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Hi Folks

I am new to the Group so hello to all fellow researchers.
My particular line of interest is in the surname Worgan, a name I have only recently discovered as being part of my family tree. The main line relatives left the area for Somerset in the late 1700's but I feel certain going back far enough to find the origin will enable me to come forward again and perhaps connect with living relatives.
I have found lots of names on the Internet to research and put together as families. The locations of interest include St Briavels, Hewlesfield and Woollaston.
Looking forward to connecting with people of similar interest

4581 views

Welcome to our merry gang Ian!

If you put Worgan into the Search box above you will find 331 postings regarding the family.

You can also go onto the Resources section (see above menu). If you look under Surname Interests there are 10 people also researching the Worgans.

Use the Resources menu to access Parish Records to assist in your research. If you need any need help just post the details of the person/s you are interested in onto the Forum. There are lots of people on here happy to help!

Regards
Chris

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Chris
First of all please let me apologise for not having replied quicker. I have a lot of grovelling to do to other people who have submitted stuff as well. My excuse is that once I registered and posted a comment I forget how to get into the site! When I did get in I didnt recognise it so logged out again. In the right frame of mind I have now fathomed how to work it
I will not try your suggestions
Thanks
Ian

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Hi Ian - a reply from NZ for you. My GGfather's sister married one John Holder Worgan, and they emigrated together to NZ as follows:

Extract from the passenger list of the ship: MATOAKA
1092 ton vessel
Bristol (2 Sep 1860) to Lyttelton (2 Dec 1860)

HOPKINS William 25 Miner (my great grandfather)
HOPKINS Sarah Ann 23 (my great grandmother)
WORGAN John Holder 25 Shepherd
WORGAN Jenatta 32 (misspelling of Janetta – sister to William Hopkins)
WORGAN Mary Elizabeth 4
WORGAN Frances Emma 3
WORGAN Julia Jenatta 3mths (died on voyage)
Janetta died in Lyttelton 29 Nov 1863 (puerperal peritonitis) Note: age at death is given as 37 on the NZ Return of Deaths record, but it should be 36. Her age on voyage was 33, not 32).

My father never mentioned the Worgan family, so either he didn't know about them, or my side of the family had lost touch some time after Janetta's death. It seems odd that Janetta had never left Lyttelton, which was the main port in Canterbury. There was an immigrant camp there. I cannot imagine that there was any shepherding work there for her husband. The rest of the five Hopkins children who emigrated to NZ from the Forest from 1860 to 1862 all settled in North Canterbury, which in those days would have been a difficult journey to and from Lyttelton, so there may have been limited contact with Janetta.

There are other connections between the Worgan and Hopkins families so they must have lived close to each other in the St Briavels parish.

Best wishes on your search. John

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Ian, I just checked the NZ BDM registry online and found that there is a death record for John Holder Worgan for 1869. Hard to think it could be anyone else with a name like that and a NZ population so small at that time.

Sadly the journey to NZ of this wee part of the Worgan/Hopkins family was ill fated. I wonder what happened to the children?

John

4504 views

Ian, I just checked the NZ BDM registry online and found that there is a death record for John Holder Worgan for 1869. Hard to think it could be anyone else with a name like that and a NZ population so small at that time.

Sadly the journey to NZ of this wee part of the Worgan/Hopkins family was ill fated. I wonder what happened to the children?

John

Greetings from New Zealand. John Holder Worgan (b. 1835), the husband of Janetta Hopkins, was actually the father of the John Holder Worgan who died in 1869. After Janetta's death in 1863, John married his second wife Harriet(t) Eaton on 15 April 1865 and they had several children: Thomas Emanuel 1866, John David 1867, Annie Elizabeth 1869, Harriet Rosina 1871, William 1873, Albert John 1884. Some of these died in infancy. However, John Holder Worgan Sr. appears to have left Harriet at around the time of Albert's death and he is next found in Monmouthshire, Wales in the 1891 census, with Elizabeth and their three children, John (another John Holder Worgan), Bertie and Jesse. There are articles in Trove and Papers Past in the late 1890s regarding a legal case involving Harriett and the Lyttelton property.

Pam

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Kia ora Pam - from Christchurch NZ.

We seem to be swimming in John Worgans. There was one who served in WW1 (I think he was resident on the West Coast where there is a branch of the Worgan family). He was shot, but was saved by the bullet hitting his identity disk. His personal account of this is on Papers Past, but I have also seen another account of his service in a West Coast newspaper, accompanied by his photograph. I'm sorry I don't have a copy - I have been concentrating on the Hopkins family rather than the Worgans.

