Although I have found quite a few references to Thomas Stocking and his wife Susan in the censuses, their children’s baptisms and marriages, and their own marriage, I have failed to find any reliable evidence of their own baptisms and, therefore, who their parents were. They are my first ‘brickwalls’ in the ancestry of my great-grandfather James Aaron Stocking (b1876).
From their appearances in the 1841 and 1851 censuses, Thomas Stocking was born around 1806-7 in St Georges, Southwark, and Susan came from nearby Newington, born in 1806-8. In both censuses, they are living at Castle Street, Kent Road, Southwark.
Ancestry has a copy of what I believe to be the couple’s marriage record at St Peter’s, Walworth, on Christmas Eve 1826 (extract below). The church was completed just the year before. They are both single and ‘of this parish’, and the bride’s full name is Susan Brown.
They would have been around 18-20 years old at the time although there is no mention of their being under age (perhaps they didn’t let on, and no family were present to say); the witnesses are James and Mary Ann Clark.
I suppose it is possible that Mary Ann was Susan’s married sister, but I have not found any evidence for this.
Infant mortality was rife in the poverty-stricken and overcrowded streets of Southwark in the first half of the 19th century, and the Stockings did not escape. As far as I have been able to find out from baptisms records and the censuses, they had seven children between 1827 and 1846: the first, Susannah, was born in 1827 and died in 1829. Their second daughter was born in 1832, and was also named Susannah. Sadly, she died in 1839, aged 7. Son John, b1839, also died in infancy in 1841, before the 1841 census. Their sons James Stocking (b1829), Thomas (b1836) and William (b1846) lived to relatively old age. The 1851 census also shows a ten year old daughter Mary, born in Bethnal Green, but I have not been able to trace any more information on her.
Thomas Stocking is variously described as a Labourer
or Rope Mat Maker in the censuses and on his children’s baptisms and marriage
records. Their address is either ‘Kent Road, Southwark’ or more specifically
Castle Street, Kent Road.
The London Picture Archive has images of Castle St looking towards Southwark Bridge Road in 1837, and an 1840 'improvement map' of the same area. The Wellcome Library has a health report on deaths from cholera, including Castle St and Ann's Place, from 1854. The area is close to the Elephant and Castle and Borough, and was closely-packed (The Mint slum was also nearby, as was The Clink prison -now a museum). There were vinegar works, breweries and other industry.
I have not found any reliable evidence for Thomas' birth around
1806-1809, but he was likely born close to the streets in which he lived in
later life, ie Castle Street, Ann's Place, Old Kent Road, St George the Martyr.
Records show him at 'Kent Street' or 'Castle Street' from the time of his
marriage in 1826. Similarly, and particularly with such common names, I have no
firm evidence for a baptism of Susan Brown in Newington or Walworth
around 1806-8 that would confirm her parents’ names.
My 4xgreat-grandparents Thomas Stocking and Susan
Brown remain brick walls for now. Without their baptism records I cannot tell who their parents were (although other online trees link Thomas with another family, there is no evidence to support this). More research to do.
For the sources mentioned in bold, see blogpost: MyRoots: Lesly's family history: Sources and resources: A quick view
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