1920. Daughter of Randolph Henry RUSSELL & Emma Jane STREETER -
David Haywood, in reply to
Interesting that Eliza called her daughter by George Hildebrand…..Hilda.
It certainly points to Hilda being Eliza’s daughter. Also Hilda’s middle name “Annie” was the middle name of Eliza’s deceased daughter to Winter.
Link to suicide in March 1908, in Christchurch of Frederick KENNARD. More tough times for Eliza possibly.
Oh dear.
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Have been out and about today with my friend and colleague Emma Hart.
I imagined that Emma would be the Watson to my Holmes, but then I discovered her special affinity to cemeteries. Emma shot about the place like an especially energetic Nancy Drew finding all the graves, while I lumbered behind her like a tired bear.
At any rate, the above is the Coleman's very flash grave (the spire is currently down from the earthquake) in the flashest part of the cemetery.
Also have the wills of Alington, George Coleman, and a divorce affidavit from Mrs E A Winter. Will post these later tonight...
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Emma Hart, in reply to
but then I discovered her special affinity to cemeteries
Hey, I was really well-behaved. I didn't even drag you off to make you look at the Jewish section of Linwood cemetery.
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More of the well-behaved Emma Hart’s detective work (with my assistance); the presumed grave of Alington’s daughter Eileen Winter Coleman.
There is a very slight question mark here for me in terms of the date and age of death, as this would imply a date of birth between 25 July 1890 and 24 July 1891 – which doesn’t quite gel with the date range in the adoption letter of 25th November to 24th December, 1891. But, of course, it’s very close.
[EDIT: Although perhaps the Colemans were told that Eileen’s birth was, say, July 1891 as it would put Eileen’s date of birth before the divorce had been applied for, i.e. while Eliza was still legitimately married to Winter.]
I also checked the data on Eliza Ann Kennard at Bromley Crematorium, which records her as “Eliza Ann Kennard commonly known as Eliza Ann Winter died 14 Oct 1942 aged 78”. This implies a birthdate of between 15 Oct 1863 and 14 Oct 1864 – which gels with her reported date of birth on 22 June 1864.
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Here are the wills and divorce affidavits:
Divorce_affidavit_Eliza_Ann_Winter.pdf
[**NOTE:** Divorce_affidavit_Eliza_Ann_Winter.pdf seems to have a page missing. I'm not sure if this was missing from the original file, or whether I somehow forgot to copy it. I can visit CHCH again to check the original if anyone needs it.]
And good news that the signature in the will from George Coleman matches that of the adoption letter. Absolutely unequivocally he and his wife adopted Alington's daughter and she became Eileen Winter Coleman.
The characteristic loop on the 'G' of his signature is also present on all signatures in the will. Given that this was present throughout the body of the adoption letter, I think we can conclude that he almost certainly wrote the letter leaving blanks for Alington to fill in as Ross Mason theorized.
From the contents of the will George Coleman sounds like a nice chap.
From the contents of the divorce affidavit Willian Winter does not at all sound like a nice chap -- though I felt a bit sorry for the poor prostitutes being described as "common".
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POSSIBLE BREAKTHROUGH…
I thought I’d go back and have a very careful look to see if anything else was in the location I discovered the Alington documents.
Bingo! I unearthed the apparently irrelevant envelope postmarked 1917 (above)…
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… and also the promissory note (above).
These seemed unrelated until I noticed the “Payable at Johnston, Mills & Joyce Solicitors, Gloucester Street, Christchurch”.
This is surely the same “Johnstone [sic]” on the envelope (which contains a message quite unrelated to the promissory note).
AND the executor of Amelia Mary Coleman’s will was one… FREDERICK WILLIAM JOHNSTON of Johnston, Mills & Joyce Solicitors.
I therefore have a strong suspicion that the documents have come to me via Frederick William Johnston, Solicitor, who decided (perhaps for obvious reasons) to refrain from giving them to Eileen Winter Coleman (who was only 20 at the time of Amelia Coleman’s death and would therefore have not been permitted to act as an executor with Johnston).
