TOPIC:

Perhaps Alfred and his new wife, Mary, wanted to close the chapter on his children with his first wife. You will note that the 1911 census provides the detail that "of 4 children born, 4 are still living" - a clear indication that Elizabeth's children e.g. Arthur were not acknowledged.

Everything fits - in fact it's advantageous that Arthur's death is not mentioned in the Ancestry Tree - I have found many such examples - the compilers probably didn't know of his existence - there is no record of him aside from the 1891 Census and a birth certificate I am not going to order.

Here is an (undated) photo of Alfred with his "new family" - the wife here is Mary Temple with her children with Alfred. I have written to the poster on Ancestry and, hopefully, she will know more. I see that some wag has "doctored" the Grannie's eyebrows with black marker pen...



Regards

Rory

www.findagrave.com/memorial/235983378/a-ackroyd

Courtesy of Find a Grave

RESULT!! - thanks to some Militia papers I managed to track down, I can now say, conclusively, that A. Ackroyd, no. 5851 West Yorkshire Regt, was in fact an ARTHUR as I averred in a previous post.

What is the proof, and how was it arrived at?

- The 1901 England census has Arthur's family living at 15 Metz Place in Leeds - this tallies with the address provided on Arthur's Militia papers (see extract below)



- Arthur's date of enlistment (transfer) from the Militia is given as 19/4/1900 on his Militia papers (see below) - this tallies with the date of enlistment on his Record of Soldier's Effects (extract below)





What is the upshot of all this? Well aside from making him more researchable - I like to think that having identified a Christian name - something nobody at the War Office seems to have able to achieve - Arthur can now be properly identified and remembered - not just Pte. A. Ackroyd on all the war memorials and newspaper reports.

Regards

Rory

Hello Rory
Agree 100%,always a bonus to have a 1st name to the medal recipient.
Congratulations on your research.

Dave.....