Hi all, First time poster here from Braintree, Essex. I am trying to find my granddads grave, his name was Kenneth Price MacWILLSON and died on the 5th April 1932, the MacWILLSON family lived at No 27,Church St, Bishops Castle, from around 1927, Kenneth was an Auctioneer by trade and was a retired ex service man with the Australian A.I.F in Gallipoli. I know the family were living at the above address in 1939 as this is the address our mother gave when she married at St John the Baptist Church in 1939. I would be grateful for any help you can give me in finding my granddads last resting place.
Best Regards, Ian
(Moved from original position to start a new thread - MJH)
Hi Mike, Yes, the person you speak of is our nan Annie Alberta Williams who died at St Michaels Hospital Braintree, Essex. Yes, Mike i and my cousins remember her funeral, at the time i was living away so did not attend her funeral. Mike, I have been researching our family tree for the past 10 years now and have hit many brick walls with our granddad, i have his death & marriage certificate's also his war service records but i nor my cousins were told where granddad was buried, i agree with you we will have to make the journey to Shrewsbury later this year. I will check the Online data base as well.
Regarding the Trade Directories , i have found our nan was running a Ladies Outfitters Shop from 27,Church Street, Bishops Castle in the 1934 Directory, i could not find earlier directories for Bishops Castle on the Ancestry site.
Clun was the registration area for BC i guess Mike.
Yes, nan had 2 sons Ian & Douglas that died in infancy in 1919.
Thanks for your help Mike, i will report back if i have any joy.
Best Regards, Ian
Hello Ian
I have had a look at the Bishops Castle Burial register and I can confirm that your grandfather is buried there.
Entry No: 459 Kenneth Price MacWILLSON of 27 Church Street, Bishops Castle buried 9 April 1932 age 54 years.
Unfortunately the burial register does not give any clue as to where his grave is. A transcript of the grave stones at Bishops Castle was made between 1992 and 1997 but no stone was found with your grandfather's name on it. I did wonder whether it would be possible to work out which area of the churchyard he might be buried in by looking who else was buried in 1932. When the Monumental Inscriptions (MIs) were recorded the whole churchyard was divided up into eight areas lettered A to H and I think it is most likely that your grandfather was buried in area 'E' which is in the north east corner of the churchyard adjacent to the B4385 Brampton Road and the eastern boundary of the churchyard. Having looked at the individual burials in 1932 there is no precise pattern so this is a rather vague way to try to locate his grave.
I wondered about local undertakers but any undertakers who may have dealt with your grandfather's funeral have long since gone to their own and it seems very unlikely that any records would survive from small family businesses. I have spoken to the present local undertaker but he is unable to offer any helpful suggestions.
It must be worth looking at local newspapers for reports of his death and funeral and possibly an obituary. I can't find anything online in Shropshire for your grandfather but there will no doubt be something in the local newspapers at the time of his death but you will need to visit either Shrewsbury or the London Newspaper Library which has moved to the British Library Newsroom at St Pancras since Colindale closed. Having said that I see that your grandparents get a mention in the Birmingham Daily Post 28 August 1916 when their son was born on the 27th and your grandmother gets a very brief mention in the Chelmsford Chronicle 26 November 1948 when she gave the secretary's report to Stisted WI.
Mike
Hi Mike,
I replied to your earlier message but it seems to have been deleted, i have no idea what has happened, can you let me know if you got it or not please.
Best Regards, Ian
Hello Ian
I did not see your earlier reply. There is no reason why it would have been deleted so I have no idea what has happened.
Mike
Hi Mike,
I have no idea either, one of life's mysteries i guess.
Mike we were over the moon to hear that you had managed to find our granddad's last resting place, we realise it's an impossible task finding his exact burial plot after so many years but at least we have some idea of the area he was buried in the church yard. I have viewed the area you mention using the Google Maps facility and viewing it from the B4385 Brampton Road, i also managed to take photo of the area E that you mentioned. Like most cemetery's Mike they do have a grid system but burials in the same year don't always follow suite do they which makes it all the more difficult to locate the one your looking for.
Regarding the newspapers Mike, a few weeks ago i contacted the Librarian at Bishops Castle enquiring whether or not they had local newspapers on fiche files for 1932, they do have them so the Librarian said he would see if our granddad's death or obit were mentioned, the Star newspaper was checked, unfortunately no entries were found so i am going to make a visit to the British Library Newsroom at St Pancras some time this year. You have removed one brick wall now Mike so we are grateful for that, our Cousin John MacWillson is going to visit the Shropshire Archive Centre in Shrewsbury shortly so hopefully he will find some mention of granddad in the Trade Directories.
