Census.
Back to Joseph Henry Pettard and family, the census 1871 to 1901 shows the family living in Bermondsey with the 1871 census showing a family consisting of parents Joseph and Annie, children Emma age 4, Henry aged 3 and Fredrick aged 1. By 1891 the family has grown to include Alfred, William, Joseph Thomas and Louisa, with Emma deceased at the age of 18 and Henry living elsewhere, also Alfred in the meantime has married but now appears to be a widower with daughter Agnes age 4 also living with the family. About this time a Christina Louisa age 3 appears in the 1891 census, she is listed living with and being the niece of Emma Marsh of Bermondsey. No other record of Christina Louisa Pettard appears in the parish such that I am left wondering weather this was also the daughter of widower Alfred, with maybe his deceased wife’s family taking the young child under their wing .
The marriage of Albert and Elizabeth was not the best blessed of matrimonial unions and as such the partnership would leave no family heirs. Their first born Alfred Joseph lived only to the age 2; deceased 1894, a second son named William died at birth 1899 with a strong possibility that mother Elizabeth also died at the same time. It was not an uncommon occurrence in these days for mother and child to die at, or shortly after child birth and this would not be the last occasion the family would be curtailed by such a sad and heartbreaking fate. We hear no more of Elizabeth, finding her husband widower Albert and her daughter living with parents Joseph and Annie and as previously mentioned the future of their second daughter Christina Louisa unclear.
The census information whilst very important for tracing whole families can also be most misleading, point in question; Bermondsey Pettards are listed in all records as Pettards. This includes Birth, Marriages, Deaths and census for the area. At the same time across the river in Poplar in the county of Middlesex as it was in those days, lives a family of Pittards, this family has similarities with the Pettards across the Thames in Surrey . Mothers name the same, i.e. Annie, same number of children most of the boys with similar names, only the father is distinctly different, named Thomas and born in Liverpool . Like the Pettards, this family of Pittards in all records are known as Pittards, that’s until you read the 1881 census where the Bermondsey family are listed Pittards and the Poplar family are listed Pettards. Confusion, illustrating well the problems with researching old records and how a simple mistake by a register can lead one up the garden path, or in this case to Liverpool. The mistake is obvious, the entries are made under the head of the family such that the surname is entered just once with the rest of the family ditto, the two surnames following alphabetically close in the registry listings, a human entry error which sits in the records to this day and one I have not seen noted by others.
The 1891 and 1901 census show the family still very much together with only Henry’s whereabouts unclear, William at the age 16 is classified as a Leather Dresser, whilst both Fredrick and Joseph are listed as Waterside Dockers with Louisa titled a Domestic General. Fredrick aged 31 and Joseph aged 22 are both unmarried and still living with parents in 1901 along with Louisa now 18, also Alfred is classified a widower and a Tin worker with his daughter Agnes also part of the family abode.
William whom we see here just at 16, will in a few short years both lay the stone of the families continued line while other avenues blow and scatters in the wind of ages, at the same time he will seed the path of murky waters, but more of that later.
The 1911 census sees the fading of our second generation and the spring of the next. The Bermondsay family is much depleted, departed and now scattered, Louisa is married and she will write her own chapter of the Ford family. Alfred and daughter Agnes are still together, although within a few years Agnes will be married, Fredrick, Joseph Thomas and Henry are still living in the parish of St. Olave. William is now deceased but in a short period of time between 1895 and his death in 1906 he fathers the heir to the next generation of Bermondsey Pettards.
Tavern - Russell Street 1880
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