Baconsthorpe? I'd never have thought of looking there.* The names (especially the surname "Lane"), home parishes, and dates fit, but I wonder why they married there. I hope to be able to get the licence affidavit, if it still exists, to see if it might answer that question.

But that's for a future post. Right now I want to say thank you to Jean, the FreeREG volunteer who took the time to contact me about a marriage record that's eluded me for months … and I also want to thank the unknown volunteers who are freely giving of their time to transcribe that record and thousands like it.

If you're not familiar with this wonderful resource, here's a brief description from the What is FreeREG page:

Our objective is to provide free Internet searches of baptism, marriage, and burial records, which have been extracted from parish registers and non-conformist church records in the UK. The recording of baptisms, marriages and burials in parish registers began in England in 1538 and is separate and distinct from the civil registration process that began in 1837. (The latter is covered by our companion project FreeBMD) Our aim is to make it easier for researchers, no matter where they are in the world, to locate a specific record relating to their ancestor within a parish register.

<snip>

What is possible with FreeREG is for an individual researcher to enter an ancestor's name, specify a search for a baptism, marriage or burial, state a date range to search, state a county, (and optionally, narrow it down to one town or village), and then search the database for the match using those criteria.

Again, my thanks to Jean and her FreeREG colleagues. One final note - a tip for searching that Jean passed along to me: It's best to tick the soundex box for the surname, leave the Christian name field empty, and enter a date range if you expect a lot of hits. This is because transcribers are instructed to transcribe as written, with abbreviations, spelling variants, etc., but there is no soundex on the Christian name search like there is on the surname name search.

Back when I had an Ancestry.com subscription, I saw a few trees that listed a 1747 marriage in Shipham (sic) for William & Elizabeth. Once I found baptism records in Stiffkey starting in 1739, however, I knew it was very unlikely they were the same couple. But after I made the post about William & Elizabeth's children, Michele Ryan left a comment saying she had seen information that marriage took place in 1737. That, of course, put a different light on things.

So this morning, I started looking through the Shipdham registers to see if I could find out which year the marriage took place.

I found no marriage in 1737, but I did find the 1747 marriage. I can't get the direct link to the image to work, but on the very last image (253 of 253) in the Shipdham Baptisms, Marriages, Burials 1558-1804 (NRO PD 337/1) is this record:

Marriages 1747

William Jairy of Mattishall(?) Single & Elizabeth Sherey of same by Licence 20 Sept.

So I guess we're back to square one as regards the William & Elizabeth Jary who started baptising children in Stiffkey in 1739. Sigh.

The next place to look may be Binham. That was Elizabeth Jary's home when she died, according to the Stiffkey register.

Source: Shipdham Parish Registers, Baptisms & Burials 1558-1804; Marriages 1558-1753. Norfolk Record Office, PD 337/1. Image online at http://pilot.familysearch.org - England, Norfolk Parish Registers, Shipdham Baptisms, Marriages, Burials 1558-1804, Image 253 of 253. Accessed 25 April 2010.

If the "Mann" household is seperate from Wm Warnes' House hold, why is Wm Warnes shown as Head against Thomas and Elizabeth Mann?The Wm Jary here is probably the son of Jacob and Mary--Davison--Jary, b. abt 1819, and apprenticed to either Wm Warnes or Thomas Mann, but who is the Wm Jary aged 15,--- b. abt 1826?--- in the Susan Starling Household?

regards, Bob

Bob's question was in regard to this household:

27	High St	Wm Warnes	M	60	Mariner	Y	(Self)
		Rose	F	40		Y	Wm Warnes	End of family mark (/) after line
		Thomas Mann	M	37	Mariner	Y	Wm Warnes
		Elizabeth Mann	F	26		Y	Wm Warnes
		Wm Jary	M	21	Sea App	Y	Wm Warnes?	See below

Page	Name	Age	Comments
27	Wm Jary	21	(Mann household) There is an end of dwelling mark (//) on Elizabeth Mann's line, but no digit in "Inhabited" column next to Wm Jary's name to indicate a new household.

Here is an excerpt of the census page showing the entries (click the image to enlarge it):

Excerpt from 1841 Blakeney census: the Wm Warnes household

I interpreted the single mark through the first two letters of Thomas Mann's name as an "end of family" mark, whereas the double lines on the line with Elizabeth Mann's name look like an "end of household" mark to me. That makes me think that the Manns lived with Wm & Rose Warnes; two families in one household. I haven't researched this family, but I suspect that Elizabeth Mann may have been the daughter of Wm Warnes. (Or perhaps Rose Warnes's sister?)

If it is indeed an "end of household" mark at Elizabeth Mann's name, I would have expected to see a digit in the "Inhabited" column next to Wm Jary's name (similar to the one next to Wm Warnes's name) to indicate the start of a new household. But there is no mark in that column, and this is why I put a question mark in the table when I transcribed it. It's not clear to me whether Wm Jary was part of the Warnes household, or if he lived by himself.

I don't think that this William Jary was the son of Jacob & Mary Davison Jary, however. From the hand-written index of the Stiffkey Register (NRO PD492, HMN6-364: F-L): "Jarey, William son of Jacob & Mary, buried 16 Apr 1819, aged 2 weeks." So I don't know who this William Jary was. We have no other William Jarys in our file that come close to being the right age. (That's not to say we don't have the data somewhere; I just may not have put it into our iFamily file yet. That's one of the reasons we started this site, to catch things like this.)

