Can anyone read this please?

[Harrys mum]

I can't make out the words in the informant box.

Any ideas???

PS............It's a death cert...lol

[Just Gillian]

Hi libby

I think it says James Scott Keeper and then Fish something - possibly ponds? If this is a Bristol one, there's a Fishponds there.

[HeatherD]

James Scott........Keeper.........Fish?????

[Harrys mum]

Thanks.................It is a Bristol one.

Sub-district of Stapleton if that helps.

Do you know what the "keeper" means???

[tanyal]

Thanks.................It is a Bristol one.

Sub-district of Stapleton if that helps.

Do you know what the "keeper" means???

Maybe it's a surname. I googled and found this page, which at least indicates that a surname, "Keeper" exists.

Keeper Coat of Arms / Keeper Family Crest

[Just Gillian]

I'd have said keeper meant a custodian of some sort. The most common is probably gamekeeper, but there are others such as lock- and gate-

If it's Stapleton, then it will definitely be Fishponds.

[Harrys mum]

Mmmmmm.....

I haven't come across either a Keeper or a Scott in this family so far.

I was thinking James Scott, then the "keeper" was a keeper of something or somewhere.
If it is Fishponds, I was wondering if it's like the keeper of the records at Fishponds????


The cert is 1837 so very early.

[Harrys mum]

Thanks Gillian.

I wonder (I do that a lot..lol) why he would be the informant?? Would the family have just sent the "keeper" off to register a death??

[Just Barbara]

There are gamekeepers on rivers so presumably on the fishponds? A family friend?

[Harrys mum]

I just have no idea Barbara. I think this lot would be more likely to have owned the fishponds rather than lived on them....lol

[Anne in Carlisle]

With no other information I would assume (if it was my cert) that 'keeper' meant gamekeeper. To me this is what it implies - not any other sort of keeper (gatekeeper; lodgekeeper etc) Can you find him on a census?

Anne

[Just Gillian]

There's a James Scott, born Scotland 1791, in Stapleton/Fishponds on the 1851.
HO107/1955, Folio 310, Page 18
He's a farmer of 70 acres employing 2 labourers though.

The best match I can find for that James in 1841 is in St Philip and St Jacob, born out of county, but an engineer.
HO107/378 Folio 58 P36

[Uncle John]

I go along with Anne's interpretation of "keeper" as gamekeeper. And though there may well have been fish ponds in medieval times, Fishponds is now just a placename.

[Mary from Italy]

And anyway, the informant box normally contains the informant's address, which confirms that Fishponds is the placename.

[Janet]

Would agree about keeper being most probably a gamekeeper and Fishponds is a very old part of the Bristol area, now contained within the city but used to be a village. See the following website for more information which would be in keeping with your man being a keeper.

Bristol Past : Fishponds Local History Society

Janet

[Harrys mum]

Thank you.....

I did find that Bristol Past website last night, but there doesn't seem to be any contact details. I'll re-visit it today.

There is a map on that site from 1839 (two years after this cert) which has Fishponds House as an assylum.

I'm starting to see eerie happenings here, but possibly due to what happens later in this family. This lady's husband re-marries in Feb 1839, so just 14 months after his wife's death, and is himself dead a year after his second marriage.

I doubt very much this family would have put anyone into an assylum. There was plenty of money to hire people to look after anyone and I doubt they wanted the stigma.

So.......maybe it is just the general area of Fishponds. They were in the parish of St Phillip and St Jacob for their marriages (although this one took place in Wakefield).

They used Broadmead and Kingsmead Baptist for worship.