My great grandfather was Charles Edwin Oliver from Walsall South Staffordshire .Went to South Africa in 1901- With the South Staffordshire regiment to fight in the Anglo Boer War . After the War he Married the Enemy A Dutch Girl and stayed on in Clan William in the West Cape .Does anyone have any info on Oliver's from Walsall ?
Ah, I see Shane's already delved into this: there is a family tree in the thread about William Oliver's suicide attempt. That confirms that William married Eliza Buckingham in 1877.
I didn't find the marriage in the Witney St Mary parish register transcripts. The next most likely place would be Hailey: the marriage register for that period has been deposited at what is now called the Oxfordshire History Centre. Next time I'm there I will have a look for the marriage.
Of course it may not be there either: it could have been a register office marriage, or a nonconformist one, or away from Witney/Hailey.
Eliza may well have died in Witney workhouse. Perhaps she is buried at the public cemetery in Witney? The people in the Town Hall would be able to check.
Off the top of my head - I think William Oliver (bn. abt. 1835) was the brother to Charles (bn.1848). I think William married late in life. He was unmarried on 1871 census.
I will keep watch, with interest, to see what you unearth.
I did not realise Find my Past was also free at a library. They are the only place I can trace some military records for my husbands grandfather. I begrudge having to pay for the searching when I also pay out an annual for Ancestry. When I cool off and am able to think perhaps I will do something about it.
We had a thunderstorm and torrential rain in Witney yesterday evening, so it is much more bearable today, not nearly so muggy. I have now escaped from the museum and am using the library computers (free Ancestry! and free Findmypast!!) to see if I can find out more about Eliza.
Eliza Oliver (73 year old widow) was in the Witney workhouse at the time of the 1911 census. Her occupation says 'Formerly Glover - Leather'. She is shown as born in Hailey.
Looking on earlier censuses to see who she was:
1901: she is a 64 year old gloveress (widowed) in Middletown, Hailey
1891: 51 year old gloveress (born Hailey) was with her husband William Oliver in Finstock High Street (in 3 rooms, enumerated next door to Charles & Charlotte Oliver).
1881: 43 year old gloveress with husband William in Finstock. No sign of any children.
There's a possible marriage in the Witney district in 1877 of William Oliver and Eliza Buckingham (a good old Hailey name, so seems quite probable). I'll see if I can find it in the Witney parish register transcript. They may have married at Hailey itself, though, and those registers haven't been transcribed. Back later...
Well done Jane, very interesting reading. I hope the room in which you sit to peruse the Witney and District Archives has air conditioning. I am finding it too hot and humid to think straight. Roll on a thunder storm and then cooler weather.
I have been rummaging around in Witney & District Museum's archives looking for anything from 1911, for our latest exhibition ('Witney 100 years ago'). Here are some Olivers I found along the way:
(i) Pension records
In a ledger called 'Old Age Pensions: Register of Claims and Questions' (Witney Sub-committee of the Oxfordshire Local Pensions Committee), Eliza Oliver appears three times:
In December 1910, Eliza was in Witney Workhouse when the Committee provisionally allowed her 5 shillings a week (possibly on the understanding that she was leaving the workhouse?). In March 1911 her pension was disallowed, because she had returned to the workhouse. (She was, if I remember correctly, in the workhouse at the time of the 1911 census taken soon afterwards.) She applied again in 1914, but was still in the workhouse. She was informed that she 'would be entitled to 5/- a week on ceasing to be in receipt of qualifying poor relief.'
(Other reasons for pensions being disallowed were: earning too much; being in asylum; not having lived in UK for long enough.)
(ii) Ironmonger's accounts
For generations there was an ironmonger's shop on the corner of Market Square and Corn Street in Witney. For much of the twentieth century it was run by the Leigh family. The museum has some ledgers from the shop.
I am looking now at pages from a ledger covering 1909-1912. You just can't get away from the Olivers . . . there are several pages listing items bought from Leighs by "Oliver Bros" of Stonesfield. Here are just a few, all from 1911:
1 sink, 4 doz screws, bolts, sandpaper, whiting, size, cement, putty, varnish brush, four WC pans, four flushing cisterns, hinges, slate nails, a navvy barrow, linseed, turps, sheet lead, spout irons, knotting varnish, a galvanised furnace, paint [and so on and so on].
From this list, these are presumably the Olivers who were builders, but I am a bi rusty on who's who in the Oliver family tree so will have to leave it to Shane to explain.
(Elsewhere in the same ledger, I was amused to see another customer being billed for some fork handles. It reminded me of that wonderful Two Ronnies sketch. Shane is probably too young to remember it!)
