Happy to announce the birth of my daughter Tessa’s first child, Dulcie Vaila Bonser on 27 March 2014 at the Norwich and Norfolk Hospital. She was delivered by c-section weighing under 3 lbs. She is putting on weight and has been able to go home with Tessa and Richard.

Jacky Fogerty has been unearthing details about the first wife of my grandfather William Domville Rowland.

They were married by Licence on 16 December 1896 at St Pancras Registry office. The witnesses were Eugenie de Belgarde, Alfred Robins,  and Lucie Bradbury. They were both living at 84 Guildford Street; he was 23 and she was 33; both described as journalists. Her father Jean de Belgarde is described as the French Consul. Henriette is also described as the divorced wife of Julius Rodolphe Ercheres.

I do not know how long they were together. In the 1901 census they were living in Balderton, Nottinghamshire. Henriette’s birthplace was given as Paris.

In 1908 William Domville fathered a child, Lorna, with Evelyn Waring, so the marriage would have been on the rocks then.

The 1911 Census shows Henriette staying with Annie Elizabeth Marriott (private means) with Annie’s mother and a servant. So they had clearly separated by then.

Henriette died in Bournemouth, aged 80 in 1940. So the information I had of her death in Austria in 1917 from Family Resource was incorrect.

I have not been able to find records of Henriette’s marriage to and divorce from Julius Rodolphe Ercheres. I assume these were in France, and it is necessary to know the relevant place to search the records. William Domville married Mabel Louise Bracey in 1918. On the marriage certificate he is described as a bachelor. So maybe Henriette’s divorce from Julius was never formalised, making her marriage to William Domville invalid. Or maybe he was economical with the truth.

Answers to this conundrum on a postcard please!

 

Simon, and my niece Rachel and family have finally taken the plunge. They have moved lock stock and barrel from Suffolk to Adelaide, where Rachel has a job as Head of Department and Head of Year at Trinity School, and Luke and Alexander are going to the Junior School. Simon previously a pilot with Easyjet will be getting his Australian pilots qualifications.

He was a younger brother of Rev William John Rowland who went to South Africa and disappeared. Very little known about him, there is the story that he returned once arriving at Waterloo Station, as thin as a skeleton with only a parrot and shotgun as baggage. The family knew something was amiss when he stopped collecting his allowance in Johannesburg

But once again Jacky Fogerty has come to our rescue-she has unearthed his Death Certificate from the Belgian Congo. He died aged 36 on 23 November 1913 in Elisabethville. Described as” celibataire” and a “peintre”. So no S African cousins to discover.

I am new here so please be kind. I am Steve from Vicksburg, Mississippi, USA. Looking for any knowledge of Rowland family that may have came to the states. I can go back about 5 generations on my side, but that’s about it.  Any help would be nice. I feel we came from the UK.

Thanks

 

Jacky Fogerty has been filling out the tree with information about Henry Edward Rowland brother of Rev William John Rowland, and an expert on the Doomsday Book, and his descendants. She writes-

I have had a look at Henry Edward Rowland’s family as you suggested.

 

1. Descendants of Henry Edward Rowland (1843-1882) and Victoria Jane nee Walker (1843-1889)

 

Henry and Victoria are very well documented, with lots of records including probate etc and a good Census trail. There were two Henry E Rowlands born around Lewisham at this time and there used to be a tree on Ancestry which had this family and their descendants attached to a different set of parents and poor Henry Edward spending his youth as a boot boy. I emailed the owner and politely mentioned the baptism records with correct parent names, the records showing the name of Henry’s father on his indenture papers, marriage record with fathers’ names etc but they did not reply and I don’t know if they changed their tree.  I think from memory it did not look as if the tree owner was descended from our branch of the Rowlands.

 

Four of Henry and Victoria’s five children, including their two sons Alexander Henry (1868-1924) and Walter Otto (1875-1903), appear to have died single and without descendants: I have extensively searched Marriage Index and parish marriages on Ancestry and Findmypast as well as Censuses and have searched hard for others with the same name or initials, but none fits the bill.