There is another John Holder Worgan, whose obituary is in The Press in 1933 as follows:
"The death occurred recently at the age of 47 years of Mr John Holder Worgan. Born in the Forest of Dean, Lydney, Gloucester, in 1886, Mr Worgan arrived at Lyttelton with his parents in 1896. He was educated at the Lyttelton District School and for some years was a member of the choir at Holy Trinity Church, Lyttelton. For many years he was in the dentistry business with his brother in Cashel street, and during the last 10 years was employed on the travelling staff of A. J. White, Ltd. Mr Worgan was once well known in musical circles and possessed a fine baritone voice. He married in 1920 Miss Minnie Elizabeth Bland, daughter of the late Mr Thomas Bland, of Island Bay, Wellington, who survives him. He leaves one son, John Holder, also his sister, Mrs E. H. Davies, Albany street, and his brother, Mr Jesse Worgan, Chester street."

So this John Holder was not a child of John Holder Worgan and Janetta Hopkins. However the link to Lyttelton is probably significant. It looks like an example of chain migration from the Forest of Dean, as happened with my family (who settled around Saltwater Creek).
John

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Here is the account of the John Worgan shooting in the Poverty Bay Herald in 1915:
"Private John Worgan, of Granity, who left with the Second Reinforcements of the Canterbury Infantry Battalion, and has been wounded at the Dardanelles, writes that he had just finished bandaging a New Zealander, who had a hole in his leg, when he (Worgan) was caught by a sniper's bullet. Coming out through the left breast the bullet struck his identity disc, pushing it along his chest and out through his coat, the disc making the biggest hole. He was taken to Southampton, the vessel by which he was travelling coming into collision with an Italian steamer during a fog near Gibraltar, and sending it to the bottom. Very little damage was done to the British steamer."

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I have to revise my opinion in part in my previous comment:

So this John Holder was not a child of John Holder Worgan and Janetta Hopkins.
John

Whilst my comment is partially correct, it appears from the will that he was a son of John Holder Worgan (widower of Janetta Hopkins), and probably Worgan's second wife Harriett.

Apologies.

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Pam, your information intrigued me, so I checked with Archway in NZ, and there is a will and probate for a John Worgan who married Harriett. In the will (where Harriett's name is recorded as the deceased's wife) John is described as an ex-warder, who died in Lyttelton in October 1907. One of his executors is his son John Holder Worgan.

Whoever you have found in South Wales, remarried, appears to be yet another John Worgan, not the widower of Janetta Worgan nee Hopkins.

John

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John

I do apologise for not replying sooner. I forgot how to get into the site and when I did didnt recognise it and logged out again!

My research is about 100 years before your records. Once I come forward then maybe I shall match something but for now I cannot comment further

regards
Ian

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Hi John,

Do you have any further information on the origins of your Great Grandfather John Hopkin who migrated to NZ in 1860 ?
This is nothing to do with the subject of your post but i am wondering whether he might be linked in to my family through being a sibling of one of my Ancestors..
Thank you

Sid Toomey

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Hi Sid

You are from across the ditch eh? I hope you are not in one of the affected areas - stay safe.

I think you have got a wee bit confused by the plethora of blokes called John Hopkins! Most of the women in our family in the Forest seemed to be called Sarah as well, so we produce quite a messy genealogy.

My Great Grandfather who emigrated from the FOD to NZ in 1860 was William Hopkins, born in Lydney in 1834 to Thomas and Sarah Hopkins (who seem to have lived mostly in Aylburton where Thomas was a labourer and small farmer). Thomas was born in Hewelsfield - I believe at that time the family lived in Hudnall's Wood. Thomas and Sarah did have a son John, but I am not aware of him migrating to NZ - half of Thomas and Sarah's children did migrate here, and the other half stayed in Britain so far as I know, including John.

As for the spelling "Hopkin" that you used - you have to go back a further generation to Thomas' father - my great great great grandfather Phillip (or Philip) to find the family name spelt the old way as Hopkin.

I have not been able to get further back in the Hopkin (Hopkins) line than Phillip because there is no birth record for him, but the family name seems to have been around Hewelsfield or the St Briavel parish for centuries. There are other Hopkins across the river in Llandogo, but I have yet to find a connection between us and them.

John

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I have Worgan connections in St Briavel. In particular Elizabeth Worgan who married Thomas Page in 1807 ; and William Henry Worgan who married Maria Page in 1839. Any interest?

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Hi

I am sorry for such a long delay in responding. You will see I am having to grovel to others but I didnt remember how to access the website and when I did dint recognise it. I am not as far advanced as the dates you indicate, I am still stuck around 1730-1760. At some point some of the relatives have gone to Pill/St Georges/Easton in Gordano. There is a lot of work researching and arranging relevent families to see who is connected but for now thanks for contacting and sorry again for not replying sooner
regards
Ian

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