Dorothy Margaret Bannister nee Swinfield (1929-2024)

Dorothy and daughter Tracey Jones

Dorothy Margaret Swinfield was born on the 29^th of December 1929 in Barton under Needwood in Staffordshire. She was the fifth of the seven children born to William Swinfield, a platelayer who worked for the Midland Railway Company, and his wife Ada. She had five brothers, William Arthur, Albert Edward, Frederick Charles, Thomas John and Geoffrey, and one older sister Joan. Amazingly, when her father married Ada Louisa Toon on 23^rd December 1922 in Barton parish church, when he lived in Barr Lane, he was a 50 year-old widower. He had previously been married to Charlotte Allsebrooke (1872-1920) in Burton-on-Trent Register Office in 1894. That first union had produced ten children born from 1896 to 1910, of whom seven survived to adulthood. Ada Louise Swinfield died on 17^th November 1974, aged 80, and is buried in Barton churchyard.

Grave of Ada Louise Swinfield
(1895-1974) in Barton under
Needwood churchyard

William Swinfield had passed away nearly thirty years earlier in 1945 at the age of 74. He had been born on 13th August 1870 at Alrewas as the son of Joseph Swinfield (1843-1905), a farm labourer, and Hannah whose maiden surname had been Riley. His family of five children lived at Alrewas before moving to Barton under Needwood between 1875 and 1881. Joseph was a native of Earl Shilton in Leicestershire being born there in 1843. He was the son of Thomas Brown and Sarah Hewitt, the mother being the estranged wife of Thomas Swinfield, who emigrated to America.    

Grave of (Albert) Edward Swinfield 
(1925-1948) at Barton under Needwood 

Dorothy’s older brother Albert joined the Navy at the age of 14. He arrived home in time for her birthday along with her first ever birthday cake. He was taken prisoner of war at the age of 17. Dot was very proud of him and often spoke of how brave he had been. Sadly, he never recovered from his time in Makassar Camp on the island of Java and died in 1948 at the age of only 23.

Dot, as she was known throughout her long life, began working at the age of 14 as a chamber maid at The Silverhill in Birmingham. She then worked at The Yenton Hotel, Midland Journey, Sharps and Knights and at the Oakmore Café.  She was a cleaner for John Taylor High School and worked for 15 years at Rangemore School for the Deaf.                                                 

It was while working at Sharps and Knights that Dot met and fell in love with Tom Bannister, who was to become her second husband in 1958. They moved to Belvedere Road in Burton-on- Trent.  Following the births of their son Paul in 1965 and daughter Tracey in 1968, the family moved back to Barton. Over the years, the family grew with the arrival of grandchildren Emma Louise, Alfie and Tasha. Dot loved and doted on her grandchildren.

Dot retired at 65 but never really stopped working. She played bowls and catered at the club, eventually being made an Honorary Member. She loved other games, playing crib, whist, dominoes and bingo, and enjoyed reading. Her world was shattered when Tom died on 7^th of June in 2003.

She continued to enjoy a very active life. Tracey had moved to New Zealand and Dot visited her and the Jones family there on several trips. Dot had a stroke on the 9^th of March 2023 and spent the remainder of her life in the Jayson Hylton Nursing Home where she died on 9^th March 2024, aged 94. The funeral service took place in her home parish church of Barton under Needwood on 3^rd April. 

Sandra Bates (1950-2024)

 I am very sorry to announce the death of Sandra Bates, a very keen member of the Swinfield Genealogy & DNA Group. She passed away on 3^rd March 2024 following a short stay in hospital after dealing with a long-term condition. 

Allan & Sandra at Ashby de la Zouch in 2010  

Sandra was born in 1950 in the Hammersmith area of London as the older of the two children of Roger and Bettyne Bates. She leaves a brother Paul and a partner Allan. 

