Dead ends and how to progress

[WeatherwaxOn]

I wonder if anyone has any ideas of how to break through a dead end on an ancestor.

This is all the info I have on my gt-gt-grandfather, and I can't seem to make any further progress.

Born around 1838/1839 in Hertfordshire
Had a son 1875 and his name on the birth certificate, combined with his occupation tally with an entry on the 1871 census.
Is on the 1881 census with wife and son.
In 1882 his wife died and he married a relative of hers. He gives his age on the marriage certificate as 44. The address and occupation tally with census entries for the previous year.
He's on the 1891 census with his second wife.
He died in 1898. The address on the death record + occupation link to the 1891 census.

There is no record of banns or marriage to the mother of his child.
There is no record of any other children.
On the marriage certificate he cites a name for his father that I cannot match to anyone living or dead in Hertfordshire that had a son of the same name.

I've not had any DNA matches to anyone else with this family name*, despite having registered my details/interest over 2 years ago.

*Other than 2 cousins and a sibling who are of my generation.

My thought process is that either
He was illegitimate and the father's name is a red herring
His name isn't what he says it was
He was a bigamist (hence no marriage to first 'wife')
He wasn't from where he said he was from.

I can't find him on the electoral register.
There are a number of people with the same name (it's not uncommon) but so far, I've eliminated all of them by tallying census returns/marriages/births to the information I have - for example, there are several people of the same name who are on the electoral register but when I check those addresses to the census returns that I have, and the spouse I know he had, they can be eliminated.

I thought if I put this out to the hive mind, someone might have some bright ideas, and suggest something I've overlooked.

Could you clarify something please? You say 'no record of banns or marriage' for the first marriage but then you say 'on the marriage certificate'. Is the marriage certificate for the second marriage?

Two thoughts. If your ancestor was non-conformist, the marriage would not be recorded in parish records. If your ancestor has two first names, tracing through both may help find him.

Where have you looked to try to find marriage details?

I presume you have his wife's maiden name from the BC; have you checked for any previous marriages for her? She might have been widowed and therefore married him using her previous husbands surname. This will make it impossible to find their marriage if you only look under her maiden name.

Of course they may not have married, or might have done so after the child's birth (have you checked right up to the death of his first wife?). It doesn't mean he was a bigamist!

Re his birth - registration of births wasn't compulsory in 1838/9. Have you looked through parish registers (including noncon) for the relevant areas?

Also - anything in the newspapers about him?

His father's name may be a fiction, or he may have been a stepfather. Have you looked for illegitimate births with his first name in the right parish at the right time? Even if the surname is wrong, if other things would fit you can then check if the putative mother married someone of that name. And look in the 1841 census for any children of his name, then to see if the mother may have subsequently married someone with the father's name as shown.

Have you managed to find him as a child on the earlier censuses?

For marriages
I've looked in Derbyshire (where she was from), Hertfordshire (where he was allegedly from), and London (where I pick them up on the census, and where their son was born in 1875).
I've looked from 1858-1882 (when his first wife died) and in all adjacent areas to where they lived or were born.
I've looked at parish records for both counties as well as for all the areas of London I know they lived in.

I've looked under variants of both their names, and just surnames. I've checked any potential matches in marriage records for either name against census returns and have eliminated all of those.

I find no former marriages for her. Nor anything obvious for him.

No. I don't find any families that match the information he gives in his sons birth certificate or his marriage certificate.

Nothing in newspapers other than the details of his death (a traffic accident).

There are a couple of potential mothers for him if I discount his alleged father's name, but nothing to confirm any are correct. Where I have found matches of the potential mothers' names in other people's family trees but I am not getting DNA matches to any.

Are you using one subscription website for all these searches? It might be worth repeating searches on other websites as well.

It wouldn’t be unheard of for them not to have married at all but if he gives his status on the marriage certificate as widower then I would assume there is a marriage record somewhere.

Have you found the first wife on the 1871 census? Is she living in one of the areas you have checked already?

Does their son's birth certificate have their date and place of marriage on it?
I had one that I only found by literally combing through marriages in an area - Robson had been mistranscribed as Hotson and Davies as Dawes made them impossible to find in listings.

She is on the 1871 census as his wife. I find her in Derbyshire in 1851 as a teenager, with her family.
She's visiting/staying with other family in Derbyshire in 1861.

The son's birth certificate does not mention marriage at all. The son's birth certificate gives his name, his parents' name, their address and the father's occupation, all of which align with the information I have from the census.
I've tried many variants of their names but as yet, nothing is showing up.
I've even tried searching just on first names with variants of those, in all areas, and still nothing.

No, I'm using multiple websites. I only have the DNA through one, but I cross-check any names/records where I find potential name matches.

I really did expect to find a marriage document but nothing has turned up. Not even banns.