 

Alexander Henry was an accountant, single in 1891, 1901 and 1911 Censuses, living with his sister Victoria Edith Bassett nee Rowland in 1891, with non-relatives in 1901 and with his aunt on his father’s side in 1911. This may have been because he was frail or just for ease of housekeeping. He died in 1924, probate to sister Victoria Edith Bassett nee Rowland. I cannot find any military service records.

 

Walter Otto Rowland (full name from Birth Index and Baptism record, the latter lists both parents) seems to have been living in an odd arrangement in 1891 (soon after his mother died), in a large single house with a non-related head “living on own means”, several servants and one other person who was a “lunatic”. This seems to have been some sort of private care arrangement. The age is wrong (he was 16 not 13) but the name Walter O Rowland and place of birth are correct. In 1903 Walter Otto Rowland died at Colchester (Death Index) and Walter Otto Rowland was buried at St Paul Colchester on 21 Feb 1903 (Parish Records Collection 1538-2005, findmypast.co.uk). I cannot find any other possible deaths or burials. In the 1901 Census, “W O R” was a patient at Eastern Counties Asylum for Idiots Imbeciles and the Feebleminded, Colchester, Essex, England, labelled “imbecile”, correct age and place of birth (at this time, people in asylums were often recorded by their initials in the Census).

 

Florence Ethel Rowland (1874-1898, you have her on your tree as Flossie), also died young, at sea, in 1898,  and seems to have been living at least part of the time with aunt Henrietta Barnett nee Rowland – “Florence Ethel Rowland of Toynbee Hall, Whitechapel and 8 Royal York Crescent Clifton (Bristol), spinster, died at sea”, probate to Francis Gilmore Barnett, brother of Canon Samuel Barnett.

 

Alice Maud Rowland (1870-1957-8?) was definitely a spinster at 41 in the 1911 Census so I think we can rule out children. In 1881 she is called Maud Alice Rowland, student, same school as her sister Victoria Edith Rowland, see below, right age and place of birth. I have not found her in the 1891 Census but in 1901 she is visiting her aunt Alice Marion Hart and calls herself Maud Rowland, single, 30, born Sydenham, occupation “designer – linens, author, artist … own account, single”. By 1911 she has settled on Alice Maud and refined her occupation to “artist, single” and is living with non-relatives “age 40”. In 1929 Alice Maud Rowland is living in Wandsworth. There are two Alice M Rowlands in the phone directory until around 1955, one in Clapham and one in Lewisham. The only two Alice M Rowland deaths that look possible for her are in Surrey mid Eastern in 1957 and Hove Sussex in 1958, and I cannot find any probate or burial records.

 

The oldest child, Victoria Edith Rowland (1867-1944, you have her as Edith) married John Dollin Bassett (1864-1949), stock jobber, employer, in 1889 and they had six children. In 1891 they had a son John Albert (1890-1892) and her brother Alexander Henry living with them. After John Albert’s death they had Geoffrey Edward Bassett (1894-1918), Marjorie Edith Bassett (1895-?), Douglas Dollin Bassett (1896-1969), Sybil Helen Maud Bassett (1903-1988) and John Dollin Bassett the younger, (1909-?). In the 1901 Census, John and Victoria are staying with his cousin, without the children, but birth records are all in order and some baptisms, and in 1911 Census the family are all together.

 

John Albert and Geoffrey Edward died young, no marriage records for Geoffrey, Lieutenant, Army Supply Corps. He was killed in action and is buried in Picardie, France, two medals, service details and nice photo of cemetery on international find a grave index  (eg also see Ancestry or forces-war-records.co.uk). John Dollin Bassett senior also served in WW1 in the Army Pay Corps as a temporary captain, two medals also.

