New York Trewhella - part problem solved?

[Cornish Terrier]

I have had a New York Trewhella problem lurking around for many years now but I think I may have just solved a part of it.

The problem revolves around a John Trewhella who married Johanna JENKIN about 1868 (presumably in New York).

John TREWHELLA has been no real problem - he was born at Ludgvan, Cornwall, October 12th 1847 and was son of Martin TREWHELLA and Sarah BLIGHT who were married at Ludgvan August 12th 1838.

This family was of Crowlas which is part of Ludgvan Parish and just north of the village of Ludgvan.

Until tonight I had nothing more than a name for Johanna and any relevant information was supplied to me probably more than 20 years ago.

Now, John and Sarah TREWHELLA had five children that I am aware of - John Henry (1869-1912), WILLIAM BLIGHT (1871-1962), James Richard (1874-1952), Mary Elizabeth (1875-bef1960) and Thomas Berryman (1882-1946).

The bulk of this information came from the same source although I have managed to add a few bits and pieces over the years.

BTW - John was a Blacksmith for the Gas Co. in New York.

My original source told me that Johanna had a sister named Sarah and tonight I started to wonder about things as I came across the family during some other searching.
I started wondering about the name of son WILLIAM BLIGHT TREWHELLA and that put me on the trail.
I started to suspect that Johanna might have been a BLIGHT herself so began to search for a Johanna with sister Sarah.

What I found was that Johanna was daughter of James JENKIN and Johanna BLIGHT and was born at Ludgvan about 1847.

Further checking showed that her mother, Johanna, was daughter of William BLIGHT and Sarah VINGOE who were the parents of Sarah BLIGHT.

This means that John TREWHELLA and Johanna JENKIN were cousins - a not unusual thing for Cornish people.

These families were all about Crowlas so there is little doubt of the results here - even though I still have much more work to do.

Anyone with any input please do so.

[calswimmer]

John and Joanna are in the 1870 census of N.Y. and appear to be boarding. Their son John, age 2, was born in the U.S.

[Cornish Terrier]

Thanks Calswimmer - yes I do have that part of things and I do have some later stuff.
Problem is (and I have just requested Zenobia to do some searching for me) that, apart from 1870 and then 1920 and 1930, I can find no records of any Trewhella (var.) families in the Census in New York.
There must be a reason for this as I know they were there so I will wait to see what Zenobia comes up with.

[Zenobia]

U.S. Census 1880, Manhattan, NY, E.D. 440, Sh. 44: (Eleventh Ave)

John Trewhella, head, age 33, blacksmith, b. Eng, both par. b. ENG
Johanna Trewhella, wife, age 35, b. Eng, both par. b. ENG
John Trewhella, son, age 11 (school), b. NY
William Trewhella, age 9 (school), b. NY
James Trewhella, son, age 5, b. NY
Mary Trewhella, dau, age 3, b. NY

And living next door:

James Jenkins, head, age 53, blacksmith, b. Eng
Johanna Jenkins, wife, age 58, b. Eng
Richard Jenkins, son, age 21, works in flour? store, b. NY
Mary Jenkins, dau, age 15 (school), b. NY

[Zenobia]

U.S. Census 1900, Manhattan, NY, E.D. 351, Sh. 8 (W. Forty Sixth St.)

John Trewiller, head, age 53, blacksmith, b. Oct 1846, Eng, m. 31 yrs, imm. 1866
Johanna Trewiller, wife, age 53, b. Dec 1846, Eng, m. 31 yrs, 5 ch, 5 liv., imm. 1858
William Trewiller, son, age 29, plumber, b. Jan 1871, NY
James Trewiller, son, age 25, window dresser, b. Oct 1874, NY
Mamie Trewiller, dau, age 23, saleswoman, b. Nov 1876, NY
Thomas Trewiller, son, age 18, b. May 1882, NY

[Zenobia]

U.S. Census 1910, Manhattan, NY Ward 22, E.D. 1353, Sh. 10A: (W. 46th St.)

John Trewhella, head, age 62, widower, blacksmith, b. Eng, imm. 1866
William Trewhella, son, age 39, single, plumber, b. NY
Thomas Trewhella, son, age 28, single, salesman, b. NY
Mary Trewhella, dau, age 33, single, b. NY
William Trewhella, nephew, age 16, stenographer, b. NY, both par. b. NY
John Trewhella, nephew, age 14, office boy, b. NY, both par. b. NY
Thomas Trewhella, nephew, age 10, b. NY, both par. b. NY
John Trewhella, son, age 40, widowed, office clerk, b. NY

[Cornish Terrier]

You are a winner again!

I cannot understand why I did not find the family in 1880 as the name is certainly spelt as it should be.

