myroots

Tracing Susan Caroline Hill's brothers and sisters

posted Wednesday, 2 January 2008

Susan Caroline HILL was one of my great-grandmothers (paternal) and was born on 17 December 1875 at 29 Vauban Street, Southwark. Her parents, shown on her birth certificate, are John HILL , a Labourer, and Elizabeth WINDEBANK. John is still something of a mystery, but he and Elizabeth are shown on various censuses after their marriage in 1869, with their children, and I would like to be able to find out more about Susan's brothers and sisters as they grew up, married and had children of their own. So far, I know very little.

John and Elizabeth's first child was, I think, John David HILL born around 1870 in Sunbury. This is largely based on a John and Elizabeth HILL appearing in the 1871 census in Sunbury, Middlesex. John's birthplace is not shown, but Elizabeth's is given as Bucks, Slough (she was born in Upton-cum-Chalvey near Slough). They have a seven month old boy John, born in Sunbury, suggesting a birth date of 1870 (there is a birth entry for John David HILL in Staines, the district including Sunbury, in December 1870). I haven't found him on the 1881 census, and he may have been the John David HILL whose death is recorded in Poplar, Middlesex aged 1, in Dec 1872, so for now I assume that Susan's eldest brother died young.

Susan Caroline was the second of John and Elizabeth's children, born after the family moved to Bermondsey. Their third child seems to have been Mary HILL, born in 1879 in Bermondsey (and on the 1881 census, aged 2).  Sadly it seems that she too died young; she does not appear in the 1881 census, and there is a death index entry for a Mary Ann HILL aged 3 in St Olave in September 1882.

Susan's brother George William HILL makes an appearance on the 1891 census, aged 9, indicating a birth year of 1882. A possible FreeBMD entry is for a George William HILL in September 1881 in St Olave, although this may be a little too early. In the 1901 census George is aged 19, living at home with his mother and her second husband Thomas George EVANS at Bowles Road Camberwell, and working as a General Labourer. What happened to him after that is largely - again - conjecture. There are a couple of possible marriage entries for him: 1902 in Camberwell, 1904 in Lambeth etc. but without more information the trail stops there.

Charlotte Sarah HILL was born in 1883 in Bermondsey and is at home at the time of the 1891 census, aged 7.  In 1901, she is living with her mother and stepfathe, aged 17, and described as a Laundress. She may have married Walter WHITLOCK in 1902.

William HILL was born in 1887 in Bermondsey and is living with his mother and stepfather in Camberwell at the time of the 1901 census, aged 14, and working as a labourer. 

John Charles HILL, John and Elizabeth's last child, was born in 1891 in Bermondsey and is aged 10 at the time of the 1901 census. His father presumably died before 1895, when Elizabeth married Thomas George EVANS.