Can you help

birth registration index Selina Fanny Featherstone Dec 1854 Hollingbourne KEN 2a 393

1871 census RG10/940/100/16
84 Bank Street, Maidstone, Kent
Elijah Swan head M 50 silk mercer and linen draper Kent, Rochester
Mary Swan wife M 50 Kent, East Peckham
Ellen P C Swan dau U 18 Kent, Maidstone
Emily Godfrey assistant U 20 silk mercer's assistant Kent, East Malling
Frederic Wolley assistant U 18 apprentice draper Kent, Wateringbury
Jane Colin assistant U 22 milliner Middlesex, Pimlico
Emma Merriss assistant U 16 milliner apprentice Kent, East Malling
Mary F Tomkins assistant U 24 miliner saleswoman Middlesex, St Pancras
Selina Featherstone servant U 18 general servant Kent, East Sutton
Mary A Hyde servant U 17 housemaid (domestic) Middlesex, not known
Walter G Woolly assistant U 16 apprentice draper Kent, Wateringbury

East Sutton is a parish approximately 6 miles south-east of Maidstone in Kent, England. East Sutton is small in number of dwellings but relatively large in area.


Can't find her any where apart from these two entries.

 

Have not found her yet, but do you have any other information from the birth record, particularly the names of the parents and the address where she was born and the parents were living?

 

That's why I'm stuck, in a One Name study I can't afford to purchase every Marriage Certificate, however I found her Married Charles Mitchell July 4 1882 Queensland She arrived in Melbourne Australia September 23 1871 from Plymouth on MV Stonehouse She was 16 and a Servent

 

I can't find her in 1861 despite varying the search criteria widely but as a fair bit of this census has not survived I wonder if she is just missing.

Kent FHS has transcribed East Sutton baptisms for the 1850s and whilst I appreciate that buying the CD would be more expensive than a certificate maybe you could find someone who could do a look-up for this one baptism for you - assuming, of course, that she was baptised! In due course I think these transcribed baptisms will appear on Findmypast - they appear not to be at FamilySearch.

Otherwise, you may have to try and identify which Featherstones could have been in East Sutton in 1854, using census records and birth indexes etc, and see if anyone looks to be a likely parent for Selina. If she travelled alone to Australia when only 16 I wonder if one or both of her parents were dead by 1871. If so, death records may offer further clues.

By the way, I assume that you are the owner of the private tree at Ancestry that has Selina in it? If not, you could try contacting them in case they have more information on her.

Pauline

 

Hi wPaulf, It is a long shot but there is a family of Fetherstones in the 1861 census in Folkstone ................
RG09, piece 551, folio 71, page 21.
There is a daughter Fanny born 1844. In 1871 the father and mother are there but all six children are not with them, it may be worth a look.

 

I wondered about the William & Maria Featherstone who were in Sutton Valence (neighbouring parish to East Sutton) in 1851. I cannot find the family in 1861 but in 1871 they are in Rochester and what appears to be their daughter Elizabeth (born 1850) was a servant in Strood, so it seems not unreasonable to suppose that another daughter may likewise have gone into service.

But obviously this is just speculation!

Pauline

 

Did she travel alone or were there others in the same party? If she travelled with others they might provide clues as to her identity.

Pauline

 

So did I but purely on the strength of some unusual names in BMD , both registered in Hollingbourne district , Philadelpha Harriet (Mar 1849) and Priscilla Naomi (Sep 1852) Selina Fanny seemed to fit that pattern! Philadelpha I can't find anything solid for in a quick search on FMP just a tempting coincidence of a William West married to a Philladelpha born in Deptford Kent but Priscilla may have married Thomas Holland and is living with her son but no Thomas in Chatham on the 1881 census. I'm hoping that wPaulf has at least ordered the birth certificate if Selina is of real interest,

 

From the Medway archives online registers, a Philidelphia Featherstone d of William, engineer, married Edward Charles Knox at Rochester St Nicholas on 12 Jul 1867, by licence, and according to some Ancestry trees they emigrated to Australia between the 1871 and 1881 censuses. At least one tree also shows her sister Mary Susanna also emigrating to Australia. However, I haven't checked this out and the various Ancestry trees showing these Featherstones have some discrepancies and it looks possibly as though two different families may have been confused.

But it could be that Selina emigrated to Australia to join siblings already there, or maybe travelled out with them.

Pauline

 

Trouble is, since they were in Rochester by 1871, and their daughter Kezia was born there in 1863, they may not still have been in Sutton Valence in 1861. So perhaps they are missing somewhere else!!

They seem an elusive lot to me!