Over the years our research of our granddad has thrown up many brick walls Mike, at least you have helped remove one of these, we now have another to remove which is his birth record that does not appear in any indexes we have checked, we have been told he was Baptised at Lichfield Cathedral but on checking this out it seems there are no entries of a MacWillson having been Baptised there so we are at another brickwall.
Mike, i will keep you updated on what we find ok.
Best Regards, Ian
Hello Ian
Having had a fresh look at your thread I have just realised that the surname MacWILLSON does not seem to exist in any UK records prior to the marriage of your grandparents in Birmingham in 1916. So why is this?
There are a few possible reasons that spring to mind and it appears that you are going to need some very lateral thinking to sort out this problem and the reason why you can't find a Birth / Baptism for your grandfather. Here are some suggestions.
Did the family change the surname in the early 1900's or possibly was it changed accidentally by some official entering the name in some record?
Did the family move into England from elsewhere. The 'Mac' prefix might suggest Scotland or even Ireland or may be they were immigrants from somewhere overseas?
Was the surname previously WILSON and someone decided to embellish it a bit?
These are all very long guesses and unless you can find some clues within your family papers it could prove to be almost impossible to sort this out.
Mike
Hi Mike,
Well the story in our family since I was a child is that our grandfather Kenneth's family originally came from Scotland and moved to the Lichfield area before emigrating to Australia in the early 1880s, grandfather told our Nan he was about 5 or 6 years old when he left the UK. However I have never been able to find the MacWILLSON family entered in any ships passenger lists for the period 1880-1890 assisted or otherwise, also despite efforts to find death and burial records for our gt grand parents Alexander & Ellen by my Australian research friends with out any luck, like you I am beginning to think there has been a change of surname at some point. At the moment I am trying to find our grandfather military records for 1899 which is not easy as up to 1901 Australia had six separate colonies each had it's own Army and Navy before it became a federal state so as he enlisted in the A.I.F at Melbourne I assumed he served for the Victoria state in 1899 and served in the Boer War.
The reason we now think granddad's family originally came from Ireland Mike was the result of one of his son's efforts to find the origin of the MacWILLSON line, Wallace was adamant the family originated from Ireland but we have no proof of this, only a DNA would confirm this I guess. I have just recently been looking at this from another angle Mike and what I find is quite interesting but it maybe because I am clutching at straws. Our grandparents first child (my uncle) middle name was Farrer, I then began to wonder, is this the surname of grandmother Ellen MacWILLSON, I find an Ellen FARRER married a Alexander HAWKINS in County Down Ireland 1860, there was also a Henry Alexander HAWKINS married a Margaret Bruce ????(sorry I given papers to my cousin), the name Bruce occurs twice in our MacWILLSON family, this couple had a daughter in 1877 named May or Mabel, maybe these were two brother's Mike. When granddad enlisted in 1914 he was living at 4, Peel Street he named his next of kin William Cronin who was an art dealer of this address his wife's name was May Cronin was this the same May I found because she may have been granddad's relation and this is why he named William his next of kin !!!!. The other thing I found Mike was a prison record for a Alexander HAWKINS in 1852 for rooting to steal his age fits our Alexander. Interesting but authenticating this would be difficult I think.
Mike, I have just been sent some paper work from my cousin Bruce, he had organised a search by the Staffordshire Records Office, the outcome was fruitless, they covered every avenue looking for the birth records of our grandfather and left no stone unturned, in their view they think he was born in Ireland and came to the UK staying here for a short time before emigrating to Australia where they became sheep farmer's. The research team also tried a combination spelling of the surname but that didn't help.
Well i think I have covered most of what i wanted to say now Mike, I did try many different ideas, like WILLSON, Wilson etc but Scottish & Irish records are very difficult to follow, I have not tried to find the family under the name of Hawkins in the ships passenger lists though but will do that shortly.
I will keep in touch Mike,
Best Regards, Ian
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Hello Ian
I see that Kenneth P MacWILLSON died age 54 in 1932 in the Clun Reg Dist 6a 652 which presumably included Bishops Castle at that time.
The marriage indexes indicate that he married Annie A WILLIAMS in Birmingham (Aston Reg Dist) in 1916 and she died in the Braintree, Essex Reg Dist in 1967 age 69. Does anyone in your family remember her funeral?
Did they have twin sons who died aged less that 1 year old in Birmingham in 1919?
I think your only hope is a trip to Shropshire Archives at Shrewsbury to go through the Bishops Castle burial register. I thought there might have been a grave stone but I can't see any record of one in the index - see Online Databases on the blue bar above. If you do come to Shrewsbury you should have a look through some Trade Directories to see when he is mentioned.
Mike