Mum said that Nan, who shall from now on be referred to as Maggie, always believed her birth date to be 10 October 1908; she was born in Epsom. Based on this information alone it was becoming apparent that I was not going to find her.
January 2001
As there appeared to be no evidence of Maggie having been born and after several discussions with my mum and aunt and uncle I decided to see if I could find the death certificate for Maggie’s brother George. Apparently someone else in the family had previously carried out some research and it was believed that George married a Griffiths and both he and his wife died within a short time of each other during the 1960s.
Throughout several visits to the FRC I searched deaths and found one for a George Walker in the 1970s. I also decided to look for a birth certificate for George but could only find one possible for an Arthur George Walker born in Epsom.
Thinking about what happened with Amy Alice Plummer actually being Alice Amy Plummer I decided to order this certificate.
I could not stop myself from looking once again for Maggie and searched through births and found myself ordering one for a Maggie Walker born in Sheffield.
I was getting desperate.
I also checked marriages for a George Walker to a Griffiths and found one for a parish in London and one for a parish in Glamorgan. There
was so little information about George. I did not even know for sure where he might have lived or if he stayed in the Epsom area so once again I had to follow up these possible leads.
The Certificates Arrived
The first is the death certificate for George Walker. This gentleman lived in the Epsom area, occupation market gardener; his son was present at his death. What did this mean to me? Nothing, because there were no other clues on the certificate. Phone calls to relatives asking about a possible son of George proved futile also.
The birth certificate for Arthur George Walker born in the Epsom area was a little more interesting. His father was George, occupation asylum attendant, mother Alice Walker. My pulse picked up pace; although he was known as George his birth name could have been Arthur George.
The birth certificate for Maggie Walker gives the parents as James and Leah Walker. Right month and year if not the right date. I phoned Mum willing her to tell me there had been some mention of Sheffield during her childhood, or that her grandmother was called Leah; it meant nothing to her but she did say, emphatically, that her grandmother was not called Leah. How did she know that? Was Mum holding back on a vital piece of information? Mum said her grandmother was called something like Azuria, Asoria or Azerora.
I searched every book I could find on Christian names and the Internet trying to find a name resembling the one Mum had given me. I even read each one out to her over the phone in the hope of discovering this elusive name. Exasperatingly Mum insisted that none of the names I had found came close to what she remembered. At this point I accused her of making it up, that there was no such name and she must have dreamt it! Mum also remembered Nan saying her ancestors were French. Now I was really beginning to believe that most of what Mum had been told was fantasy. Nothing added up!
The two marriage certificates for George Walker left me cold. There was not a single piece of information that gave me any hope at all.
During this month I paid a visit to the Wirral where Mum lives and found myself at the Central Library in Liverpool looking at microfiche of
births. I decided to order copies of all the Walkers born in the last quarter of 1907 and 1908. At least I could study the births at my leisure in the hope that Maggie would spring off the page and say ‘here I am’.
Back at the FRC (a quick visit as it is my wedding anniversary and hubby is not best pleased) I decided to find and order the death certificate for Maggie. I also looked for my grandmother’s birth on my father’s side, Elizabeth Pilkington born about 1861, and found one registered in Prescot, close to Liverpool. My main reason for being there though was to try to find a marriage certificate for Arthur George Walker, hoping he might be married to someone called Griffiths, and found one in the 1930s.