Her mother (1921-2002) was the daughter of Albert Arthur Summers (1898-1976) and Frances Minnie (1897-1984) whose maiden surname was Swinfield. Surprisingly, on her birth certificate, Frances’s mother was recorded as Ellen Paddison, a domestic servant who lived and worked at Willington in Derbyshire. By the date of the 1901 census, her 4 year-old child was living at Derby Road in Willington recorded as the daughter of Alfred Swinfield (1868-1919), a general labourer, and his wife Theresa or Thirza. That couple had married in 1893 in the parish church and, after they had lost their only child Daisy as a baby, they appear to have “adopted” the young Frances. As such, she and her descendants including Sandra and Paul have become part of Swinfield Family 5 & 2.

 

Alfred Swinfield was the son of Joseph Swinfield (1843-1905) and his wife Hannah Riley, who had married at Alrewas in Staffordshire in 1865. He was yet another grandchild of Thomas Brown, a life-long bachelor, by Sarah Swinfield nee Hewitt, the estranged wife of Thomas Swinfield (1808-1893) who left his “family” behind to emigrate to America in 1854. So Sandra was, on paper, my 3^rd cousin once removed. A very complicated and certainly not genetic relationship!  

 

Sandra was educated at Keynsham near Bristol, later studying microbiology at Cardiff University and graduating with an M.Sc. in Brewing Technology from Birmingham University. She certainly put her education towards what was clearly to become a vocation in the brewing industry. Working for Courage and later Harp Lager, she took on the Eight Bells pub at Alton, Hampshire, and then worked for Ushers at Trowbridge in Wiltshire. Eventually she joined Wadworth’s in Devizes, where she became part of the team that brews her own favourite beer, the famous 6X. Those who enjoy real ale should be very grateful to her.  

 

Ashby de la Zouch - 11 September 2010 

I first corresponded by email with Sandra back in late in 2008 when she lived at Melksham in Wiltshire and introduced herself as the granddaughter of Frances Swinfield. We have been in regular contact ever since discussing the family’s history and collaborating on research. When she decided to hold a Bates, Rowland and Eyre family history “get-together” for her close relatives at Ashby de la Zouch in Leicestershire on 11^th September 2010, Di and I were invited to be there to represent the Swinfields.

 

First Swinfield Gathering - September 2013

That meeting of her part of the family lead to the first Swinfield Gathering at the Sir John Moore Foundation, Appleby Magna, another Swinfield ancestral parish in Leicestershire, on 22^nd September 2013. Sandra found the venue and organised the day whilst her partner, Allan Francis, was appointed the photographer.  

 

Second Swinfield Gathering - September 2015 

Two years later, the event was expanded and the second Swinfield Gathering took place at the George Ward Centre in her new home village of Barwell, Leicestershire, on 12^th September 2015. Once again, Sandra booked the venue and played a major part in organising the event. She even scheduled her daily dog-walking routes to pass as many Swinfield homes as possible to distribute leaflets, publicising the day and encouraging attendees to be there!

 

Later in her genealogical research, Sandra became involved in DNA testing to try to answer long standing questions and relationships in her family history. She ran a local U3A group near her home in Barwell and was a member of the Leicestershire & Rutland Family History Society.

 

I will be very forever grateful to Sandra for all her input, help and support and the effort that added so much to making the gatherings such a success and bringing us Swinfield cousins together. Only in January this year, we talked about holding yet another English Gathering later in 2024. Sadly now Sandra will not be there to see it.   

Happy 2024 to all Swinfields

 A very Happy New Year for 2024 to all Swinfields wherever you may be! 

As we end 2023, we think back on what has happened in this past year. Of course, we had to say goodbye to members of our families. I am aware of three Swinfields who all passed away in September. One was Jeanette (nee Morgan) born in 1937, the widow of Derek Swinfield (1935-2021) of Family 3. The other two were William “Bill” Swinfield, born 1946, and Reginald “Reg” Swinfield, my own father, born in early 1925, both of Family 5. 

