by John Slaughter  

I am pleased to welcome four new members, Darryl Hockings, Trish Graydon, Ian Desoer and Barbara Armstrong.

Darryl Hockings is researching his fiancée’s family tree. Her great grandfather is Joseph John William Saull whose WW1 service record features on our website and she is keen to establish whether there are any living descendants, other than those she knows about.

Her great grandfather was born in the Poplar area of London and we have been able to trace the genealogy back through several generations of Joseph Saull’s to a Joseph Saull who married Amelia Oates in Hackney in 1839. On census returns this Joseph consistently gives his place of birth as Warwickshire but unfortunately on none does it state the actual place. He would have been born about 1810 but we have not found a suitable candidate for him in our records. I have suggested to Darryl that he obtains a copy of the marriage certificate for Joseph and Amelia Oates, which should at least give us his father’s name and occupation. Joseph had three sons who each had their own families so this could develop into a fairly sizable tree.  

Trish Graydon is descended from Thomas Saul and Elizabeth Addy of Stubbs Hall, Stubbs Walden, Yorkshire through their daughter Hannah who married Edward Naylor in 1828. This ties in to John Amos’s tree and John has been in contact with Trish.

Ian Desoer is a descendant of Isaac Sawle who was born in Gerrans, Cornwall in 1828. Isaac married twice and lived for some years on the Isle of Wight before moving to Liverpool. Initially Ian added a message to the thread we have running on the Forum about Isaac. Ian connects to the two other people who have contributed to this thread, one of whom, Derek Sawle, is a member. Ian has additional information on some of Isaac’s descendants and will also make contact with the other Forum members.

Barbara Armstong connects to one of our Preston charts. Her great great grandfather was Jonathan Saul who married Henrietta Langdon at Preston in 1864. We have their children on the chart but no later descendants so Barbara should be able to add considerably to our knowledge. Jonathan Saul has been linked back a couple of generations to a Robert Saul who married Mary Wesley at Preston in 1813. Researching the early Preston Sauls is proving to be quite problematic.

Preston’s population expanded rapidly in the early part of the 19^th century, with the development of the cotton industry, and amongst those that migrated to Preston were several individuals named Robert Saul. Distinguishing one Robert from another is difficult, but even more problematic is identifying their origins. So far we have not found a feasible candidate for Barbara’s ancestor. 

There have been some further interesting developments on the Solomon Saul saga. Readers may recall that last year I had correspondence with two descendants of Solomon and discovered that he appeared to have undergone a change of name sometime between 1871 and 1881, having previously been known as Saul Solomon. Paula McGuigan got in touch having seen the reports on this on our website. She is tracing a friend’s family tree. She initially thought that the name change was just a census error. However Paula was able to provide details of Solomon’s two marriages and his children and I was able to confirm that all of these birth and marriage events are recorded in the GRO indexes under the name of Solomon. Paula also obtained a copy of the certificate for second marriage to Anne Croft in 1855. This gave the father’s name as David Solomon.

The key to this could lie in the parish registers of Boston, Lincs where Solomon, according to census returns, is shown as having been born around 1808. Paula is planning a trip to view these registers. We know there were both Solomon and Saul families in Boston around this time so it will be interesting to see what the registers reveal. Paula has been in contact with one of the previous correspondents and has kindly forwarded on to me substantial information about the descendants of Solomon Saul.

Paul Davies is writing a book about people buried at two cemeteries in Great Yarmouth. Amongst those interred there are Thomas Saul and his family who operated a timber merchants business at Great Yarmouth for many years. Paul sent through copies of photographs he had taken of the gravestones and also an obituary notice that appeared in the local newspaper when Thomas Saul died in 1905.

These Sauls are the ancestors of Les Saul and Les has been in contact with Paul to see what further assistance he can provide.  

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