To take us to the next generation you will find other records sourced below:

• The death of Amy Plummer and Lilian Chappell
• The marriage of Frederick Chappell and Susan Lugg
• Frederick Chappell’s death

The marriage details of Frederick and Susan gave me the names of their fathers.

Step 1 – How long do they live?

To keep things clear we are going to follow Frederick Stone Chappell. Thanks to Frederick’s birth certificate I know that his father was called Samuel Chappell, occupation shoemaker, that it is possible he was still living in 1877, as the marriage certificate does not say ‘Deceased’, and that his mother was called Mary Ann Sampson.

There is a number of things I could do here. Try to trace the death of Samuel Chappell by using the Census to reduce my search years, or start with the 1861 Census when Frederick would have been about 10 years old, which could provide me with further clues to a marriage date of his parents.

My first search for Frederick Chappell did not produce the result I required, so I chose a Soundex search on his name and found him under the spelling of Chappel.

Add	Name			Age	Rank	Where born
Pickle	Samuel	Head	Married	65	Navy Pensioner/	Colyton, Devon
Sq, Lyme	Chappel				Cordwainer
	Mary Ann	Wife	Married	55	Charwoman	Axmouth
	Henry	Son	Unmarried	24	Painter/Glazier	Axmouth
	Frederick	Son	Unmarried	9	Scholar	Lyme
	Stone

Information from the 1861 Census

From the above I now know that Frederick had an older brother called Henry, who was 15 years his senior. I also have the ages of his parents and places of birth. What is interesting is that Samuel was once in the navy, although apparently retired and his occupation is listed as cordwainer. By typing in old occupations on the address line of my browser several sites produced the following definition:

Cordwainer – shoemaker, originally any leather-worker using leather from Cordova/Cordoba in Spain

I was very confident that I had the correct family and based on the above information I searched the 1851 Census.

Add	Name			Age	Rank	Where born
Mill	Samuel	Head	Married	48	Shoemaker	Colyton, Devon
Green,	Chappel
Lyme	Mary Ann	Wife	Married	34	Charwoman	Axmouth
	Henry	Son	Unmarried	13	Painter/ Glazier	Lyme

Information from the 1851 Census.

Again even though there is a big discrepancy in the ages of Samuel and Mary Ann, between the two Census records I am confident I have the right family. The only irritating piece of information is that the date of birth for Samuel Chappel is now between the years of 1796 and 1803, and the date of birth for Mary Ann between 1806 and 1817.

Naturally I wanted to source the 1841 Census. Given the above information, I thought this would be fairly easy and to my delight it was, as they were living in Lyme at that time. The 1841 Census gave the birth-date for Samuel as about 1814, and for Mary Ann about 1816, and Henry, their eldest, about 1837.

Before I try to source the marriage details for Samuel and Mary Ann, I am going to source their death details. Although Frederick’s marriage certificate does not state that his father Samuel was deceased, I am going to check the 1871 Census for Frederick who at this time might still have been living at home with Samuel and Mary Ann.

Unfortunately, I could not find Frederick or his father even using Soundex, so I looked under his mother’s name, Mary Ann Chappell, and found Frederick and her both living in Pickle Square, Lyme. Mary Ann was recorded as ‘Widow of Mariner’. What is worth noting is that Frederick was recorded as Fred S., and this did not come up on a Soundex search. I now know that Samuel Chappell died pre-1871 but post-1861, and Mary Ann Chappell post-1871. Searching FreeBMD under the spelling of Chappell, Chappel and finally Chapple, I found him:

Deaths Mar 1870
Chapple Samuel	72	Axminster	5b	4

The death certificate proved to be the correct one. Samuel Chapple died aged 72 in Pickle Square, Lyme – occupation pensioner in the Coast Guard Service.

In the 1881 Census, I found Frederick under Fred T. Chappell, living with his wife Susan and his widowed mother Mary Ann, aged 68. Getting wise as to how Frederick was recorded, I searched the 1891 Census under the name Fred and sure enough he wasn’t there! Typical, I found him as Frederick S. Chappel still living in Lyme, but in Coombe Street with his wife, four children and his widowed mother Mary Ann, now aged 78.

Mary Ann was not recorded as living in the 1901 Census, so my search years for her death index are from 1891 to 1901. I found her in 1893, making her 80 years of age from the information on the 1881 and 1891 Census records, but to my dismay her age recorded is 72 years:

Deaths Mar 1893
Chappell Mary Ann	72	Axminster	5b	2

Again, this proved to be the right certificate, if not the right age, or maybe it was the right age! Mary Ann is recorded as widow of Samuel Chappell, shoemaker, living at Coombe Street, Lyme, and Frederick Chappell was present at her death.

