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Saturday, October 16, 2021

Edward’s Mysterious Marriage

 Did Edward Bland marry the same woman twice?  When I was looking for a record of his marriage to a woman named Hannah, this is what I found.





Here’s a close up of the names. Notice there is no detail about where they live or what Edward’s profession is. 




Fast-forward eighteen years, and the same database shows this. 

January 14, 1719. Edward Bland Widr & Gardner of Hammersmith and Hannah Every Spr. Ditto.


Hannah’s last name is actually indexed as Evry in the database, which is even more similar. Is this the same Edward? Is it the same Hannah?  It’s so strange. 




 








Early Bland Family Vital Records at St Paul Hammersmith Chapel

 These records, from the Chapel of St. Paul in Hammersmith, are out of order chronologically.  I am recording them in the order in which they appear in the record books on Ancestry, and  while some of the records go from early to late dates, as one would expect, occasionally some go from late to early. Also the records are largely organized so that all like categories (birth, marriage or burial) are listed together, which means that a certain baptism, for example, could appear in the records earlier than the marriage which preceded it, if baptisms are placed before marriages in the listings.  The first record book available (1671-1689) has no entries for the Bland family, which suggests that they perhaps came from elsewhere. The following are from the record set of St Paul Hammersmith from 1690-1728. There are very few marriages listed in this register, and none at all for the Bland family.  


Baptism.  June 12, 1700.  Mary d. Of Edward Bland & Mary. 



Burial.  February 19, 1697. Edward Bland buried S of Edward & Mary. 


Baptism. November 12, 1699. John Corles Bland S of Tho (Gardener) & Elisa. 


Baptism. March 23, 1697/8. Elisabeth Bland baptism, d of Edward and Mary.


Baptism. February 23, 1695/6. Thomas Bland baptism. S of Edmund (sic) and Mary.


Baptism. January 28, 1692. Edward Bland baptized Son of Edward and Mary, died age 5 (see above). 

Record book 1707-1717:


Burial. May 8, 1714. Elisa wife of Tho Bland.


Baptism.  January 1, 1709/10.  John S of Edward Bland & Mary.

That's it for this record collection.  There were some marriages recorded for the Hammersmith Chapel, but interestingly, they were all for people who came from other parishes.  I have no idea why.  The next record set is 1717-1723. 


November 28, 1722. John son of John Bland & Elisa. Could be John Eland?



Burial record. December 29, 1721-22. Hannah wife of Edward Bland. There are no records that show children born to this couple anywhere in London, but I did find a record of their marriage. It was in a sneaky little database that I don’t check very often called “London Clandestine Marriage and Baptism Registers 1667-1754”. Hannah was a spinster when they married but Edward was a widower, so this was at least his second marriage. There’s something odd about this marriage which I’ll get into in another post. 



January 14, 1719.  Edward Bland of Hammersmith (sic) Gard…Hannah Evry ditto. W. Sp. 



Burial record. March 22, 1718/9. Mary wife of Edward Bland. 

The record group 1723-1727 has nothing on the Bland family except the baptism of Edward, son of Edward and Frances. No John Highlord Bland anywhere.






Friday, October 15, 2021

Whitfields in Hammersmith

 Hey, did anyone else know that there are records of a Whitfield family in Hammersmith? The records seem to be before the era of Eleanor (Whitfield) Bland and then after, but not during. Perhaps there is a family connection, which could explain how she and Stephen became acquainted.



Edward Bland and Frances Winchester of Hammersmith

 In a recent post I explored which Bland family members had been sextons at St Paul Hammersmith chapel. The first one identified by the vestry minutes was Edward Bland, who married Frances Winchester on June 9, 1726, at St Giles in the Fields, Holborn, London. Frances was the daughter of John Winchester, yeoman, and his wife Mary, and she was baptized on August 8, 1699, at St John the Baptist, Pinner, Harrow, Middlesex. They were apparently married by licence but I have not located it so far.  The marriage record doesn’t say if Edward was a bachelor or a widower. 



Frances Winchester had several siblings, who are identified in the will of her brother John Winchester “of the Hamlet of Pinnor in the parish of Harrow on the Hill”,  proved April 21, 1742. John gives two acres of land, which he calls a close,  to his sister Mary Chandler, widow of the late George Chandler, for the course of her life and makes her his executrix. After Mary’s death the land passes to his sister Susanna Chandler, also a widow, and after Susanna’s death the land finally goes to Mary’s daughters Mary and Elizabeth Chandler.  John gives his sister Frances Bland one guinea, and his sister-in-law “Anne the widow of my late brother James” one shilling. Here’s the source for the will if you’d like to see it yourself:


These are the children of Edward and Frances that were baptized at Hammersmith:

  1. Edward bap. June 25, 1727 died September 1766 (he was sexton at Hammersmith after his father)
  2. Susanna bap. Jan. 24, 1733
  3. Steven bap. Jan. 18, 1734 (potentially our ancestor and father to Ann Elliot)
  4. Sarah bap. May 22, 1738
  5. James birth unknown buried June 8, 1740
  6. Thomas bap. Nov. 30, 1741 buried August 14, 1785 age 44
There is no record of John Highlord Bland’s birth, but nor is there anywhere else, and it is quite a distinctive name. His birth date is circa 1732 so he could fit in between Edward and Susanna.  There is a gap of six years between those two. 

We know that Edward Sr. dies in August of 1764. His widow Frances died March 10 and was buried March 14, 1773, age 74. By the way, Frances was the only Bland I have seen so far who was unable to write her name, as evidenced by this signature witnessing a marriage in Hammersmith Chapel in 1769. 




What do we know about the children? We don’t actually know from the vestry minutes whether Edward Jr. is married or not. There is an Edward Bland who marries a Mary Hubbard in Hammersmith on April 15, 1754 who could be this Edward.  They don’t seem to have had children. 









This may be the death record of Thomas Bland, son of Edward and Frances, potential brother to Stephen and John Highlord Bland. The dates fit exactly and he is buried in Hammersmith. August 14, 1785. This would make him 23 years old when Thomas and Gwyn Bland’s first child is born in 1764, which would be reasonable. 


What is purple fever, you ask? Well, so did I. It can mean various things, from childbed fever (obviously not applicable here), to typhus, to scarlet fever.  Poor Thomas. 

For the moment I can’t find any further records for Susanna or Sarah. 

Thursday, October 14, 2021

The Signature of Eleanor Bland

 I hadn’t ever seen a copy of Eleanor (Whitfield) Bland’s signature, but it’s turned up today, as I was perusing marriage records from Hammersmith. Cool find. I don’t know the relationship between Eleanor and the newlyweds.