In answer to Bob's second question, I think the Wm Jary enumerated in Susan Starling's household may have been her nephew, William Richard Shepherd Jary, born 2 October 1823, and christened 5 October 1823 in Blakeney. He was the son of Susan's brother, John Jary (b ca 1800) and his wife, Peggy Baines. (Blakeney Baptisms 1813-1840; NRO PD619; MF691/30). This William would have been about 18 years old, but remember that the 1841 enumerators' instructions were to record ages from 15 and under 20 years as 15 years. Those instructions weren't followed in many instances, but perhaps they were in this one.

We will add to this as we find more information. Right now we're especially looking for Willliam's parents and Elizabeth's maiden name. If you can help, please contact us.

Chart showing the William Jary family

Now I'm beginning to wonder about that. I'd been planning to write about William, Susanna, and their children, so when I realised that today was Tombstone Tuesday, I figured this would be a good time to do so.

Susanna's tombstone lies directly behind, and very close to, those of William Jary (senior) and his wife, Elizabeth, and of their son, Andew Jary, and his wife, Catherine (Warnes) Jary.

Tombstones of William, Elizabeth, Andrew, Catherine, and Susanna Jary

Here is a closeup of Susanna's tombstone:

Tombstone of Susanna Jary, Stiffkey St John.

It's a little hard to read, so here is a cross-processed image that may be easier to make out (click either image for a larger version.)

Crossprocessed image of Susanna Jary's tombstone

The wording looks like this:

"In memory of Susanna the Wife of William Jary Jun'r who died May 12 1774 Aged 36 Years"

Hang on ... 1774?

I noticed this as I was preparing the picture of Susanna's tombstone for this post. That's the reason for the cross-processing above. I was trying to bring out the last digit in the year as clearly as possible. It certainly looks like a four to me, not a five.

The year struck me, because in my previous post, I talked about how the parish register and AT have her burial as having occurred in 1775. Could I have been wrong when I wrote that post?

I went back and checked the notes we made at the NRO when we looked at the hand-written index to the parish register transcript, and at the microfiche of the PR itself and the AT. All the notes say she was buried on 14 May 1775. Not only that, we have a copy of the AT on microfiche, and I just rechecked it.  The previous page shows baptisms, burials, and marriages from Easter 1774 to Easter 1775; it contains burials up to 19 March 1775 (the year is clear). The entries on the page containing Susanna's burial record start from Easter 1775.

George son of William & Susan Jeary baptis'd May 4th
The same Infant buried May 9th
Susan Wife of William Jeary buried May 14.

There are four more entries for 1775, then the next entry is clearly dated Jan'y 5th, 1776. At the bottom of the page is written: "Taken from the Register May 22, 1776."

So the parish register & Archdeacon's transcript recorded her burial in 1775, yet her tombstone shows, or at least appears to show, the year 1774.

I am going to have to revise my earlier statement about trusting the tombstone. We know the parish register was contemporary to her burial, and the Archdeacon's transcript was a made the following year. We don't, however, know when or by whom her tombstone was commissioned, or who dictated what should be carved upon it. We also don't know if the stonemason may not have made a mistake in the year, putting a 4 instead of a 5.

As a source, the register is most contemporary, followed by the AT, then (presumably, since we can't date it) the tombstone.

So a lesson learned and I take it back. Even though I'm still not sure about the name variant (and she probably went by each of them at some point in her life), I'll go with the parish register and Archdeacon's transcript on the year.

(And another lesson learned and note to self: pay closer attention & don't make assumptions. If I'd actually looked at the tombstone more closely, instead of just assuming it had the same year as the records, my previous post would have been very different.)

It does contain several other names that have provided possible lines of research, but so far we have been unable to link him to our line. This is posted here in hopes it may assist other researchers.

The original document is held at the Norfolk Record Office; reference NRO: ANW, will register 1707-1708, fo.51

Names mentioned:

Robert Jeary
Anne Jeary
Elizabeth Jeary
John Jeary
Margaret Jeary
Maria Jeary
Witnesses:
Absalom Billet
William Loads
Fran Barker

Download: will-of-robert-jeary-stiffkey-1707 (PDF file)

William Jary b1741[a],  son of William Jary b1702[b] (sigh!), married Susannah Walters in May, 1765[a]. Susannah died in 1775, shortly after the birth of their 7th child.

The parish register entry of her burial shows her name as "Susanna"[c], as do the handwritten index[a] and her tombstone[d].

The Archdeacons Transcript, however, shows her name as "Susan"[e].

I think I'd be inclined to trust the tombstone in this case.

Sources:

• [a] Stiffkey (PD 492) Register Index - HMN6-364: F-L [Boxed loose-leaf handwritten index held in NRO strongroom; accessed 21 Nov 2008]
• [b] Tombstone: William Jary. St John the Baptist Churchyard, Stiffkey, Norfolk, England
• [c] Stiffkey (PD 492) & Morston (PD 478) Parish Registers 1538-1784 [microfiche no. 4; accessed 20 November 2008]
• [d] Tombstone: Susanna Jary. St John the Baptist Churchyard, Stiffkey, Norfolk, England
• [e] Norwich Diocese, Norwich Archdeaconry, Walsingham Deanery, Archdeacon's Transcripts: Stiffkey 1600-1811/12 (Fiche 2 of 3) (PD 492)