 

Douglas Dollin Bassett (1896-1969)  also served in WW1, also has medals, subsequently described as a Company Director (coal merchants) in probate for both parents and wife Catherine M nee Spiers (1897-1964). I cannot find any children by my usual method of checking for other family trees and, if this is not successful, putting in “unknown Bassett”s with birthdates in right range until all the children with that surname and mother’s maiden name (in this case, Spiers) on their birth index record show up in searches.

 

John Dollin Bassett (1909-?) was an insurance broker in 1944 when his mother’s probate went to him and Douglas. Have not found any definite records after that so far but will keep trying. Wife Doreen B Airs (1919-?) is also elusive. No children found by the methods outlined above.  As Bassett is quite a common name, the best hope with both of these might be that one of their descendants puts a tree up on Ancestry.

 

On the other hand, both daughters definitely had children.

 

Marjorie Edith Bassett (1895-?) married Archibald N Palan (1898- ) who was born in Buenos Aires to an English mother who also lived in the United States for some time, as did Archibald (including after his marriage). They had one child in England, Geoffrey B Palan (1921-?), who married the wonderfully named Lulu St Claire Gower Williams (1921-?) in England. It is possible that Marjorie and Archibald had more children in the US but none of those showing up look particularly likely.

 

Geoffrey may have changed the name spelling to Palin as there are two baby girls Jacqueline H Palin (1947-1948) and Patricia J Palin (1949 – ), mother’s maiden name Williams, born in the right area at the right time. A couple of possible marriages for Patricia J Palin, however no death or burial records appearing for Marjorie, Archibald, Geoffrey or Lulu in England and no likely looking ones in United States either. Having said that they may suddenly appear tomorrow, Ancestry sometimes suddenly decides to offer up the record you were looking for for hours the day before.

 

Sybil Helen Maud Bassett (1903-1988) married Arthur James Mountford (1907-1959) and had two daughters, Helen (1939- ) and Mary (1940-), birth indexes Mountford mother Bassett. Sybil had an obituary in the Times. The daughters show up as private (ie living) on one tree on Ancestry, so it is not possible to see whether they have children and I could not find any marriage records for them (the obituary would probably have family info but it is not readable from Ancestry).

 

2. The solution to the mystery about Ethel Theresa Rowland

 

As mentioned before, your tree has FAA Rowland’s daughter Ethel Theresa Rowland marrying M J Bassett and having two children Cissie and Dolly. You mentioned that this information was from your father. As you know, my family was told that she died single and in an asylum, so I tested the proposition by creating a new family tree for this family and trying to find them. I could not find any matching records on Ancestry or findmypast- there were no possible Rowland/Bassett marriages or births, and although I found one actual Cissie Bassett and one Dolly Bassett born about the right time (and lots of Dorothys), their parents’ names were wrong.

 

However, once I got to Henry and Victoria’s eldest daughter Victoria Edith and her husband John Dollin Bassett, all became clear. Your father must have confused her for her cousin Ethel Theresa. She married a Bassett, and their two youngest children, Sybil and John Dollin Bassett, could easily have been Cissie and Dolly as children (especially as their parents had already had a baby John who had died as a toddler – Dolly was a common nickname for boys called Adolphus, so not as cissy then as it sounds now). I still have no explanation for the initials M J  – I thought maybe he was a major in the army, but he seems to have been a captain, then I thought maybe it was Mr J Bassett

Mervyn Tulloch from Canada has recently sent me family trees of the extensive Tulloch family from Northmavine, Shetland which complement my researches in my Tree 24A relating to the Foyles and the Tullochs.

Thanks to Mervyn’s researches we now have links for Christina Foyle (whose husband Ronald Batty was my mothers second cousin) going back 6 generations to Laurence Tulloch born about 1749. I will update Tree 24A in due course.

Mervyn’s tree has over a thousand members.

So with Jacky Fogerty’s 4000 strong Australian tree this has been a very productive month.

Here is more information from exchanges of emails between Jacky Fogerty and me and a picture of the Von Ditges’ family schloss

 

Your research is  very impressive indeed, and I see you have perfected the skill of hunting missing pieces of information down by lateral means and in unexpected places, so vital to the historian. My Australian research was based on the excellent records and treasury of photos and documents kept by my grandmother and parents. The English research I did myself, but 30 years ago I did a doctorate in 19th and 20th century British social history, so I am fairly comfortable with the sources, if not very adept at the internet side of things.

