The Family of Edward and Louisa Orange

One of the first challenges I came across in my research was the identity of one of my great-great-great-grandmothers on my mother’s side. There is also confusion about the number and names of the children she had.

On the birth certificate of my great-grandfather (Thomas Walter Pillar, born 21st August 1876) his parents are identified as Thomas Walter Pillar and Susan nee Orange.¹ Walter Piller and Susan Orange were married in St Thomas’s Church, Bethnal Green on 29 May 1876 with Susan being a 20-year-old spinster, the daughter of Edward Orange.² Thank goodness for the censuses, because official documentation for “Susan Orange” prior to her marriage doesn’t exist. Thank goodness also that there was only one Edward Orange of the right age in Tower Hamlets at that time. While happy to chat to the Census taker, the relationship of Edward and his wife to religious institutions was non-existent and their relationship to the Register Office was intermittent and unreliable.

Edward appears in all the censuses from 1841 to 1891.³ Until 1861 he is living with his parent(s). In 1861 he is living at 7 Turk Street, Bethnal Green, with a wife, Louisa (age 34, born Bethnal Green) and four daughters: Martha (age 8), Susan (age 6), Ann (age 3) and Eliza (age 4 months) all born Bethnal Green.⁴ In 1871 he is living at 11 Old Nichol Street, Bethnal Green with Louisa (age 45, born Bethnal Green) and five children: Martha (age 17), Susan (age 16), Eliza (age 11), Thomas (age 5) and Caroline (age 2) all born Bethnal Green.⁵ So we have 6 children over the 2 censuses: Martha (~1854); Susan (~1855); Ann (~1858); Eliza (1860); Thomas (~1856); and Caroline (~1869) with Ann disappearing before 1871.

Louisa Orange wife of Edward Orange died on 3rd March 1878, the informant for the registration of death being her daughter, Susan Piller.⁶ This tells us we have the right Edward Orange and that his wife’s name was Louisa in 1861, 1871 and 1878. But was it the same Louisa for all that period?

There is no marriage registered for Edward Orange and a Louisa between 1851 and 1878. There are no missing entries because I’ve searched the Tower Hamlets index (when it was on line) and the Tower Hamlet parish registers. Tower Hamlets Register Office were really nice. When you found a possible birth entry in their index, you could email them and they would tell you the given name of the father. This way I found four birth registrations: Ann (19th June 1854, 7 Virginia Row); Eliza (5th March 1856, 7 Virginia Row); Eliza (6th December 1860, Workhouse); and Edward John (8th January 1864, 7 Turk Street).⁷ The parents names were Edward Orange and Louisa née Goodman. This gives me a name for the woman living with Edward as his wife and that it is the same woman between at least 1854 and 1863, but only one of the children match the names and ages given in the census. A search for deaths, turns up Ann (died 17th August 1863, age 5, at 7 Turk Street) which fits nicely with the 1861 census data, but not with the 1854 birth certificate.⁸ It also turns up another Eliza (died 1st October 1860, age 7, at 7 Turk Street).⁹ This Eliza would have been born in 1852-3 and is too old for the 1856 Eliza. Given the lack of a marriage, registration under the surname “Goodman” is possible, but there are no relevant index entries.

Birth Certificate for Eliza Orange issued by Tower Hamlets Register Office

One other bit of evidence is relevant. In the admission records for Turin St School is an entry for Thomas Orange son of Edward, born 6th February 1865.¹⁰

A search of cemetery records finds matching entries for the Ann (1863) and Eliza (1860) deaths in Victoria Park Cemetery, plus a burial for Elizabeth Louisa Orange, age 9, of 7 Turk Street on 2nd July 1858.¹¹ Given that “Old Virginia Row” and “Turk Street” were interchangeable names for the same thoroughfare, this must be another child from the Orange-Goodman household.¹² The age would give a birth date of 1848-9, while Edward was still residing with his mother. I postulate that this may be a child from a former, undissolved marriage of Louisa’s. I can find neither Louisa nor the child in the 1851 census, but the existence of such a marriage would explain why Edward and Louisa never married. Cohabiting out of wedlock was condemned by the churches but you could live with that. Bigamy was a criminal offence which carried a jail sentence. Why were they so erratic in registering births and deaths? We’ll probably never know, but at least they talked to the census takers.

So trying to make some sort of coherent picture of the records, it appears that Edward and Louisa probably had seven children:

1. Eliza, born about 1853, died 1st October 1860
2. Ann/Martha, born 19th June 1854
3. Eliza/Susan, born 5th March 1856, married Walter Pillar, 29th May 1876,
4. Ann, born about 1858, died 17th August 1863
5. Eliza, born 6th December 1860
6. Edward/Thomas John, born 8th January 1864 or 6th February 1865
7. Caroline, born about 1868

Louisa appears in the 1841 census, age 14 and living with Thomas and Mary Goo(d)man.¹³ She was born on the 26th February 1827 in Bethnal Green and baptized in St Matthew’s on the 18th March 1827.¹⁴ Her parents were not born in Middlesex, but the tracking down of the Goodmans is another tale.