I wrote about my Dad’s life and career in a Blog of January 2015. Since 2008 he has lived in a care home and has three great-grandchildren, Lexia, Reggie and Vinnie. When he died, he was the oldest Swinfield in the World, then being 98. That mantle, as far as I’m aware, has now passed to Arthur Henry Swinfield of Family 3, who was born in July 1928. If anyone can advise me otherwise, I would love to know. If you would like to add a Blog of the life of any of your recent ancestors, please send me the basic information and I will put in together for you.

Of course, these losses will have been replaced by new members of our family through the babies born during 2023. If there have been any that you know of, again I am always delighted to hear about them. Again, tell me please.

During the second half of this year, I have been revisiting the four main Swinfield pedigrees that I have compiled over the past five decades since I started researching the family’s history in 1972. I have been adding the information about our ancestors and relatives that can be found in the decennial census returns of England and Wales for 1841 to 1921 and in the 1939 Register. This includes addresses where they lived, occupations, relationships, ages, and places of birth. 

1911 census of 40 Parry Street, Leicester, for John Anthony Swinfield (1878-1964) and his family

For 1921, it even tells us who they worked for: 

1921 census of 40 Parry Street, Leicester, for John Anthony Swinfield (1878-1964) and his family

1939 Register for 8 Uppingham Road, Leicester, for John Anthony Swinfield (1878-1964)
and his wife Amelia (Penn) (1878-1953)

Unfortunately, the equivalent censuses for Australia do not exist.

This information for your part of the family can now be seen on the Swinfield family trees on the Ancestry website through these links:

Swinfield Family 1 & 4A   

Swinfield Family 5 & 2

Swinfield Family 3 & 4      

Swinfield Family 12

Once you are on the relevant family tree, "Tree search" for or "find" the deceased person whose information you seek.

Also, there have been suggestions that it’s time for another Swinfield Gathering to take place in England this year. The last one was held at Barwell, Leicestershire, in September 2015. Is it now time to meet again, nine years later? What do you think? Would you like to come along? Let me know your thoughts.    

E-mail: geoffswinfield@gmail.com    

Swinfield Family 3A has a new source of genealogical information

Having conducted research in the history of the Swinfield family for 50 years, since I began my study in 1972, I thought that I knew of all the main sources of information which are available for its investigation. You never should say that there is nothing else to look at! 

Recently, I became aware, during recent online correspondence with Linda Swinfield of New South Wales, of a privately-printed work which includes a very significant account of the genealogy of the branch of the family which I call Swinfield Family 3A. The book is entitled Caroline Eleanor Burrows/Ferrier nee Meredith 1813-1893 Burrows Descendents and was compiled and produced by Val Ferrier of Waratah in 2000. Why did this contain such a wealth of information about those called Swinfield, especially the branch that has lived in New South Wales from the mid 19th to the end of the 20th century?

Val's quest was to identify the descendants of Caroline Meredith, who was born on 17^th November 1813 in Sydney, NSW, as the daughter of Frederick Meredith and his wife, Sarah Mason, who he married in 1811. Frederick was on the First Fleet as a steward on the “Scarborough” arriving in Sydney on 26th January 1788. He eventually became the first Chief Constable of the Sydney Police and died there in 1836. There is a Facebook Group where his descendants engage in discussion of his family's history. In an attempt to locate branches of Caroline’s descent, from the 16 children that she had by her two husbands, John Burrows (1794-1859) and Frederick Robert Ferrier (1813-1882), she sent out many “information sheets” on which living relatives could provide their genealogical information. She then compiled a spiral bound book of 236 pages of text, photographs and pedigrees just for the Burrows descendants.

The fifth section of this epic work, pages 177-235, recounts the descendants of the seventh of the eight children who Eleanor had by John Burrows. That was Ellen Sophia (1840-1890) who was to marry John Swinfield (1838-1903) on 25^th June 1858 at St Andrews Scots Church, Sydney. 

1858 marriage of John Swinfield & Ellen Sophia Burrows

John had arrived on 30^th December 1848 aboard the “Walmer Castle” as the 10 year-old son of William Swinfield (1804-1876) and his step-mother Sarah (Williamson) (1816-1861). 