 

In Suffolk FAA and Catherine Rowland lived at Stanstead Hall, Hitcham, and Catherine later lived with Alton, Henrietta and Marion at Mill House, Hartest Mill, Bury St Edmunds. I don’t know whether FAA Rowland was still living when they moved there and I don’t know what other places they lived in, my mother only remembers the Mill House address. I think the family left Mill House for more modest accommodation when Stanley died. Stanley did a couple of ink sketches of Mill House which my parents have framed – I scanned them and copied them on the tree but now cannot find my original scans to send you. I think Mill House may now be a furniture store of some sort, it seemed to be when I last googled it.

 

I have attached a photo of Catherine Rowland nee Laflin reading, probably at Stanstead Hall, and one taken by Stanley Rowland of Mill House and Hartest Mill. Also photos of FAA Rowland’s children (l to r: Alton, Henrietta, Percy, Stanley (front, in sailor suit), Ethel Theresa and Marion), PF Rowland with his wife Jessie and the three eldest children (Marion, Frances and Philip), PF Rowland’s entry in the Australian Dictionary of Biography mentioning his parents’ names, and baptism records from the London Register of Baptisms, Marriages and Burials for PF and his brother Alton.

 

I do not have any hard evidence that Alton died childless, although only he and his wife are listed in the household in the 1911 Quebec Census. However they were in correspondence with my grandmother and she was very definite that Alton had no children and nor did any of PF Rowland’s other siblings, which was why she was expecting the (non-existent) Rowland money when the last sister, Henrietta, died.

 

In answer to your earlier question about  Marjorie Rowland  She changed her name to deed poll to Mrs Marjorie Rowland and her son David’s birth was registered as David Miles Wisely Rowland.

 

My mother was born Alison Ruth Milfull, mother Marian Laflin Rowland, and Marion was the eldest daughter of PF Rowland.  As you say, my mother is your third cousin.

 

Also I think I was being a bit glib about Philip Hastings Rowland, PF Rowland’s only son. Although it is true that he felt under pressure to do well academically like his father, he left school to go jackarooing immediately after his mother died horribly and in great pain from breast cancer.

 

I am attaching an old family tree chart by my cousin Peter, which does not include children born in the last ten years. I cannot work out how to convert it to a different format to edit it, and unfortunately Ancestry does not let me print out a tree diagram going downwards that is wide enough to fit everyone in, although it does a fine upwards (pedigree) view. Please ignore the last two sisters of PF Rowland at the very bottom of this chart, Ethel Theresa was a single person, not two people Ethel and Theresa (at this point we had not done any research on the English part of the family).

 

If Brian Rowland and family are in Australia, we would love to meet them. Looking forward to keeping in touch – thanks so much again, we are all so pleased about your research and making contact with the English family again.

 

By the way, did you know that Rev William John and FAA’s sister Alice Marion Rowland Hart wrote a long, interesting and amply illustrated book called Picturesque Burma about her travels there in 1895? I did not know this until I started looking for Rowland family publications and found a reprint at betterworldbooks.com. They are certainly an interesting family.

 

Jacky Fogerty

 

 

 

 

Thanks for sending through your Ancestry tree-immensely impressive-did you put it together and research all the documents yourselves? My researches are positively amateur by comparison. Also Australians seem to have supersize families-probably because you have so much space there! By all means update your trees with information from mine.

I think my search for continuation of the male line in Australia is likely to be still-born-both John Neville and David Miles Wisely are getting on in years. You will see from my tree that I have a first cousin, Brian Rowland who emigrated to Australia-I will check out his whereabouts from his sister Sally who lives in Norwich near my daughter Tessa. Also my son Ben and family now live near Sudbury in Suffolk-do you have FAA’s address there?

