John Smith's Family Tree Website

Walsh family

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Part 3: Thomas Walsh (c1828 - 1899)

Early life and marriage to Lucy Flitt

Thomas Walsh was the sixth child of Mark Walsh and Elizabeth Vass. He was baptised 01 June 1828 in Chipping Barnet, Hertfordshire. He had moved to London by his early 20s and become a plasterer. During the Victorian era, decorative plaster became more popular but it is likely Thomas was a plasterer in the old sense, of applying plaster in construction to cover holes and cracks.

He married Lucy Flitt (c1834 - 1915) 10 June 1855 at St John’s Church, Paddington, London. Thomas and Lucy had known each other since they were little, the Walsh and Flitt families both having lived on Wood Street, Chipping Barnet. Nine years earlier, Thomas’ sister Rebecca had married Lucy’s uncle Charles. Unlike his wife and his siblings, Thomas could not sign his name when he married, which meant he probably had received no schooling.

After their marriage, they returned to Chipping Barnet to live and raise their family. Although they moved house several times (including back to Wood Street), they always stayed within a 500m radius of the area.

They had seven children: Walter, Thomas, Elizabeth, Richard, William Vass, Mark and Rebecca. Thomas’s older brother Michael lived with the family for many years, as did one of their grandsons. By 1891, they had no family living with them though one of their children was living in the same street. Perhaps times were tough then as they took in three boarders. Thomas died 14 September 1899, aged 71, following a stroke and Lucy went to live with youngest daughter Rebecca, then eldest son Walter. She died 28 July 1915, aged 81.

Children of Thomas and Lucy

Walter (1856 - 1923) was baptised 31 August 1856 in Chipping Barnet. He married Fanny Jane Ginn (1854 - 1933) in Bedfordshire in 1876 and they spent the rest of their lives living in the north-west part of London. Walter was a carpenter for some of his life, but changed jobs (and addresses) many times. At one point the family were lodgers but then a decade later, Walter was working as a pig feeder and seemingly doing well enough that all his children were listed as ‘scholars’ with none going out to work! He and Fanny had eight children and in later years, Walter worked as a beer retailer of the Green Man (referred to as a ‘beer shop’ rather than a ‘public house’). Walter died in St Andrew's Hospital, Dollis Hill, 17 June 1923, aged 67, and left his widow £1900 (nearly £60,000). She died a decade later in 1933, aged 80.

Thomas (1857 - ?) was baptised 31 January 1858 in Chipping Barnet. Nothing else is known of him and he probably died in infancy.

Elizabeth (1859 - ?) was baptised 25 September 1859 in Chipping Barnet. There is no record of her after 1861 and it is possible she died young.

Richard (1861 - 1916) was baptised 24 November 1861 in Chipping Barnet. He became a plasterer, like his father, and married Ellen Royer (c1864 - 1929) in 1882. Ellen’s father and her brother Thomas were both house painters which is most likely how she met Richard. They lived at 21 Salisbury Road the rest of their married life, with Ellen’s parents at number 19, and her brother’s family at number 23! Richard and Ellen had four children (Ellen Lucy, Florence Emma, Albert Richard and Mabel Annie) but two sadly died before they were teenagers. Richard died in 1916, aged 54, and Ellen in 1929, aged 66.

William Vass (1863 - 1864) was baptised 31 January 1864 in Chipping Barnet. Sadly he died when he was about a year old.

Mark (1865 - 1870) was baptised 28 May 1865 in Chipping Barnet. Sadly he died when he was five.

More information about Rebecca (1867 - 1952) appears in Part 4.

Next: Rebecca Walsh

Footnotes