What complicates things is that she had a sister, a couple of years older, who had a similar name. In the public domain these people have been conflated by quite a few contributors, but I've been able to trace both her and her sister independently and evidence that they're not the same person.

We all have these dead ends ! sometimes you get lucky and it is a typo, as a lot went on spelling of local dialect . Have you tried "Family Search" it is perhaps a site you have not checked yet, free to use. https://www.familysearch.org/en/united-kingdom/

Good luck

The son's birth certificate does not mention marriage at all. The son's birth certificate gives his name, his parents' name, their address and the father's occupation, all of which align with the information I have from the census.
I've tried many variants of their names but as yet, nothing is showing up

Is the mother listed by her maiden name or her supposed married name?

It sounds like they weren't married, or perhaps married under his real identity - if he used a step fathers name then he may have had to marry under the name on his birth cert

The mother is listed as both names - her married name and underneath that it says, formerly (unmarried name).

I know that I have the mother right - I can track her family back and I've found people who match on DNA on that side.
It's the gt-gt- grandfather that's causing the issues :)

Thanks - I have tried FS but no harm in trying again.
I've looked at so many sites, and have so many questions about why he doesn't show up anywhere.

Do you feel able to give us any names and dates so we can have a look? I'm not suggesting you're incapable, it sounds as though you really have given it the best of shots! But sometimes someone has some resources that aren't available online, or a similar name which has been horribly mistranscribed. Etc Etc.

Rootschat is usually good for this sort of thing, or www.genealogistsforum.co.uk. The witches there found one of my ancestors living in the US when everyone seemed to think he had died in Nottingham!

Am I right in thinking that the mother was older than your g-g-grandfather? If he was born in 1838 then in 1851 he would be 13 max and you say she was a teenager then (unless they are the same age?). If the child was born in 1875 that makes her at least 37 which is quite old for a first child in those days.

I’m sure where that might lead but it’s an interesting scenario. A PP mentioned the non-conformist records. Have you looked at Scotland?

What was your g-g grandfather’s occupation? There might be guild records in London.

Second this. Within hours they'd unravelled a brick wall for me I'd have had no chance of breaking through myself.

@WeatherwaxOn What records are you looking at that mention Hertfordshire?

If you can't find records in Herts, have you taken any boundary changes into consideration? There is a wikipedia page about Hertfordshire boundary changes over time, there have been a few.

Wild stab in the dark - are you sure it is Hertfordshire and not Herefordshire?

Both their ages are a little variable, if you go by the census!

She was baptised in August 1840 in Repton., and is listed as 10 months old on the 1841 census. On the 1871 census, her age is given as 28, in 1881 her age is 38, but her death certificate for 1882 gives her age as 43.

I can't confirm any records [as in, I cannot be certain I have right person] for him prior to 1871, when he gives his age as 30. In 1881, according to the census, he's 41. In 1882, when he marries his wife's cousin, he says he's 44. His death certificate from 1899 states he's 59.

There's no connection to Scotland at all that I've found. Their son, born 1875 was baptised in the church of England.

I should add that I've also searched baptisms 10 years either side of this one child,.with the same parents, variants of them, and each person individually- where there has been an occasional name match, the address and occupation don't tie in.

Gt.gt grandfather was a cabman/carman, so no guild membership.

Census returns are consistent in putting his place of birth as Hertfordshire. On one entry it says "Herford" but that looks to be a transcript problem. I have checked Herefordshire, but can't find any matches.

I was wondering if perhaps there was some issue that made it inadvisable to marry locally so perhaps they eloped to Scotland?

Yes, can do.

He's Henry Chapman. The 1871 census has him living with wife Elizabeth at 7 Fleet Street, Bethnal Green. He's listed as a Carman from Hertford. She's from Derby.

The birth certificate for their son gives the address of New Wharf, Whitefriars precinct, and gives the parents names as Henry Edward Chapman and Elizabeth Chapman, formerly Barton.

I can trace Elizabeth back to Derbyshire, and can link her to Jane Roberts, who was the woman Henry married after Elizabeth died.

At the moment, the best shot I have for Henry is that he may have been the child of a Mary Ann Chapman, who was the daughter of Daniel & Mary Chapman. She was baptised in Ware in 1819. There is also a Mary Ann Chapman, daughter of Thomas & Mary Chapman, baptised in 1820.
I can't confidently link either of those people to Henry.

There's also a Henry who was the son of a James & Louisa Chapman, but again, I can't confidently make a link.

Having looked at people who have those persons in their family trees, I'm not getting a DNA match to either Mary, or to James or Louisa.

Scotland's People doesn't show any marriages for the couple, unfortunately. I've looked from 1855-75.

They seem to have mostly lived in very poverty-stricken areas until the later 1880s, after Elizabeth died.