The Harts (General)

by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Friday, December 16, 2011, 00:39 (4730 days ago) @ Davidhart

Hi David and welcome to this great forum and website. Unfortunately this thread http://www.forum.forest-of-dean.net/index.php?id=16574 is rather an old one, almost 3 years. If you look at the various poster's names you'll see that apart from "Slowhands" (THE venerable font of all knowledge on this site and a leading light to us all), t'other names do NOT appear as blue hyperlinks. This means they've not visited the forum for several months and have been cut-off as it were (see "Help-FAQ" section for further info). If their names were blue this would enable you to send them direct mails to their email inboxes, so negating the need for them to hopefully spot your message while visiting the forum. Therefore sadly it's unlikely they will see your post. That said, if you email the forum moderators its just possible they may be able to help you.

Moving on, did you realise that the real beauty of this site is you can freely search the huge Parish Records database. Similarly the site contains many other interesting items that may also be searched.
From this site's database I can find baptisms for a few Ernest Harts but no son's of David Hart. Similarly I cannot find the Marriage you seek. However it doesnt help that I have no dates at all, please can you help ?. Clearly this website/databse is for the Forest of Dean only so won't include Ponty area (I lived there while at Poly in the 80s) or Bristol.

http://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/search.pl
Using the FreeBMD website and searching for "David HART" in "Glamorgan" (for Ponty & area), I see a long line of them, presumably related to a greater or lesser extent, going right back... The most recent entry is a Marriage of David S Hart & Young abt Mar 1958, is this you ?.

The site shows the preceding Marriage:
Surname Given Name District Volume Page Transcriber
Marriages Sep 1905
HART Ernest Thomas Pontypridd 11a 807 michaelpilgrim
to
Marriages Sep 1905
RENFREE Elizabeth Jane Pontypridd 11a 807 Columbine

Now search for all Births of "Hart" & "Renfree" you'll find these Records:

Surname First name(s) Mother District Vol Page

Births Sep 1914
Hart David R Renfree Pontypridd 11a 1559

Births Jun 1918
Hart John D Renfree Pontypridd 11a 1195

Births Sep 1919
Hart Clifford R Renfree Pontypridd 11a 1241

I presume they are some of your ancestors?

If you now use FreeBMD and search for "Marriage" of "David Hart" and "Mary Preece" but for "All" Counties/Districts, you will get only one (thankfully) match:

Surname Given Name District Volume Page Transcriber
Marriages Jun 1868
Hart David Hereford 6a 847 chrishoare

(NB I didnt search for Mary ANN as it might not have given a hit, if her second name hadnt perhaps been entered on the marriage register)

Working backwards to check by searching just for "Mary Preece", gives the following:

Surname Given Name District Volume Page Transcriber
Marriages Jun 1868
Preece Mary Ann Hereford 6a 847 DaveM

The fact the Volume & Page details, 6a & 847, agree for both records shows this is a correct marital match.
(NB there are MANY Mary Preeces going back several generations, most if not all from the Here/Worcs/Salop Borders).

http://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/districts.pl?r=43445109&d=bmd_1322564104

SO, if these dates seem correct to your researches, and these are your grandparents, they were married in "Hereford" District.
http://www.ukbmd.org.uk/genuki/reg/districts/hereford.html

Clearly, using FreeBMD# you should be able to trace more of your family's records, some of whom may be in the Forest area so will perhaps be on this database. If they are then you'll get far more detail information for each record.

Hope this helps, good luck !

# be warned that with FreeBMD not being a subscription website it is a work-in-progress database and may possibly be incomplete in some areas.