Perhaps another mystery solved?
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I wonder if the stamps have any value?
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The dates of birth , christening or baptism often get mixed up.
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JacksonP, in reply to
David, I've been promoting this thread heavily elsewhere, but just wanted to say, this is one of the best PAS posts OF ALL TIME. Great distraction from all that ails us. Cheers.
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David Haywood, in reply to
David, I’ve been promoting this thread heavily elsewhere, but just wanted to say, this is one of the best PAS posts OF ALL TIME.
Thanks, JacksonP!
This letter does indeed seem to be connected to all the basic human elements: birth, death, marriage, assault, desertion, fornication with “common" prostitutes, embezzlement, illegitimacy, abandonment, adoption, suicide, and a millionairess at the end.
In fact, apart from the last item, it reminds me of the time I went to dinner with Russell Brown and Dr Jolisa Gracewood. I kept thinking: “Thank goodness we have a doctor along. If the worst happens then at least she can make a surgical intervention”.
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Hilary Stace, in reply to
Ditto. I went to a fascinating talk about Alexander W Bickerton yesterday. He was one of the first professors at Canterbury university (later fired), and a slightly scandalous citizen of Christchurch, founder of a commune, prolific writer to the newspaper, and developer of pleasure gardens in Wainoni, which some the subjects of this thread likely visited.
However, the speaker was lamenting that he could find out very little about his two (consecutive) wives, Phoebe and Mary. This post shows the power of crowd sourcing genealogical mysteries.
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Emma Hart, in reply to
Although perhaps the Colemans were told that Eileen’s birth was, say, July 1891 as it would put Eileen’s date of birth before the divorce had been applied for, i.e. while Eliza was still legitimately married to Winter.
Ah, yes! That would make sense of it. I was puzzling over this yesterday, because normally you legitimise a child by making them younger than they are, not older.
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I nipped into the library while out this morning. The microfiche birth records in our local library ( transcribed manually from the birth registers, not digitally scanned as the online records today are) give the birth of Hilda Annie WEBB being registered in Christchurch in the first quarter of 1892. So the birthday in December 1891 looks very sound.
I could not find Eliza Ann residing with Mr Alington, as his housekeeper, on electoral rolls but I did not have all the relevant data with me.
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
...all the basic human elements:
Where are the food, shelter and cycling threads in that list then?
...not to mention joy and illumination?
;- )
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Poor Eliza didn't have much luck with the fellas. I looked for husband #2 Fred Kennard on Papers Past and it looks like he abandoned Eliza and the family in 1899 - she took a case against him for desertion and was awarded 17/6 per week maintenance. The Magistrate's Court sentenced Kennard to a month's gaol with hard labour for defaulting on his maintenance payments at least half a dozen times between the maintenance case and his death in 1908. It looks like he must have been arrested for drunkenness quite a few times in those years, too. Court reports in the Press in 1906 and 1907 mention fines for breaching a prohibition order, which banned the sale of alcohol to people deemed to be "habitual drunkards" (typically, those arrested at least three times in a year for drunkenness).
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Lynley Chapman, in reply to
I agree. I am wondering how Geo Alington and the father/s of Horace and Bertie Alfred treated her.
Eliza appears to be on her own in the 1905/6 Electoral rolls which record her as living at 9 Dean St and Fred Kennard at Park Rd, St Albans, carpenter
In 1900 electoral rolls they are recorded as living at the same address.
There is an Inquest file at Archives into Fred's suicide in 1908.
In an potential "trip up your research" coincidence, the Mother of Bertie (presumably his adoptive mother) is also named Eliza. 1919 electoral rolls show Bertie, a tailor, back from the war and living in Nelson Cres, Napier with Eliza Forster, who he named as NOK at this address in his Attestation file. His birth mother Eliza seems to have generally used her second name "Ann/e" for official docs which is very helpful when trying to weed things out.
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