John Swinfield arriving in 1848 with his family
(NSW State Archives: NRS5316/4_4786)

John had been born at Hartshill in Warwickshire, England, on 22^nd July 1838. His mother Sarah (Ballard) had died in 1845. John and Ellen Sophia Swinfield had ten children of their own, born from 1858 to 1879 in Sydney.

Three of their issue died as infants and although two of their other children grew up and married, they had no issue who survived infancy. Of the five children, whose living descendants are documented in Val’s book, four were sons. Those were Henry Swinfield (1858-1923), Albert William (1866-1934), Arthur Thomas (1868-1917) and James Ernest (1871-1923). All have living Swinfield lines of descent.

NSW has no publically-available census for the 20^th century as I referred to in my blog about the 1921 census of England and Wales.  This lack of data can be supplemented by some information found in the Ryerson Index of newspaper obituaries and death announcements. If the family can be contacted, and I am in contact with representatives of many NSW families, they can, of course, help with vital information about the more recent generations.

The most important new information concerns the descendants who were born after 1921. 1921 is the latest year which can currently be searched through the online state birth index for NSW. The limitation is due to a 100 year confidentiality regulation. In the absence of the birth index information from 1922 to the present, clues from the marriage index, which are now available to as late as 1971, and the death index which can be searched to 1991, it is almost impossible to build trees to the present-day

Now that we have access to the wealth of information gleaned and compiled by Val Ferrier to as late as 2000, this reveals other Swinfield lines of descents through those people who were born in the last eight decades of the 20^th century where an “information sheet” was completed and returned. All the new names, dates and places have now been added to my databases and the pedigree for Swinfield Family 3A. Thank you Linda and Val!

Ray Swinfield (1939-2019)

On the morning of Friday, 17^th June 2022, an auction will take place at Gardiner Houlgate at Corsham in Wiltshire of the musical instruments of the pre-eminent jazz flute player, Ray Swinfield (1939-2019). 38 lots, numbered 1611-1648 in the sale catalogue, are his collection being sold by his widow Lindy.

I was contacted by Lindy Burrows Swinfield in August 2021 to share family history information about her late husband. Ray had died in October 2019 in London where he had lived since he first visited in 1964. Lindy had written an obituary of husband which was published in London Jazz News on 15^th June 2022. As can be seen, he played with all the greats of jazz music. He also worked on many film soundtracks, commercials, TV and West End shows and pop music recordings. Two of his most popular claims to fame are that he played on the 1967 Beatles song Penny Lane as well as on the much-repeated childrens’ TV programme Mr Benn, originally of 1971-1972.  

Ray was born on 14^th December 1939 in Sydney, NSW, Australia as the only child of Raymond Walter Swinfield (1912-1984) and Gertrude Brigid (Murphy) (1907-1995). His grandparents married at Balmain and later lived in the Leichardt area of Sydney where they had their five children. As such, Ray junior was the great-great-great-grandson of William Swinfield (1804-1876), who arrived in Sydney on 30^th December 1848. As such, he was the progenitor of the NSW line of Swinfields who still live there today. He had arrived from Warwickshire with his family aboard the “Walmer Castle”.

On looking back through my much earlier correspondence with other Swinfields in the 1970s and 1980s, I found that I had first heard from Ray back in 1973/4 in response to a circular that I had sent to all Swinfields listed in the English telephone directories. He then lived in Kingston upon Thames and was able to provide a brief outline of his pedigree which he had gleaned from his father who still lived in Australia. Later Ray wrote again in January 1988. As Lindy had told me, Ray was very interested in his family’s history! Ray was able to provide me with a fairly detailed outline of his family’s story which had been sent to Ray’s widowed mother “Dot” or “Dollie” and Raymond junior in late 1987 by his uncle Arthur Norman Swinfield (1905-2000). Ray’s mother had moved to live with her son in Kingston after the death of her husband in Sydney in 1984. Both his father and uncle have commemorative plaques in Australian cemeteries.

