Would you be up for this challenge ?

[greyingrey]

I'm (still) trying to find an otherwise unaccounted for William Asher who married my gggg grandmother in Leicester (although he wasn't my gggg grandfather unless he changed his name....which is what I'm trying to find out)

A few moons ago in a seizure of absolute madness I went through all the possible candidates I could find, but couldn't find one who wasn't married to someone else. Would you be willing to give it another go ? It might take some time because my intention is to recheck them all & type them up here with the marriages & then ask you to see if you can see a WA from a likely location that I may have missed.

Would this be OK ?

[Elaine]

If you give me some details and dates I will have a look as I have lots of bits for Leicester

Did a quick look at William from the previous post and there is one 1816 to Elizabeth Hall, will wait to hear what your names are exactly

[Darksecretz]

can't see why not Grey, stick up some details and let the dog see the rabbit.. ~~~ to Elaine

[greyingrey]

If you give me some details and dates I will have a look as I have lots of bits for Leicester

Did a quick look at William from the previous post and there is one 1816 to Elizabeth Hall, will wait to hear what your names are exactly

I'll get back with the details. If I had to say what I think happened, I think the chap who married Elizabeth Hall is my man.....I suspect this marriage was bigamous after his marriage to my gggg grandmother broke down. But it's highly speculative....what makes me think this might be the case is that the dates would fit & the name of the first son WA had with my gggg grandmother would have been the same as your WA's father....& in WA's marriage with Elizabeth Hall the children bore the names of his mother & siblings....but not his father. But, of course, the possiibilities are endless (groan)

You know you're going to regret encouraging me, don't you, Julie ?

[Elaine]

Leicester, All Saints 01-Feb 1816 Banns
William Asher OTP
Elizabeth Hall OTP

another Elizabeth just in case

Leicester, St. Martin 19-Sep 1814 Banns
William Asher OTP
Elizabeth Barfield OTP

there are a few others

[Darksecretz]

yep but I just love saying it...lol.... it's lovely to see you back too Grey :smilee: have missed your ashers... :p

[greyingrey]

yep but I just love saying it...lol.... it's lovely to see you back too Grey :smilee: have missed your ashers... :p

Heh, heh ! Well, if you're mad enough....

Elaine....you've found the marriage. My gggg grandmother, Elizabeth Barfield married Wm Asher on 19 Sep 1814 at St Martin's Leicester. They moved to Nottingham & had 2 children baptised there (from later data quite/very late baptisms) After this second baptism (in 1818) William disappears & the next we see of Eliz is when she has a child by Lyon Asher (my gggg grandfather) baptised in Nottm in 1820 (at least, we assume it was her...it was certainly her with Lyon on the census records) Maybe Wm started calling himself Lyon, but every brave soul who has looked at this (& there have been a few) have had the gut feeling that they were 2 different men. W&E's second child was named Samuel Lyon....maybe he was named after Lyon or maybe he was Lyon's child. Lyon was a Jewish immigrant & the first time we see him in Britain is in 1820. We've done the "What happened to William" & the Nottingham angle to death & concluded that we don't know what happened to him. I've looked at the witnesses at W&E's wedding & followed what happened to them & I can't find any other connection to an Asher family....they seem to have been friends

Sooo....if you haven't run out of the room screaming, I thought maybe we could try & find a baptism for Wm Asher in Leics/the Northants/Leics border area (Eliz came from just inside Northants...Titchmarsh). I think there was quite a large Asher family in a village near Market Harborough. You know how, on TV, they say "Don't try this at home"? Well, please feel free to wait till I've gone back through the notes I made on this ages ago....could save you a lot of work. Then again, I probably got it all wrong.

I may be gone for some time (quite apropriate comment in the current weather)

[Darksecretz]

I have just found this Grey..

https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/JWS9-WJT

I'll have a look to see if I can spot anything else.

this looks to be him in 1841:

http://search.ancestry.co.uk/cgi-bin/sse.dll?rank=1&new=1&MSAV=1&msT=1&gss=angs-c&gsfn=wm&gsln=ash**&msbdy=1793&msbpn__ftp=Northamptonshire%2c+England&msbpn=5277&msbpn_PInfo=7-%7c0%7c0%7c3257%7c3251%7c0%7c0%7c0%7c5277%7c0%7c0%7c&cpxt=1&uidh=lg3&msbdp=2&cp=0&pcat=35&h=8737466&recoff=6+7&db=uki1841&indiv=1

Source Citation: Class: HO107; Piece: 797; Book: 24; Civil Parish: Wilbarston; County: Northamptonshire; Enumeration District: 23; Folio: 4; Page: 2; Line: 25; GSU roll: 438874.

1851: http://search.ancestry.co.uk/cgi-bin...&rhSource=8978
Source Citation: Class: HO107; Piece: 2079; Folio: 256; Page: 25; GSU roll: 87705.

poss death as martha seems to be a 'nurse' in 1861

Name: William Asher
Date of Registration: Jan-Feb-Mar 1855
Registration district: Kettering
Inferred County: Northamptonshire
Volume: 3b
Page: 124

[greyingrey]

Thanks, Julie.....yes, I thought I'd nailed him when I found that baptism.(very close to where Eliz was baptised) But he was accounted for elsewhere ! But possibly the Wm who married her in Leicester was part of the same family

[kylejustin]

sounds like your tracing a jewish family. didn't they have a name that they used in their community, and one outsiders were known by? could his family have called him lyon, and he used william in everyday life?

