James Carden

I broke down and ordered the certificate. I'm not too much further ahead, though. Or, rather, behind, since I'm trying to go back in time!

James Cardon was the son of John Cardon and Lucy, born 1818 in Dublin. John was a corporal in the Royal Horse Artillery at the time.

There is a marriage record (I think it was in Pallot's?) for a John Carden of the Royal Horse Artillery who married a Lucy Foster in 1812 in Woodbridge, Suffolk. These might be James's parents... however, Lucy is listed as a widower, so Foster is not her maiden name. I wonder if it might be Fryett; the only record in that area that I can find of these names comes from a daughter (Elizabeth) of John Foster and Lucy Fryett in 1809.

In any case, if I've got the right John and Lucy, then my James had at least two full siblings as well: John Carden (1812) and Matilda Carden (1815). Unfortunately, it looks like this is as far back as I can go without getting heavily into military history... which I have no idea how to do.

Not Irish after all?

I bought a few pay-per-view credits and had a look at findmypast's armed forces birth indices... and I found my ancestor. James Carden (spelled Cardon in the index... close enough) was born in 1818 in Island Bridge (an area of Dublin, Ireland). I already knew he was born there around 1818 or 1819, but now at least I've got the exact year pinned down. Too bad if I want to find out more I have to spend a lot more money to do so. And I really wish these certificates were digitized so I could just view them; I don't really care if I have a paper copy in hand (in fact, I'd prefer not to).

This new information also points to the fact that James may not have been Irish at all. It looks like his father was probably a military man as well. Perhaps the family didn't even spend much time in Ireland. Unfortunately, the time period we're talking about is before 1841, so I can't even search the censuses to find out the whereabouts of this family.

Carden family of... Ireland!

Thanks to my distant cousin, John, I've discovered that James Carden was actually Irish! He was born in a place called Island Bridge in Dublin around 1819. That still doesn't help me trace the tree any further back, but at least it helps explain why I couldn't find him in the English or Welsh birth records.

So now I've got at least two ancestors who were born in Ireland...

Carden family of England? Wales?

My great-great-great-grandfather has been somewhat of a mystery ever since I started tracing my family tree. It's not as if he's so far in the distant past that there are no surviving records; he was born around 1820, after all. I think the problem is that he was a military man. Other kind researchers have helped me out a little bit, confirming that there was a James Carden who served with the Black Watch in the Crimean War (which fits in with the family stories). He never returned to his family in Scotland, and I haven't found any death records for him... but apparently there was a 37-year-old James Carden of the 42nd Regiment who was buried in one of Malta's military cemeteries in 1855. Malta! Who would have guessed?

I would really like to be able to tie my James Carden to one of the Carden families that have been extensively researched. Family stories say James was Welsh, but on the 1841 census his birthplace was listed as England. I'm wondering if he was perhaps one of the Cheshire Cardens -- a possible candidate is a James Carden, born about 1820 in Manchester, who was the son of William Carden and Elizabeth Lee. I know there are some DNA studies out there that might help me out, but unfortunately they use the Y chromosome... and that doesn't exist in my branch of the family anymore.

There must be someone out there who knows something about James. I guess I just have to keep searching.