Besides Lindy Jennifer Burrows, whom Ray married in 1996 in his native Australia, he had previously been married in 1970 in the Merton Registration District of south London to a widow whose maiden name was Rosemarie Hood. Through her he gained a step-daughter, Caroline Angela Louise McDonald-Peattie, who had been born in 1964.

Ray Swinfield died on 4^th October 2019 after a long battle over two decades against the debilitating diseases of Parkinson’s and later Dementia. He had played his last musical note in public, ironically, on the Parkinson TV show in 2007.

How many Swinfields were there in 1921?

A census of England and Wales has been taken every ten years since 1801. In the first four censuses, those of 1801 to 1831, the government was only interested in obtaining a headcount of how many people were living, divided up by sex and age groups. Occasionally the enumerators recorded the name of the head of each household. 

In 1841, for the first time, the names of all those in the two countries were to be recorded in the household where they were on the night of the 6th June. Their occupation, if any, was stated and the age of adults was generally "rounded down" to the nearest five-year interval. Those of children under 15 were stated “accurately”. For those born in England and Wales, the question was asked "was this person born in this county?" to which the answer was either yes or no. 

Every ten years, from 1851 to 1911, the census in very late March or the first week of April, with the information compiled being recorded into enumerators' books for each census district. This varied from census to census. Generally, for all those residing in each household, we learn their relationship to the head of the household, marital status, age in years, or perhaps months, weeks or even days in the case of new-born babies, occupation and place of birth, usually expressed as the county and parish, hamlet or sometimes even a street. In 1911, for the first time, each householder completed and signed their own return. He or she was required to state, in the case of a married couple, how long their union had lasted, how many children it had produced and the number who were then living or had died. In more recent years, the censuses have been made available by the National Archives (TNA) for public inspection and research after their 100th anniversary. 

Earlier this year, the enumeration taken in 1921 was released and can now be searched by name index and the householder’s return viewed on the Find My Past (FMP) website. Currently, it is only available on a pay-for-view basis although it can be seen free of change at TNA. The information seen is very similar to that recorded in 1911 but, in addition, where someone was working for an employer, that company or individual will be named. Of course, this is a very valuable resource for any family historian or genealogist who is seeking vital information about someone who was living in England or Wales in 1921. The census, which was originally to have been taken in late April, was delayed until 19th June due to the general social and industrial unrest of that year. 

1921 census of 67 Deburgh Road, Wimbledon, London S.W. 19 (RG15/3622, schd. 304
 for John and Mary Swinfield and their four children 

 

How many Swinfields were enumerated in that year? Using the name index provided by FMP, together with some inventive use of searching techniques, it has been possible so far to locate and identify: 

 152 people indexed as Swinfield 

   20 people identified as Swinfield-Wells or Swinford-Wells 

   29 people who have now been positively identified as Swinfields but have been indexed as: 

        Salinfield (4), Sarsfield (6), Scourfield (1), Shinfield (2), Summerfield (6), Sunfield (2), 

        Swinford (3), Swinpold (2), Swinsfield (1) and even Thursfield (2) 

 In addition, 3 people are indexed as Swingfield but have yet to be identified 

Of the 104 males, 47 were married men or widowers, 22 were bachelors, 12 were teenage boys and 23 were boys under the age of thirteen. Amongst the 97 females, 48 were married woman or widows, 16 were spinsters over the age of nineteen, 9 were teenagers and 24 were girls who were 12 and younger. 

In Australia, mainly in New South Wales, the Swinfield surname has found a home since the emigration of two married brothers from Warwickshire with their families in 1848 and 1853. The first census in Australia was taken of NSW in November 1828. Although many censuses were taken of that colony from 1846 onwards, at five or ten year intervals, until 1881, those were all destroyed by fire in 1882. All Australian colonies held censuses from 1881, every ten years, until after Federation in 1901. The first national census was in 1911. There was a census of the whole country in 1921 and again in 1933, 1947 and 1954. From 1961 onwards, a national census has been taken every 5 years. However, after the compilation of the statistical data, the household information is then destroyed as a matter of privacy. 

