(4) John GENT

As an addendum to the BARTONs I've researched John GENT who married Martha and had two children with her.

John was from Exeter, Devon and was born in 1845. I searched the census sheets from that area and realized that GENT was like Smith in some areas!

I did find one family that I thought might be him. His father was John born 1815, mother Mary 1820 and a brother Thomas born 1847. The father's occupation was a bit of a puzzle to me. The census listed F-llmonger, I couldn't read the second letter. When I looked it up it turns out he was a Fellmonger. You learn something every day. A Fellmonger was a man who took the hair off animal skins before they were tanned to make leather. When I was looking at the census page that I found them on, there were several women who were glove makers.

All this is speculation about his family. Maybe they are, I don't know for sure.

Then I did find a record of him at a later date. I used a spread of a couple of years for his birth and up popped a soldier! John GENT, Private, 55th Regiment. He gave this same regiment as his occupation when he lived with the Bartons in Carlisle.

In 1861 he was listed at Fulwood Barracks, Lancashire. This was home to the Queens Lancashire Regiment. An interesting point about his record was that it showed his age as 18. His birth year in following records showed his birth in 1845, I wonder did he lie about his age to join the army?

He married Martha in 1879 and died in 1896.