[Darksecretz]

I have been looking back on 'Lyon/William Asher' threads on here and the more I look at it, the more I am inclined to think that they are one and the same person.

do you think that there could be 'something' that kicked off between William vanishing and Lyon appearing? [be it prison? avoiding something/one] maybe something to do with 'Jews' I don't know, I know I am rambling... it just seems like too much of a coincidence if you get me!..

[greyingrey]

Possibly, kylejustin. Lyon was certainly Jewish & so I've wondered if he called himself William at first to "fit in" & then gained confidence enough in his Jewish identity to use his real name. But, if that were the case, then his first child would have been named George Thomas & that doesn't sound very likely to me. I think it's likely that William Asher was from a related Jewish family/family with Jewish roots too that had come over earlier & got to the stage where they used anglicised names (all children credited to Lyon have very Jewish names). I don't want to point anyone in the direction of Nottingham because we have exhausted that (I think) but there was an Asher family in a village that I'd say were definitely related or had some kind of "kinship friendship".....there's a woman named Clementine Brown from Derby who married into it & my great aunt used to tell me lots of stories about a"great aunt Clemmie" from Derby who was a bit of character & what she told me fits absolutely. I've traced that family back in that village in Notts back to 1720 (& then got bored), & haven't found a set of typical Jewish names that far back, so I reckon the same was true of them.Notts & Leics have/had by far the largest numbers of Ashers anywhere in Britain....the vast majority had Jewish immigrant roots. In those counties, it would have been like having the name Singh or Patel today.

[greyingrey]

[ I know what you mean, Julie. I've veered between thinking "they must be the same" to thinking "no they're not". As I say, it's the name of Wm & Eliz's first child that stops me thinking they are....I just can't see Lyon naming his firstborn George Thomas.And, as I've said, there were a heck of a lot of Ashers about, so it wouldn't be that unusual for Eliz to have had 2 Asher partners, especially if her family had Jewish roots, too (probable, unless Lyon wanted to be completely ostracised in a foreign country)I guess we'll never know....but my gut feeling is that she either took up with Lyon or Wm took up with Eliz Hall (or in the other order, if you see what I mean) & Wm married Eliz Hall bigamously in Leicester in 1816. That would fit in with the "break" between babies credited to Wm & Eliz & Wm & Lyon in Nottm. The Wm in Leicester was also in the army....so he may have joined then

I have been looking back on 'Lyon/William Asher' threads on here and the more I look at it, the more I am inclined to think that they are one and the same person.do you think that there could be 'something' that kicked off between William vanishing and Lyon appearing? [be it prison? avoiding something/one] maybe something to do with 'Jews' I don't know, I know I am rambling... it just seems like too much of a coincidence if you get me!..

[Janet]

My only comments so far, having suggested you put your brick wall up here is that there are no Asher in Northants in 1777 Militia Lists, which is interesting! But there is a Thomas Barfield, cordwinder, listed in the Militia List for 15 December 1777 at Titchmarsh. There is also a Jonathan Barfield shoemaker listed in the Militia List 28 November 1777, living at Chelveston Cum Caldecott. But no other Barfield in Northamptonshire. All able bodied men from 18 to 40 had to be enlisted in the Militia unless they were very poor but even then the men's names were listed along with their children, so if you are only finding two of this name it suggests the family may not be a true Northants family.

Reading your above comments about possible prison etc well if he was working for the landed gentry of which there were many in that area then the list is endless regards possible offences and poaching is one that springs to mind for this area. I have many poachers in my family in this area, all having done some time somewhere or other.Northants Mercury is great for that area, I think it strays into Leicestershire and in any case does stary into Rutland now Leics

Janet

[greyingrey]

Thanks very much, Janet. I think the Wm who married Eliz Barfield was the Wm from Leicester who married Eliz Hall in 1816. "My" Wm & Eliz named their first child George Thomas. I've exchanged emails with a descendant of Wm Asher & Eliz Hall & she has confirmed that his father's name was George & my Eliz's father's name was Thomas....so they'd have been naming the first child after both fathers. In his marriage with Eliz Hall, Wm Asher didn't name any of his sons George (his father's name), despite naming others after his brothers & father in law. Could just be coincidence, tho.....

[Elaine]

Was looking at baptisms and am not up to scratch with family names for William and Elizabeth poss couple no.2 but found
Baptism
St Martins
ASHER BETSY 1820 WILLIAM & ELIZABETH 27-Sep

and wondered if you had come across this one

Found Lyons death in the paper 12th August 1860 yellow jaundice...sponge dealer

[Elaine]

Am a little confused, why do all the trees online have Elizabeth Bradley
been digging in the paper, don't know what marriages you have but at least I can name a church to check entry for father's name

Births, Deaths, Marriages and Obituaries .
Nottinghamshire Guardian (London, England), Thursday, October 07, 1852; pg. 3
At Trinity Church, Nottingham, on the 4th instant, Mr. Jacob Asher, Newcastle Street, to Miss Elizabeth Moor

Marriage refs I have
Abraham to Harriot Russel St Paul 20 Feb 1847
Alfred to Ann Lowe 4 May 1840 St Mary

[greyingrey]

Oh, thank you Elaine....I'd got the details on Lyon's death (I think I've got all the Nottm stuff), but that baptism is intriguing.

[Elaine]

William of Rushton married Martha Hodges 1818 2 Dec Kelmarsh

[Elaine]

I know the baptism is a little past Nottm dates but it would be good to see the original and compare the occ to the Nottingham baptism