 

Richard Rowland

 

 

Dear Richard, How lovely to hear from you in person! Thanks so much for taking time to write such a helpful email.

 

And thank you again for your wonderful book, my uncle and mother (who are in their seventies) were thrilled, and my uncle of course was particularly excited about having some concrete information at last on the German connection.  My mother’s name is Alison Fogerty and she would be very pleased if you would sign a book for her.

 

I also noticed when I was tracking down the Rowlands that the Lewisham Local History and Archives Centre had a slightly inaccurate information box called “The Rowland Family and Champion Hall” on their website. It states that William Rowland was a barber, rather than his son. I emailed them mentioning this and asking if they had more information about Rosenthal or Henrietta Ditges and they said they had no more information on the Rowlands, but would be grateful for anything I could send. I then found out about your book, so I sent them the web address along with some jpg images of a few documents I already had. I am sure that if you wanted to provide them with a copy of your book, they would be very grateful and it would help researchers in future. Their email is localstudies@lewisham.gov.uk

 

I will certainly post you some information about Frederick Arthur Alexander Rowland and family, but below is a brief synopsis. I will also invite you to our tree on Ancestry. I understand if you prefer not to use Ancestry, however there is a tremendous amount of documentation attached to it (BDM index references, baptism, birth, marriage, death certificates, photos, documents, letters etc) which I cannot possibly send.

 

Frederick Arthur Alexander Rowland was admitted as a solicitor on Dec 20 1871 and mostly practised from 14 Clement’s Inn. He seems to have fallen out with his family in 1869 when he married a servant girl, Catherine Laflin, daughter of Suffolk farm bailiff Abraham Laflin, at St Clement Dane’s (23 August 1869, bride’s name is given as Kate Laflin). We are very grateful that he did do the decent thing and marry her, as Percy Fritz Rowland, my great-grandfather, was born very soon afterwards.

 

He did however, at least in the early 1870s, act in some cases for the family, eg in the sale of Rowland assets, and I have some advertisements and legal proceedings attached to my tree on Ancestry.

 

FAA Rowland and Catherine had three boys and three girls, but the family was very quickly in financial trouble. FAA seems to have inherited his family’s exuberance and wide ranging interests without the finances to support them. He may also have incurred litigation costs as he was personally involved in at least two cases, one relating to alleged fraud by a clerk for the solicitors acting for Alexander William Rowland’s estate, of which I have a transcript, and another as plaintiff in relation to the estate of Anton Leo, for which I have recently put in a request with UK National Archives.

 

He is first in the London Gazette relating to a liquidation of his assets in relation to bankruptcy proceedings on 19 August 1879, but seems to have avoided bankruptcy on that occasion. There may have been other issues in the intervening period which I have not been able to track down, apart from a couple of partnership dissolutions, but on 12 April 1894 he was declared bankrupt. At that point he permanently disappears from the Law Lists (and from the Census as you say until 1911, when he is a retired solicitor living in Suffolk; in 1901 he is elusive but Catherine is visiting her sister in law Alice Marion Hart). He does not seem to have a probate record, although his wife does, which suggests to me that he never got his affairs onto a sound footing again.

 

My own theory is that his wife was quietly given money by FAA Rowland’s siblings to support the family. They certainly seem to have traded down into progressively more modest rented country houses in Suffolk as time went on. My great grandfather PF Rowland was able to go to Oxford on scholarship but the other children do not seem to have done this. Stanley, Marion and Henrietta worked as teachers until their retirement and did not marry. Alton emigrated to Canada, married Emma Holland in Quebec and died there childless. I understand he was an accountant and the 1911 Quebec Census bears this out. Ethel Theresa, who was called Cissie, was said to be somewhat feeble-minded and subject to nerves. My understanding is that she did not marry but retired to a rest home/asylum, and in 1911, ET Rowlands born Hampton Middlesex in the correct year, is listed at the City of London Asylum and Hill House, as having been a typist.