Thus, as there is no surviving 1921 census for NSW, we cannot compare the population of Swinfields from those records. However, an analysis of the online state birth indexes, which are now available to 1921, and the family trees and databases which I have compiled, it would seem that there were 64 Swinfields living there in 1921. There were 35 males with 15 of those being either a married man or widower. There were 3 unmarried men, 8 teenage boys and 9 boys aged from 0 to 12. Of the 29 females, who were then using our surname, 16 were married women or widows, 2 were unmarried adults, 4 teenage girls and 7 girls aged 12 or less. 

Thus, it can be calculated that the World population of the surname of Swinfield in 1921 was approximately 265.

Swinfield DNA testing in 2021

During 2021 I have tried to encourage interest in DNA testing amongst the more senior members of the different parts of the Swinfield family. This is a very valuable tool for testing the relationships between people who the genealogical records suggest are connected in a certain way, joining previously unconnected branches of a family together and even bridging apparently insurmountable gaps in a genealogy. It is particularly useful when the identity of one or more parents or grandparents is unknown due to an illegitimacy or adoption or when the father of a child is not the man recorded in a genealogical document.

I wrote about the theory and practice of using DNA testing in a One-Name Study in a Blog of May 2019. As it can be used to learn more about the make-up and thus the genetic ancestry of either men or women, autosomal DNA (at-DNA) is ideally suited to testing the accuracy of the Swinfield family trees and perhaps joining the currently unconnected lines together.

This year, four members of two of the larger Swinfield lineages have taken autosomal tests with AncestryDNA. They were chosen as excellent testees as, being amongst the older members of their families, they will have more Swinfield DNA than their descendants. Where possible, testing the oldest people in the living generations provides the most information about how much of the “Swinfield DNA” has been passed down to them and through which ancestral line. It will also tell them about their ancestors and relations on many other lines of their ancestry through both their mother and father. The raw DNA data generated by AncestryDNA can also be uploaded, if required, to other testing companies, such as My Heritage and Family Tree DNA, and a third-party website called GEDMatch to increase the number and range of matches.     

Andrew and Geoff
studying the tree of Family 3 at
the Swinfield Gathering in 2014

Three members of Swinfield Family 3 & 4 have been tested in 2021.  They are Shirley Margaret Stott Despoja and Ian George Swinfield,  both part of Family 3C, and Andrew John Swinfield, who is in Family 3A. Shirley, whose mother was a Swinfield, is a particularly significant and valuable asset to the study as she is perhaps the only living great-granddaughter of William Swinfield (1804-1876), the emigrant from Warwickshire to Sydney, Australia, in 1848. He was the founder of the very large Swinfield lineage of New South Wales named Family 3.

The “Swinfield DNA”, which has been inherited by his descendants  through two of his three wives, can be identified by those who have tested today irrespective of the current surname which they now have. That same DNA will be shared by descendants of his Swinfield relations who remained in England after 1848. That same DNA is detectable in living descendants of the lines which come from William’s brother, John Swinfield (1806-1874), who followed him to NSW in 1853. Although it is probable that he no living descendants who are now named Swinfield, he was the founder of the large Swinfield Family 4 whose members will have the DNA that he took with him from England.   

Geoff and Derrick in October 2021

The other person, who tested late in 2021, is Derrick George Joseph Swinfield, my fellow Swinfield family historian. As part of Swinfield Family 5, he is my genealogical 4^th cousin whom I first met in 1972. 

His DNA is a very valuable asset to the research project as he has inherited Swinfield DNA. Sadly I am not his genetic 4^th cousin, having received the DNA passed down to me from one Thomas Brown rather than Thomas Swinfield, the brother of Derrick’s ancestor. I am now busy analysing his DNA data and matches which is not only providing very useful information about his Swinfield cousins but also finding him new ancestors and relatives on many of his other ancestral lines.

It would be great to test other selected older “Swinfields” especially from families that have not yet given a sample. I would love to have DNA samples from those in Swinfield Family 1, Family 12 and Family 44 (the Swinfield-Wells line).

                                        Any volunteers in 2022?