Step 2 – Marriage records beyond 1837

To complete this family unit, I now need to source the marriage record for Samuel Chappell and Mary Ann Sampson.

As their first child, Henry, was born about 1837, I am presuming that Samuel and Mary Ann married pre-Civil Registration, so I am going to utilise FamilySearch, a free site providing genealogical information worldwide.

I put in the name Samuel Chappell, selected Marriage as the event, put in the year 1837 with a range of 10 years and selected England. This is what the search produced:

To the right of the screen you will see there are only 16 possible matches; 1 ancestral and 15 IGI (International Genealogical Index). Looking down the page, the most positive is number 11. Samuel Chapple, 1836, Axmouth; where Mary Ann Sampson was born. I clicked on number 11 and found the following.

Step 3 – Original Sources beyond 1837

The source information at the bottom of the above page is important should you wish to obtain the original record. Although I have not as yet found this particular record I do have one for an ancestor from my family – William Podevin.

The above record is that of my five times great grandfather’s and mother’s marriage record. I decided to trace the information to the original source. I went back to the home page for FamilySearch and looked up a Family History Centre related to this site near where I live.

I found one in Aldershot and took a copy of the record I had sourced to them and placed an order to view the microfilm. Within one week I had a call to say the film was in. I was thrilled and went to view the original record only to find they did not have facilities for me to make a copy of the information. I transcribed the details and later that day I searched the Internet for Saint Mary’s Church in Newington.

Besides giving me lots of information about the church for my family file it also provided a link to record offices (see the index on left).

I emailed the link for the London Metropolitan Archives and they emailed back with an enquiry form which I posted off, for a fee, and within a short time I received the following:

So again, with the help of the Internet it is possible to access records without having to go to the source location.

Back to Samuel Chappell and Mary Ann Sampson – I can now add their marriage details to my tree and utilise the same method as above to find the original details.

Step 4 – Birth records beyond 1837

The next step will be to try to source church records of the births for Samuel and Mary Ann. The main problem here is that I have such a range of possible birth-years owing to the information received from the Census and death certificates. I go back to FamilySearch and key in the name Mary Ann Sampson, date 1810 with a range of 10 years either side.

This search brought up 191 possible records, but by clicking on ‘refine search’ to the right, I can reduce this search by adding further information.

This search produced the following:

Looking down the list, number 17 seemed the most likely.

I believe this to be the correct record. If Mary Anne Sampson was born in 1814 it would make her about 79 at the time of her death; this ties in with the 1891 Census, the 1881 Census and the 1871 Census. Additionally, all the Census records show her as being born in Axmouth. I now also have the name of her father and the Christian name of her mother.

Before I add this information to my tree I will try and source Samuel Chappell. I know from the Census records that he was born in Colyton, Devon but again I have a range of years in which he could have been born. Using the same screen in FamilySearch as I did with Mary Anne Sampson, I clicked on ‘search results’ and then ‘refine search’ but changed the details for my next search.

The most obvious is number 2 for a Samuel Chapel born in Colyton in Devon.

Again looking at the information I already have, this birth-date matched the information on his death certificate and the age I have on the 1861 Census.

Step 5 – The Search for Siblings beyond 1837

I decided to look for further clues by carrying out a search of other children of William Chappell and Honor. By clicking on search results from my last search page and refining the results again, I can alter the search criteria to find siblings of Samuel Chappell.

This search brought up details of the birth and christening dates of four children for a William and Honor Chappell in Colyton, Devon.

Step 6 – Ancestors born in the 18th Century but still living in 1841

I couldn’t look for these ancestors previously as I did not know of their existence until I started investigating FamilySearch, but I could now establish whether Samuel’s parents and siblings were still alive in 1841 by looking at the Census.

In Ancestry.co.uk I put in my search criteria for Honor and William Chappell. I tried several permutations of both the surname and Christian names for Honor, William and children, but without success. Trying Christian names gave me lots of individuals named Honor and William, but none related to the family I was researching. I continued without success and eventually decided upon another way of searching, rather than face searching through the whole of Colyton in Devon and quite possibly again in Lyme, Dorset.

I went back to my 1841 Census search screen in Ancestry.co.uk and unticked ‘Exact matches only’ in the top left. I put in Hon* (the asterisk means wild card and it will search for all Christian names beginning with Hon). I chose Devon as the place of birth and residence but without a result, so I then chose Dorset.

