More on the William Bridge Family

I've recently had two surprises on the Bridge line. First, when I was browsing the family tree on new family search (www.new.familysearch.org), I noticed a little green arrow next to William Bridge and Jane Aspinall. I had already completed all the work for this family (including finding their daughter, Louisa, who was born and died in 1848), so I was surprised that there was something new. Someone else working on this line must have entered something. So I clicked on the arrow. Apparently this couple had a daughter born in 1835 named Ellen. The information came (most likely) from the LDS extraction program, which is now no longer operational, but which compiled christening records from all over the world for many years. Ellen Bridge was born in 1835 to parents William and Jane Bridge. Since I have researched every Bridge family in Bolton thoroughly to find relatives, I know that there was only one William Bridge married to a Jane - so this child must be theirs. Also, William and Jane were married in 1834, so it makes sense that their first child (remembering that there was no birth control back then) would have been born in 1835. So that was surprise number one!

Surprise number two happened today as I was reading my email and came across a post from the Lancashire BMD website. They (and I, since I volunteer for them) have been correcting the birth, death, and marriage indexes and entering the information from birth certificates online for all government records going back to 1837 when they started requiring registration of vital statistics. I decided to just check all the birth records from 1837 to 1841 when the first living child of William and Jane's, Joseph, was born. Guess what I found? Robert O. Bridge, born 1838. His mother's maiden name was Aspinwall just like all the other children of this family. Since there was no Robert Bridge on the 1841 census with William and Jane, I assumed he died as a baby, so I checked death records and found him in 1839.

So add two more children to the William and Jane Bridge family:

William Bridge m. Jane Aspinwall 1834

Children: Ellen, born 1835, died before 1837; Robert O., born 1838, died 1839; Joseph William, b. 1841; Thomas Richard, b. 1843; Emma, born 1845; Louisa, born 1848, died 1848.

Ta DAAAAAAA!