1900 I can understand given I never tried a search with 'er' on the end of - so I will 'sort of' forgive myself on that one.

1910 - I did have them but only with the bare information available to non-subscribers.
I was able to match this group up with my current database but had to place a query against each as I was not absolutely sure.
Obviously I am sure now.

There is one son missing here - James Richard - but he was married with one son at the time and should be in New Jersey but, guess what, he does not turn up in the list I have so I might try and have another look at this tonight to see if I can find him.

BUT a little 'snippet of interest' for you:-

In 1910 the widowed John Trewhella had with him children William, Thomas and Mary.
Also in the household were NEPHEWS William, John and Thomas along with their father (and John's eldest son) John.

Well GUESS WHAT - relationships as described in some of our other postings are NOT RESTRICTED to the Cornwall back in the 'dark ages'!

The three NEPHEWS mentioned here are actually GRANDSONS - children of John's eldest son John. ;D

[Zenobia]

ianjtrewhella said:

I cannot understand why I did not find the family in 1880 as the name is certainly spelt as it should be.

It was spelled correctly in the census, but indexed as "Trewhelfa"

1900 I can understand given I never tried a search with 'er' on the end of - so I will 'sort of' forgive myself on that one.

I always start my searches with Trew*** and if that doesn't turn up anthing I omit surnames entirely and begin searching on given names.

There is one son missing here - James Richard - but he was married with one son at the time and should be in New Jersey but, guess what, he does not turn up in the list I have so I might try and have another look at this tonight to see if I can find him.

I will give a look out for him...

BUT a little 'snippet of interest' for you:-

In 1910 the widowed John Trewhella had with him children William, Thomas and Mary.
Also in the household were NEPHEWS William, John and Thomas along with their father (and John's eldest son) John.

Well GUESS WHAT - relationships as described in some of our other postings are NOT RESTRICTED to the Cornwall back in the 'dark ages'!

The three NEPHEWS mentioned here are actually GRANDSONS - children of John's eldest son John. ;D

I did note that they were grandsons, but it was late and I was tired, so the implication of them being listed as 'nephew' went right by me. Nephew meaning grandson is much rarer, but I can recall seeing it at least once before.

In medieval times it was more common, as the latin "Nepos" actually meant grandchild....

[Zenobia]

Gave it a try, but could not locate son James R. Trewhella on any census...

Do you have additional details?

[Cornish Terrier]

Not at the moment but will try to look at this again tomorrow - I am 'dog-tired' and about to have a light meal before getting to bed. (Hope my next shift is easy at the pub )

[Cornish Terrier]

Well I have finally found James in the 1910 Census!

He is at Jersey City, NJ with wife Agnes and son Arthur living with Agnes' parents Michael and Margaret DAY.

Looking at the original the name looks like TRULLA but on a closer inspection it is TRUILLA.

To find it I simply looked for Arthur with parents James and Agnes and then checked through each name until one looked 'odd enough' to be what I was after!

It was indexed as - TOUELLA

[Cornish Terrier]

And now another part of the New York mystery has been largely solved! ;D

There were several events in New York for the name TREWHELA and I had never been able to determine if this was actually one of 'my' families or if it may have been something else.

There have been instances where a family appears in the Census as TREWHELLA but they were actually Polish and the name apparently not Trewhella at all.

But in this case I have managed to get the link back to Cornwall .......... via Ireland!

This was John TREWHELA born about 1830 in Ireland son of Richard and Mary Trewhela from Crowan.

Thomas son of Richard and Mary (therefore brother to John) was the man who took his family to Chile in the mid-1850s.

It was only today that I finally found the marriage of John.

John TRAWHALE married Elizabeth Ann COLLINS 4th September 1859 Houghton, Michigan

I had already found what appeared to be the right family in the 1870 Census .... recorded as TRAWHALLE.

And then this afternoon I finally found John and Elizabeth in 1860 at Houghton, Michigan as TROWHOLES!

Looks like they had only three children - Thomas, John and Daniel - and then they seem to completely disappear by 1880.

Thomas, John and Daniel 'may be' in the 1880 Census as TROWHOLM although the age for Thomas 'appears' to be 48 rather than 18.

The other odd thing is that John and Daniel appear as 'sons' yet the ages match those of the children of John and Eliza(beth) Trewhela.

Nevertheless I have a death record for Daniel TRAWHELLA in New York and his brothers married sisters Florence and Sarah WELLS.

The family were in Massachusetts in 1870 but later on moved to Brooklyn where they remained.

Interestingly - John Trewhela was a blacksmith as was his father. But more interesting is the fact that there was another John Trewhella in New York at the same time and who was also a blacksmith.

I need to flesh this out now and it will be a bonus when I finally find the marriage records for New York.

CT