It was a large search but before I went through each one I decided to go straight to the letter C. Luckily on the second page, there was Honnor Chappel in Lyme Regis. Could this be her?

Yes, I think it is!

The address was the same as that for Samuel and Mary Ann. On the very next page I found Honor Chappell aged 84 and a William Chappell aged 45. I believed William to be the brother of Samuel because his birth-year is the same as that of William Chappell born to Honor and William Chappell, see below:

I am now about 90% certain I have the right records for Samuel’s birth, those of his siblings and the names of his parents, but what would make me happier would be to find the death records for Honor and what appears to be her son William, as per the 1841 Census.

Oddly, I could find neither of them on the 1851 Census, so my search took me to the decade between 1841 and 1851. I found a couple of death records for a William Chappell and one proved to be correct and what was even more exciting was the informant of the death.

Mary Ann Chappell was present at the death – fantastic, what a find! Now I am confident I’m on the right track. Also, another clue is William Chappell, brother of Samuel, who is recorded to be a cordwainer!

I found the death record for Honor Chappell dated 1849,1 could now add these details to the main tree (see the end of this chapter).

Using the same method as above, I wanted further evidence that I have the right information about Mary Ann Sampson’s birth but the Census records for 1861, 1871, 1881 and 1891 put her at about the right age. Although her death certificate records her as 72 years in 1893 making her birth date 1821,1 think I’m about 75% convinced I have the right details.

To be more certain I found two possible marriages in Axmouth for John Sampson – one was dated 1813 to an Elizabeth, and the other to a Betty Hake in 1798. Both couples had several children, and John and Elizabeth had a daughter called Mary Ann Sampson born in 1814, the year following their marriage. Although John and Betty had a daughter called Mary born in 1798, she died in 1799. 1 am now 90% certain that I have the right Mary Ann Sampson born to John and Elizabeth Sampson in 1814, Axmouth.

I also went on to find an Elizabeth Sampson in the 1841 Census, working as a Maid Servant at Hawksdown Farm in Colyton, aged 68. My Elizabeth died in 1850 aged 80 on the death certificate, so there is only a discrepancy of 2 years. The death certificate for Elizabeth Sampson records her as the widow of John Sampson, with an Ann Hamer present at death.

As yet 1 cannot find a link between Ann Hamer and Elizabeth Sampson, but in the 1851 Census I found Ann Hamer (under the transcribed spelling of Harne) aged 47, living with her husband and children in Colyton. Maybe she is related through marriage, because the other John Sampson who married Betty Flake had a daughter called Ann born in 1803, which fits with the age of Ann Hamer. However, I cannot find a record of Ann Sampson’s marriage to a Hamer, so this could be a cold trail, but not until I can confidently eliminate her from my research.

Recap

• 1.Church records will take you beyond Civil Registration.
• 2.You may find ancestors who, although born and married prior to 1837, actually died post-1837.
• 3.You can search for birth, marriage and death certificates pre-1837 online via church records.
• 4.Once you have found an entry for an ancestor, you can source the original document using research services.
• 5.The total cost so far is:

  Annual UK Deluxe Membership with Ancestry.co.uk	£69.95
  Cost of 17 certificates	£119.00
  London Met	£35.00
  Total	£223.95

  Optional cost if choosing to utilise another source:
  Subscription to findmyfamily.com Census/BMD (You could choose either or both Ancestry and findmyfamily.com)	£65.00
  Total	£288.95

 Tips

• 1.When searching on the Census, shortened names such as Fred for Frederick will not always come up even when carrying out a Soundex search. (Soundex is not foolproof).
• 2.When searching using FamilySearch, it is easy to get carried away and keep searching and printing. Try to keep your searches to a generation until you have finished researching, documenting and recording your sources otherwise you will just end up with a mass of paperwork that won’t make sense.
• 3.Remember to investigate ways to manipulate research sites such as FamilySearch to get quick results, such as finding siblings.
• 4.You can book research services at most hi story/ archive centres but it will cost you, although if you weigh up time and transport, the cost could be less.
• 5.You will more often than not find discrepancies in the ages of your ancestors. This does not necessarily mean you have the wrong person, you just need to look for other sources to confirm your findings.
• 6.Do try to obtain original sources pre-1837 to prove your findings.
• 7.Remember if someone was born and married prior to 1837, it does not mean you can’t trace them via the Census or death certificates. Although the average age at death was a great deal lower than it is today, you will find that some of your ancestors lived to grand old ages.
• 8.Never discount the names of persons detailed on BMD certificates, there could be a connection that might provide further clues to discovering your ancestors.