Tall tales from Miss Marshall!

I've been talking to my Nan today about my Grandad's family. One of the main reasons I embarked on this mission with nan was because my Grandad always claimed that his mother was born in Ireland. This is what he had been told growing up and accounted for the fact that his middle name was Patrick. Grandad took to this and loved to tell people of his Irish roots. My nan and I wanted to find out all of the details regarding her life and how she came to be living in Chatham, Kent. The search for Rosa Lynda (Grandad's Mother) was not an easy one. We didn't know when she had been born or who her parents were, only that she had been born in County Cork. The maps came out and the search began, looking at different towns and villages in the county to see if any of the names jogged my Grandad's memory. No such luck. Finding a record of my Grandad's birth gave us a maiden name of Marshall, which Grandad agreed with. The only problem was that Rosa Lynda Marshall was born in Sheerness, Kent and NOT County Cork, Ireland. Sheerness sounded viable as it is only roughly 15 miles down the road. Grandad however was not impressed that his roots were not so Irish. Maybe, he thought, it was her mum or dad that gave rise to the story. The search would continue.

Today I was checking over facts regarding my Grandad's family; I successfully located them on the 1911 census, which places her in Sheerness once again. Apart from her birth and death record, the 1911 census is the only evidence I had found of her life. Remembering a story my Grandad had told me about his parents not being married, I questioned my nan to see if this rang true with her. It did. Of course years of research has taught me to take everything with a pinch of salt, especially with Rosa Lynda after the Irish Debacle. Lo and Behold after a quick search of marriages between Marshall and Edge in Kent and a certificate turns up. A phone call to my Great Auntie (Grandad's sister) confirms she had always thought they had never been married either. Apparently she had actually been married before, but the marriage never consummated. This is my next step, to see if I can find record of her previous marriage. Not that I know anything at all about the gentlemen in question or what happened to him. 

It seems that Rosa Lynda liked to tell a tale or two!