I'm still trying to convince myself that I've got this right and enter it all into my family tree.

Sources

1. England, birth certificate for Thomas Walter Pillar, born 21 Aug 1876; Bethnal Green registration district, Town sub-district. Photocopy of original in possession of Jennifer Commons
2. England and Wales, marriage certificate for Walter Piller and Susan Orange, married 29 May 1876; citing 1c/695/280, Jun quarter 1876, Bethnal Green registration district; General Register Office, Southport. Original courtesy of Jennifer Commons
3. 1841 census of England, Middlesex, Bethnal Green, folio 5, page 2, Thomas Orange; digital images, Ancestry Information Operations, Ancestry Australia (https://www.ancestry.com.au/ : accessed 23 Apr 2006); citing PRO HO 107/694/6; 1851 census of England, Middlesex, Bethnal Green, folio 259, page 29, Susan Orange; digital images, Ancestry Information Operations Company, Ancestry Australia (http://www.ancestry.com.au/ : accessed 27 Mar 2006); citing PRO HO 107/1539.
4. 1861 census of England, Middlesex, Bethnal Green, folio 125, page 10, Edward Orange; digital images, Ancestry Information Operations Company, Ancestry Australia (http://www.ancestry.com.au/ : accessed 4 Feb 2006); citing PRO RG 9/263.
5. 1871 census of England, Middlesex, Bethnal Green, folio 23, page 40, Edward Orange; digital images, Ancestry Information Operations Unlimited Company, Ancestry Australia (http://www.ancestry.com.au/ : accessed 28 Mar 2006); citing PRO RG 10/474.
6. England and Wales, death certificate for Louisa Orange, died 3 Mar 1878; citing 1c/207/138, Mar quarter 1878, Bethnal Green registration district, Town sub-district; General Register Office, Southport.
7. England, birth certificate for Ann Orange, born 19 Jun 1854; Bethnal Green registration district, Hackney Road sub-district; England, birth certificate for Eliza Orange, born 5 Mar 1856; Bethnal Green registration district, Hackney Road sub-district; England and Wales, birth certificate for Eliza Orange, born 6 Dec 1860; citing 1c/282/33, Dec quarter 1860, Bethnal Green registration district, Green sub-district; General Register Office, Southport; England, birth certificate for Edward John Orange, born 8 Jan 1864; Bethnal Green registration district, Town sub-district.
8. England and Wales, death certificate for Ann Orange, died 17 Aug 1863; citing 1c/233/488, Sep quarter 1863, Bethnal Green registration district, Town sub-district; General Register Office, Southport.
9. England and Wales, death certificate for Eliza Orange, died 1 Oct 1860; citing 1c/210/177, Dec quarter 1860, Bethnal Green registration district, Town sub-district; General Register Office, Southport.
10. Turin Street School, Bethnal Green, "Admission and Discharge Register for Boys," p. London Metropolitan Archives LCC/EO/DIV05/TUR/AD/001, Admisson and Discharge Register for Boys, Admission #367, Thomas Orange; digital images, Ancestry Information Operations Unlimited Company, "London, England, School Admissions and Discharges, 1840-1911," Ancestry Australia (http://www.ancestry.com.au/ : accessed 9 Feb 2013).
11. Victoria Park Cemetery “Register of Burials at Victoria Park Cemetery 1857-59", The National Archives RG8/Piece 44_2, Burial of Elizabeth Louisa Orange, 2 Jul 1858, The Genealogist, “Non-Parochial BMDs, 1581-1970" (https://www.thegenealogist.co.uk, Accessed 12 Dec 2008); Victoria Park Cemetery “Register of Burials at Victoria Park Cemetery 1860-63", The National Archives RG8/Piece 45, Burial of Eliza Orange, 11 Oct 1860, The Genealogist, “Non-Parochial BMDs, 1581-1970" (https://www.thegenealogist.co.uk, Accessed 12 Dec 2008); Victoria Park Cemetery “Register of Burials at Victoria Park Cemetery 1863-66", The National Archives RG8/Piece 46, Burial of Ann Orange, 22 Aug 1863, The Genealogist, “Non-Parochial BMDs, 1581-1970" (https://www.thegenealogist.co.uk, Accessed 12 Dec 2008);
12. "Bethnal Green: The West, Shoreditch Side, Spitalfields, and the Nichol," in A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 11, Stepney, Bethnal Green, ed. T F T Baker (London: Victoria County History, 1998), 103-109. British History Online, accessed February 16, 2020, http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/middx/vol11/pp103-109.
13. 1841 census of England, Middlesex, Bethnal Green, folio 8, page 10, Thomas Goodman; digital images, Ancestry Information Operations, Ancestry Australia (https://www.ancestry.com.au/ : accessed 9 Nov 2007); citing PRO HO 107/694/5.
14. St Matthew (Bethnal Green, Middlesex, England), "London Metropolitan Archive P72/MTW/019, Register of Baptisms Vol 14 1825-28," page 142, baptism of Louisa Goodman, 18 Mar 1827; FHL microfilm 855,941, item 3.