Hugh, I don't know if you have found William on the 1891 Census. I did using Ancestry and he was living in Caernarfonshire but I couldn't see where, as I don't subscribe to that website.
He must have left Glan Conwy as he was about 16 and was working as a shoe maker, his Grandparents in Glan Conwy may have died by then. Do you know his address in the 1991 Census?
Hi Hugo. You certainly seem to have been very busy on my behalf. Where do I start? Okay, -
- I have written to my potential cousin Gwyndaff in Pwllheli and am awaiting a response.
- I identified the three potential birth records for William Davies in Conwy back in 2010 and sent away for the associated birth certificates, all of which showed a father.
- I looked at the
http://www.northwalesbmd.org.uk/index.php site for the birth of Edward Davies (eldest son of William and Catherine) and found, as expected, an entry for Llandudno. Similarly, an entry for my father Hugh Davies was similarly located, As I mentioned previously, dad's brother Richard mentioned in a letter that he loved the mountains he could see from his family's front door and in fact had been born in those mountains in his grandmother's cottage. A search for Richard Davies showed possible records for Betws y Coed, Colwyn Bay, both in Conwy Count Borough (Llandudno) It would seem that the Bets y Coed seems to be the most mountainous of the two. Is this a fair assumption?
- I am somewhat frustrated that the Conwy and St Asaph birth records all show fathers. There were two anomalies. The first was two entries in the Conwy records with the same Volume and Page number which proved to be two unique certificates with only the child's name William Davies in common. The second anomaly was a similar duplicate Volume and Page number for two of the St Asaph records which, in this instance, showed a common mother's name - ' Eleanor Davies formerly Roberts'. I find it hard to believe that two Eleanor
Roberts married a Davies in such a small area then gave birth to a son within days of each other and both called their son William. So how do I seek clarification on this?
- Again, looking at the North Wales BMD site, there is only one match that seems to match the criteria =- William Davies b1876 Denbigh. It could well be worth my while obtaining a copy of this record -however, they do not accept payment via credit card so I'll have to explore alternative payment methods.
- Perhaps I should take a view that the absence of a father's name on William Davies' Marriage Certificate may not conclusively indicate that he was an illegitimate child.
Any further ideas/advice warmly welcomed.