What a mess. I’m thinking right about now that I would do better to scrap the current family tree and just start over again.

I’m not sure about Mary Jane Thompson, who married Charles Allen. They did get married on 21 Oct 1847, but the rest of Mary Jane Thompson’s family I’m not so sure about. It looks like there are three families in Lincolnshire with parents of Thomas and Elizabeth Thompson, and they seem to have moved around some. I think our family lived in Waddington for awhile, but our Mary Jane seems to have gotten mixed up with another Mary Jane. Cheryl had our Mary Jane born in Waddington in May 1829. But it turns out there is another Mary Jane born in Fiskerton in Mar 1829, which looks like ours instead. The 1900 census in Joliet, IL, says she was born Mar 1829, not May.

On the census for 1851, 1861, 1871, and 1881, Mary Jane’s birthplace is listed as Fiskerton, not Waddington. That’s consistent all right. The 1841 census does not list the town where born, and after the 1881 census Mary Jane left England, so she is not on the 1891 census. During the 4 censuses which list her birthplace as Fiskerton, she is married to Charles Allen, so we know for sure that is the right Mary Jane. But as for her parents and siblings, I’m going to have to do a bit more digging.

Right now, Mary Jane’s parents are Thomas Thompson and Elizabeth Staples, and they are living in Waddington in 1841, 1851, and 1861. Thomas Thompson died in 1864. I’m not sure I can figure this out, the time period in question is pretty far back. The first census in the UK was in 1841, and that will just tell us family groups and the town they lived in, not where they were born.

So let’s see what I can come up with for Mary Jane’s family! Where are you great-great-grandma?? 🙂