The Webb Wagg Family in Australia

Update — June 2026: George Turner, Scarborough, John Tindall, Mary Ann/Jane, and the beginning of a new investigation When I first wrote this post in May 2017, I described 16 May 1847 as the “highly likely” death date for George Turner. I wrote it deliberately on what appeared to be the 170th anniversary of his death, while also acknowledging that much of George’s story was still unfinished. Nearly a decade later, the research has moved on. I now know that 16 May 1847 was indeed George Turner’s death date. I have also established, from New South Wales records, that George came from Scarborough in Yorkshire. Those same records point to a birth date of about 1805, although I have still not found a definite birth or baptismal record for him. The most important new development is that George’s 1818 apprenticeship indenture can now be placed much more clearly in its Scarborough context. The original family-held indenture fragments showed that George was apprenticed from 3 September 1818 to ...

Part 7:  Testing the Cley baptism — Is George Horatio Wegg the right man? In Part 6, the documentary and DNA evidence allowed us to extend the Wegg line two further generations. That work identified George Wegg, who married Susanna Wilkin in 1778, as the paternal great-grandfather of William Webb Wagg. That conclusion gave us a firmer foundation. But it also opened the next question: Can we identify the origins of George Wegg — and is he the same man as George Horatio Wegg, baptised at Cley next the Sea in 1761, son of Horatio and Mary Wegg? This is not simply a matter of finding a promising baptism. It is a question of identity. Does the whole life of the man fit? In Part 6, I noted that the Cley baptism was plausible by name, date and location, but that without direct linking evidence the connection had to remain provisional. That remains the starting point for this post. What follows is an attempt to test that possibility more carefully. An unexpected lead The investigation bega...