Using the free access to the 1871 census on Ancestry I have located my wife
s gt grandfather Charles James JOHNSON
He is resident at Rockside House Llangollenfechan and while we were in
Lllangollen on Saturday I asked the excellent Library [ over the Tourist
Information ] if they could locate this place as it did not appear on any
maps on the web.
An assistant brought a number of maps and that for 1909 -10 [ revised 1938-9
and 1965 ] showed it as Lllangollen-fechan just outside the town to the east
off the road to Chirk. When we passed by it is now the Golf Club.
Another look at the census - showed the home next to a Queen St address and
also Tyn-y-wern - provided me with the location on the Old Maps website and
this seem to show Rockside but is not very clear at that scale.
Has anyone access to any town maps of Lllangollen for the period ?
Charles James Johnson was then a Sergeant Major with the Denbighshire
Yeomanry. He had formerly been in the 13th Light Dragoons and his children
were born in Ireland, Coventry, Edinburgh and in the case of my wife's
grandmother in Dorchester.
In 1871 his wife Sarah Lewis [ WILLIAMS] aged 42 born in Carmarthen was with
him and his daughter Sarah Ann, sons Charles D and Sydney T were present but
not.
In the same census I found 2 other daughters, one married, still in Wales
but have failed to find Haidee Jane JOHNSON, my wife's grandmother in either
Wales or England - she would have been aged about 16.
By 1881 the mother was with her son Sydney at Chirk where he was Station
Master
Hiadee Jane married in Chirk in 1885 to Maude BARRET lawyer of Otley
Yorkshire.
But Charles James must have died before 1881 and army records have him
drawing pension in 1876 and dying in 1877
I wonder if any burial records exist for Llangollen.? Those in the Library
were for earlier periods.
Most grateful for any help or further advice
Mark Andrew
Halifax
Yorkshire