 

Frederick Arthur Alexander’s male line has not run out, but I think it is down to one thread. His son Percy Fritz Rowland had one son, Philip Hastings Rowland and three daughters, Marian, Frances and Joan. There were hopes that Philip would be a great scholar but the expectation was too much for him and he went off after his Junior Certificate to be a jackeroo (horseman on remote properites) and farmer, later qualifying as an engineer and serving in the air force in Morotai in World War 2. Philip had one son, John Neville Rowland, and one daughter, Helen Beatrice Rowland. John Neville Rowland lives in Tasmania. He has three daughters and grandchildren, but we have been out of touch with that side of the family, so I will just check with his niece that he has not married again and produced sons.

 

Percy Fritz Rowland’s daughters, on the other hand, had children, almost all of whom have had their own children and grandchildren and some great grandchildren. Frances Rowland’s only grandson is named David Miles Wisely Rowland, as his mother (now deceased) changed her name by deed poll to Marjorie Rowland.

 

We have always been very proud of the Rowland connection, although my grandmother, who was a bit of a snob, always spoke of them as a landed family with an “estate” in Suffolk and had expectations that she would inherit the (as it turned out non-existent) Rowland money when her aunts died.  We had no idea about the association with Rowland’s Macassar Oil or FAA Rowland’s financial troubles or his wife’s humble background until we started researching them. Ironically the research was mostly to track down the elusive “German grandmother” that my grandmother spoke of but had no more information about. We are very grateful that, thanks to your work, we now know so much more about the Rowlands and also the German connection.

 

 

 

I have attached photos of FAA Rowland’s entry from the Bankruptcy Register from the UK National Archives (BT 293) , and the original bankruptcy petitions in 1894 (B 11/11) with more details: the full file references are on my tree. There is also a listing from the London Gazette relating to this bankruptcy and the marriage certificate for FAA Rowland and Kate Laflin. I have not attached the baptism or other records for the children because I copied them so long ago I cannot immediately find them on the system, but they are all in the London Baptisms, Marriages and Burials and images are copied on our tree.

 

If you come across any photos at all of FAA Rowland or his siblings (apart from the very well documented Dame Henrietta Barnett), I would be very grateful for a copy. Thank you so much.

 

Jacky Fogerty

 

 

 

 

The wonders of the internet!

How good to hear from you- I suppose you came across the website whilst idly browsing

I had drawn a blank on Frederick Arthur Alexander Rowland and his progeny-the reference to his daughter Ethel and her husband MJ Bassett came from my father but I don’t know where he got it.I knew nothing about PF.

I knew FAA was a solicitor in London, but he seemed to avoid Census returns, and as you will gather from my book his brother (my great grand-father) William John made a watchword of having nothing to do with his family. So any information, photos etc would be interesting.Also of course Percy Fritz and his family. It would be good if you could send me a printed copy of your tree. I will be able to update my trees on line.

So it looks as though the Rowland male line from FAA has run out.

The von Ditges stuff is interesting. Micky Watkins a biograther of Dame Henrietta Barnett is also interested in Henriette von Ditges, her mother-she learnt she was a catholic-but other than what I have included in my book, I have no more information on her. I will try to visit the “family” schloss in Honnef-you will see from my book that my great uncle Sir Philip Gibbs failed to do this.

I will be pleased to send you a copy of the book -what is your mother’s name-I can dedicate it to her.

 

Richard Rowland

 

 

 

I have heard from Jacky Fogerty in Australia about Percy Fritz Rowland who emigrated to Australia- he was the son of Frederick Alexander Arthur Rowland, the brother of my great-grandfather William John Rowland.

See Jacky’s comments about the “family” schloss in Germany. I will hope to visit this, and also include details of the Australian connection in my tree.

Last week-end I attended the wedding of Graeme Garvin, the son of Della Noel (nee Pollard) my first cousin to Marie Hudec. So an update to the Pollard tree.

Also Colin Pollard is working on extending the Pollard Tree back-wards in time. He is going to work on these changes in Excel so they can be down-loaded to the trees.