East End and Beyond

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Peter Oxbrow was keen to know more about his roots in the East End of London, and the origin of his grandfather's middle name 'Snowling'.  

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Using census records, street directories and historical maps, I plotted where Peter's ancestors had lived in Stoke Newington, Dalston and Hackney in the early 20th and 19th centuries.  Many of the buildings still exist, and Peter was able to visit the places where his grandparents, great grandparents and 2x great-grandparents had raised their children and worked as mechanics, grocers and oilmen.  I also cross-referenced the locations with Charles Booth's 'Poverty Map' from the 1880s and 1890s to see what sort of enviroments Peter's ancestors lived in.

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I traced the Oxbrow line back to Bocking and Braintree in Essex, where Peter's 2x great grandfather had been a Master Watchmaker.  Generations of Oxbrows had been born, lived and died in Bocking from at least the 17th century, and I was able to put Peter in touch with another Oxbrow descendant who was keen to meet other long-lost relatives.

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The 'Snowling' name turned out to be the surname of Peter's great-grandmother - Alice Ann Snowling.  Alice's father, Edward Snowling, seems to have been quite the entrepreneur, and he chopped and changed from being a publican to a farmer in Suffolk, then to holding the contract for transporting the mail between Yarmouth and Ipswich in the 1870s.  A couple of the pubs are still open, and Peter told me he intends to stop in for a pint one day!

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