To take us to the next generation you will find other records sourced below: The marriage details of Frederick and Susan gave me the names of their fathers.

Step 1 – How Long Do They Live?

To keep things clear we are going to follow Frederick Stone Chappell. Thanks to Frederick’s birth certificate I know that his father was called Samuel Chappell, occupation shoemaker, that it is possible he was still living in 1877, as the marriage certificate does not say ‘Deceased’, and that his mother was called Mary Ann Sampson.

There is a number of things I could do here. Try to trace the death of Samuel Chappell by using the Census to reduce my search years, or start with the 1861 Census when Frederick would have been about 10 years old, which could provide me with further clues to a marriage date of his parents.

My first search for Frederick Chappell did not produce the result I required, so I chose a Soundex search on his name and found him under the spelling of Chappel.

Information from the 1861 Census

From the above I now know that Frederick had an older brother called Henry, who was 15 years his senior. I also have the ages of his parents and places of birth. What is interesting is that Samuel was once in the navy, although apparently retired and his occupation is listed as cordwainer. By typing in old occupations on the address line of my browser several sites produced the following definition:

I was very confident that I had the correct family and based on the above information I searched the 1851 Census.

Information from the 1851 Census.

Again even though there is a big discrepancy in the ages of Samuel and Mary Ann, between the two Census records I am confident I have the right family. The only irritating piece of information is that the date of birth for Samuel Chappel is now between the years of 1796 and 1803, and the date of birth for Mary Ann between 1806 and 1817.

Naturally I wanted to source the 1841 Census. Given the above information, I thought this would be fairly easy and to my delight it was, as they were living in Lyme at that time. The 1841 Census gave the birth-date for Samuel as about 1814, and for Mary Ann about 1816, and Henry, their eldest, about 1837.

Before I try to source the marriage details for Samuel and Mary Ann, I am going to source their death details. Although Frederick’s marriage certificate does not state that his father Samuel was deceased, I am going to check the 1871 Census for Frederick who at this time might still have been living at home with Samuel and Mary Ann.

Unfortunately, I could not find Frederick or his father even using Soundex, so I looked under his mother’s name, Mary Ann Chappell, and found Frederick and her both living in Pickle Square, Lyme. Mary Ann was recorded as ‘Widow of Mariner’. What is worth noting is that Frederick was recorded as Fred S., and this did not come up on a Soundex search. I now know that Samuel Chappell died pre-1871 but post-1861, and Mary Ann Chappell post-1871. Searching FreeBMD under the spelling of Chappell, Chappel and finally Chapple, I found him:

The death certificate proved to be the correct one. Samuel Chapple died aged 72 in Pickle Square, Lyme – occupation pensioner in the Coast Guard Service.

In the 1881 Census, I found Frederick under Fred T. Chappell, living with his wife Susan and his widowed mother Mary Ann, aged 68. Getting wise as to how Frederick was recorded, I searched the 1891 Census under the name Fred and sure enough he wasn’t there! Typical, I found him as Frederick S. Chappel still living in Lyme, but in Coombe Street with his wife, four children and his widowed mother Mary Ann, now aged 78.

Mary Ann was not recorded as living in the 1901 Census, so my search years for her death index are from 1891 to 1901. I found her in 1893, making her 80 years of age from the information on the 1881 and 1891 Census records, but to my dismay her age recorded is 72 years:

Again, this proved to be the right certificate, if not the right age, or maybe it was the right age! Mary Ann is recorded as widow of Samuel Chappell, shoemaker, living at Coombe Street, Lyme, and Frederick Chappell was present at her death.