Morris was my great-grandmother’s maiden name, so when I was growing up, I was well aware of its existence in my recent family history. However, when I later became interested in genealogy, I soon discovered how difficult it was going to be to track down the origins of the Morris family tree.

The earliest ancestor I was able to trace without much difficulty was my four-times great-grandfather Samuel Morris. Born towards the end of the 18th century, he died in Almeley (Herefordshire) in 1867 having survived his wife Ann and the youngest of their three children; his only surviving children were his daughter Mary (who married Thomas Seaborne in 1853) and my three-times great-grandfather, who was called Samuel Cartwright Morris.

Given that he died in 1867, Samuel Sr. is recorded in three 19th-century census records (1841, 1851 and 1861). In the last of these he was already a widower and lived with his son Samuel and the latter’s family in Kinnersley, not far from Almeley. Ten years before, in the 1851 census, Samuel was already living in Kinnersley, but in the company of his wife Ann, their eldest and as yet unmarried daughter Mary, and their baby granddaughter Catherine (their son Samuel’s eldest child). Ten years before, in 1841, Samuel was living with his wife in her native hometown of Kington, together with their two youngest children Samuel and Charlotte.

The ages given on all three census records, plus Samuel’s age at death in 1867, all suggest a birth year somewhere between 1788 and 1792. Although apparently born in the city of Hereford, there is some inconsistency as to the parish in which Samuel had been born: according to the 1851 census he was born in the parish of All Saints, while in 1861 he was noted as having been born in the parish of St. Peter.

The main issue arises from the fact that there are two infants called Samuel Morris who were baptised in the city of Hereford around the same time: one, baptised on 16 May 1785 in Hereford All Saints, was the son of Samuel and Elizabeth Morris; the other, baptised on 30 October 1796 (but born on 19 August 1794) was the son of Samuel and Catherine Morris. The first candidate’s parents were probably Samuel Morris and Elizabeth Gritton, who were married in Madley in 1775, while the parents of the second one were almost certainly Samuel Morris and Catherine Carpenter, who were married in 1791. The big question now is: how can I be sure which one of the two boys was my ancestor?

There is, unfortunately, very little to go on that would allow me to say with any degree of certainty which one of the two is my ancestor. If I had to hazard a guess, I would say it’s probably the one born in 1794 and baptised in 1796. There are mainly two reasons for this: firstly, a Samuel Morris was buried in the parish of All Saints in 1793, which could be indicative that the child born to Samuel and Elizabeth Morris in 1785 passed away at a young age; sadly, the burial record itself only states the deceased’s name, without noting where he lived or if he happened to be someone’s child – and most other child burials in the parish do seem to indicate as much. Therefore, this entry is, at best, inconclusive.

The second reason for my supposing that my Samuel Morris was born to Samuel and Catherine Morris in 1794 is the fact that Catherine is a name found in the family tree – it was the name given to Samuel’s eldest granddaughter, who happened to be living with him in the 1851 census. Alas, this could well be nothing more than an almighty coincidence.

Unfortunately, intuition in genealogy is not enough to prove or disprove a theory. I need tangible evidence in order to conclude who really were the parents of my ancestor Samuel Morris. In effect, neither of my reasons for believing that the boy born in 1794 to Samuel and Catherine Morris is sufficiently watertight to reach a final conclusion. I will have to keep digging until further evidence surfaces to prove me right – or wrong…

Do you have any suggestions as to how I can take my research further? Do you think there is a strong possibility that either one of the two boys was my ancestor? If you have any ideas or have spotted any flaws in my research, please leave a comment below.