Letters

MORE MARGINALIA

Alan Crosby’s article in your February issue reminded me of something I found in a parish register some time ago.

I was researching my Cole family that came from Witchford in Cambridgeshire, and at the front of a register the vicar had recorded notes about events in the village. This note for 31 July 1851 caught my eye: “Parish meeting to make a Poors Rate, the Overseer John Cole, gone to US America, having absconded, his account £118 deficient.”

Now I realised why I hadn’t been able to trace this John Cole after the 1851 census. I couldn’t find him on any passenger lists, but suspect that he may have changed his name.

Recently I found his brother Thomas Cole had also gone over to America. I found him on findagrave.com, buried in Verona, Oneida, New York State.

It made me wonder whether he had gone over to the USA first (he is recorded on the 1850 census having arrived that year) and his