Henry Burgess appears out of nowhere when he marries Jane Hordle of Wareham, Dorset, on 1st January 1865 at St Martin in the Field, London. Their marriage certificate gives few clues:

Jane’s father is confirmed to be George Hordle, carpenter, as expected. Fortunately, Hordle is a relatively unusual name to trace through the censuses, so Jane’s background is well established.

The witnesses don’t appear to be relatives (Perks and Ponton?) but the names are worth keeping in mind. St Martin in the Field is a long way from Jane’s origins in Dorset, so not the family parish church.

Henry Burgess states he is a bachelor, of full age, working as a fishmonger and that his father is Henry Conwright Burgess, greengrocer. There is no obvious sign of either of them in the 1861 census, but they could have changed occupation more than once in the intervening years and Henry (junior) was about to change again.

When the couple’s first child, George Henry Cornelius Burgess, is born on 5th May 1865 his father is recorded as a police constable.

The certificate also shows that Henry has expanded his name to include Conrad Cornelius as forenames. A look back at the marriage certificate reminds us that Henry (senior) had a middle name of Conwright, so there are several unusual names beginning with C associated with these Henry Burgesses. This could provide a lead to Henry’s origins, unless they were all created out of nowhere by young Henry, as he was himself!

How unusual are these names? An “all records” search of four large data sets proved interesting. Looking at the 19th and early 20th centuries, beginning with the “C” name plus Burgess, then Henry C or C Henry Burgess, produced the following:

These results do not include family trees as they are so repetitive and too often provide no sources.

The frequent mention of Ipswich in the table is necessary as it became clear that Henry “C” Burgess was a regular feature for at least one Burgess family in that area of Suffolk. More significantly, the naming pattern didn’t seem to occur anywhere else, apart from in my family. It is certainly worth following up this Ipswich family.

There is no obvious evidence for Henry Burgess, born about 1838, or his father in the census records:

Henry Burgess, fishmonger: none in 1861 census;,
Henry Burgess, greengrocer: one grocer in Devon, 1861 census; one grocer in Lancashire, 1871 census. Neither appears to have a son Henry of the right age.

Now for the Ipswich family of Burgesses.

I concentrated on those lines with a link to the “C” names found previously. They were easy to trace through several online family trees and I have backed up the results by using censuses, parish records and the GRO index to confirm the dates and references to names.

The Henry Burgess in my family would be an elder brother of Christopher Cornelius Burgess, if my suspicions are correct.

Click here to open a new window with source citations for the tree in the left.

There is no sign of Henry Burgess, born about 1838, in Suffolk censuses after 1851. There are 14 Henry Burgesses in the Suffolk 1861 census but none of the three born within three years of 1838 have the correct names for the parents.

There is no sign of a death for Henry Burgess between 1851 and 1861 in Suffolk (two with wrong ages when burial records are consulted).

The one mention of the very rare name Conroyd in 1875 might just be down to an error by the registrar. What would Conrad or Conright sound like when spoken with a Sullolk accent?

It is an interesting coincidence that Henry Burgess, born 1838, Ipswich, disappears from the area after the 1851 census and that Henry Burgess, born about 1838, cannot be found before his marriage in 1865. A plausible census entry for 1861 for either of them would be very helpful.

Provisional Conclusions:

The naming patterns which seem to be unique to this Ipswich Burgess family stretch across several generations. When Henry Burgess died in 1888 it was the first time his full name of Henry Cornelius Burgess appeared in records. Where did it come from? He had previously named a son Christopher Cornelius (b. 1845), who in turn named a son Henry Conroyd (b. 1875). That Henry’s son, Henry Conright Cornelius (b. 1901), then named his son Henry Conrad (b. 1929), the great great grandson of the first Henry Cornelius.

Compare this with my great grandfather’s naming habits. He declared his full name was Henry Conrad Cornelius Burgess; that his father was Henry Conwright Burgess; then named his first son George Henry Cornelius. George was Henry’s father-in-law’s name and Henry Cornelius his father’s name, as it turned out to be in 1888! (Perhaps he made a mistake on his marriage certificate with Conwright and was able to correct it when George was born?)

It seems very likely to me that my Henry Burgess is the missing Henry Burgess from the Ipswich family.

There is one more piece of evidence to consider. Henry Burgess wrote his Will in October 1882 and it was dated, signed and witnessed but didn’t name an executor. Consequently, after he died on 11 May 1888 Letters of Administration were applied for and granted to his youngest son Joseph, who also took over the running of the Eclipse Inn.

In the Will Henry lists his eight children, in order of age and includes the married names of his daughters. They will all inherit equally, and there is no mention of a son Henry. This negative evidence does at least suggest that he knew for certain that young Henry was not around to inherit his share. The Will also specifies that if one of his children dies, then any surviving grandchildren should inherit in their parent’s place. If he knew for certain that young Henry had died but that there were grandchildren he would surely have mentioned them.

From all this we can deduce that son Henry (born 1838) died between the 1851 census and the writing of the will in 1882. There was no point naming young Henry in the will because, even if he had married, there were no known grandchildren. This lack of a mention also seems to eliminate the possibility of Henry having emigrated, gone to sea and not returned, etc. His name is not even worth adding to the will as a possible legatee.

Where does this leave the Henry Burgess on my family tree? If the two Henrys are one and the same, then there are more questions to think about: Did Henry in Ipswich know his son had married? If so, did he know Henry had died and/or had a first son, George, who also died? Would he ever have heard from Henry’s widow, Jane, that a second son, Henry James, had been born posthumously six months later, after Jane had returned to live at her parents' home in Wareham, Dorset?

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