Searching for the Bevan family (General)

by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Saturday, February 04, 2012, 20:30 (4679 days ago) @ unknown

You're most welcome Paul, thanks for taking the time to come online to update things. From your continued research do you now have a better idea where your grandfather lived while a miner, that will give some clues as to which mine he was at ?. There have been a few posts lately asking about employment records for the mines for the C20th, but sadly I've not seen any replies to suggest there are existing records.
My grandfather was a coal miner born 1897 in the Pludds, Lydbrook. He lived in the area all his life but died aged 68 when I was just a toddler. His most likely mine in Lydbrook area is Arthur & Edward aka Waterloo. However thats not certain as in his days miners would commonly walk 5miles or more each way to work.

I suggest you search this forum for threads that may help you.
Examples might be these which include several mine-related weblinks etc, including maps showing the mines, the first link is a Lydbrook mines thread:

http://www.forum.forest-of-dean.net/index.php?id=35220

http://www.forum.forest-of-dean.net/index.php?id=35524

I do hope this helps. Unfortunately for both of us, it's actually often easier to research our ancestors from the 1800s than it is those from the late 1900s, due to confidentiality rules. What a shame we didn't start our research when we had older relatives to ask, which is what all the text books recommend...ah well.

Finally, Paul, as said before to research PRs from beyond the Forest you'll probably need access to one of the big subscription websites such as Ancestry. This is particularly usefull as will give the Census Returns showing how the family groups interact. In England you can get free access via dedicated terminals in public libraries, I don't know if that's the case abroad... if you do try this in my experience the site can be very slow, I suspect dictated by the library's own server speeds, plus the number of users accessing the site worlwide especially in the US where the site is based. For these reasons if using the library I recommend trying to do so at a "quiet" time, eg a weekday morning, not a weekend evening when the Americans are also getting on line.

OR, try the Latterday Saints website. Not so convenient/easy but they do give free access to the census returns. (The most recent census we can see is 1911 due to the 100 years confidentiality rule). See this thread for some hints.
http://www.forum.forest-of-dean.net/index.php?id=35296

Hope this helps !.
(well done for doing some research yourself, I think far more satisfying and enjoyable that way).
Good luck Jeff.

ps did you enjoy the rugby today, not a bad match and nice to beat the Scots away for a change, or are you now a Scot ?!

PPS BAsed on the belief Harry was born in 1897, I've just had a quick look at the Latterday Saints site. Even allowing for possible transcription errors (it did and does happen!), the most likely 1901 Census Record is:

England and Wales Census, 1901 for Harry Bevan
Name: Harry Bevan
Event: Census
Event Date: 31 Mar 1901
Gender: Male
Age: 4
Relationship to Head of Household: Son
Birthplace: Cinderford, Gloucestershire
Record Type: Household
Registration District: Westbury On Severn
Sub-district: East Dean
Ecclesiastical Parish: St Stephen
Civil Parish: East Dean
County: Gloucestershire

In other words this appears the same record as the Beran household Slowhands unearthed on his earlier post. Odd how in this case LDS has a correct name transcription, it's this sites the books say is error prone !
By coincidence I was born Cinderford and my mother still attends St Stephens as we did as children, my sisters were married there.

Sometimes the LDS site quotes complete households on one handy page, if I cheat and look for Slowhands' suggested father Oliver Bevan b1863... I do find him but sadly no complete household, although clearly it's the same family group:

England and Wales Census, 1901 for Oliver Bevan
Name: Oliver Bevan
Event: Census
Event Date: 31 Mar 1901
Gender: Male
Age: 38
Relationship to Head of Household: Head
Birthplace: Cinderford, Gloucestershire
Record Type: Household
Registration District: Westbury On Severn
Sub-district: East Dean
Ecclesiastical Parish: St Stephen
Civil Parish: East Dean
County: Gloucestershire

AND his wife, as found by Slowhands:

England and Wales Census, 1901 for Myra Bevan
Name: Myra Bevan
Event: Census
Event Date: 31 Mar 1901
Gender: Female
Age: 37
Relationship to Head of Household: Wife
Birthplace: Abertillery, Monmouthshire
Record Type: Household
Registration District: Westbury On Severn
Sub-district: East Dean
Ecclesiastical Parish: St Stephen
Civil Parish: East Dean
County: Gloucestershire

IMPORTANT NOTE !
When searching the LDS site, I strongly suggest to input just the name, and then the birth year (use filters to the nearest decade). Then only select the likely "Census" under "Collections". Don't use the BMD fields. Avoid using the place fields, sometimes it confuses England with UK, for example.
(If you enter too much data, even if correct, the search engine often falls over and ignores hits it should find !).

It then displays a list of possibles, including spelling variations. Many of these will be listed under foreign, usually US, Censuses. Ignore those and select the England etc ones. Hopefully you'll find the same target person listed more than once, for different Censuses. You may also find relatives by accident.

Good luck !