Hello Kirk

I’m now thinking that the parents of John Skelly were probably NOT Edward Skelly and Margaret Quine. I’ve gone back to basics to try and sort it out.

I’m going to refer to James Radcliffe, tinsmith, as JR. And I’ll refer to James, 1842-born illegitimate son of John Skelly and Esther Radcliffe as JR/S. The intention is to establish whether JR and JR/S are the same person, or whether it could be proved that they are not the same person.

Comparing individuals named John Skelly in the 1841 and 1851 census indexes:

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1841:

SKELLY John 63 Douglas 1465/6 26 48
SKEALEY John 60 Ballaugh 1463/4 28 6
SKELLY John 35 Peel 1463/8 54 35
SKELLY John 30 Douglas 1465/7 6 7
SKEALY John 30 Michael 1464/9 8 10
SKELLY John 30 Peel 1463/8 39 5
SKEALLY John 25 Douglas 1465/6 6 8
SKELLY John 20 Castletown 1464/5 14 21
SKELLY John 19 Malew 1464/4 9 11
SKEALLY John 9 Malew 1464/4 46 10
SKELLY John 2 Patrick 1465/9 37 11

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note: there’s also this one which Brian indexed as Kelly:

KELLY John 23 Castletown 1464/5 22 5

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1851:
SKELLY John 72 Ballaugh 2523 382 33
SKELLY John 67 Douglas 2525 145 67
SKELLY John 40 Ballaugh 2523 382 33
SKELLY John 36 Castletown 2526 169 84
SKELLY John M. 33 Peel 2523 120 136
SKELLY John 32 Douglas 2525 230 101
SKELLY John 32 Douglas 2525 328 190
SCELLY John 19 Patrick 2523 80 72
SKELLY John 11 German 2523 186 78
SKELLY John Thomas 7 Douglas 2525 328 190
SKELLY John 4 Arbory 2526 228 76

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I’ve looked up the census pages for the ones in the right age category and then cross-referenced them to rule some of them out (eg the tailor and the butcher who were both born and lived in Douglas)

I feel that the 19 yr old in 1841 who is with his farming family (Edward and Margaret) at Balla Mona, Malew, viz John Skelly bap 1821 Malew, is unlikely to be the father of JR/S. The reason is geography, ie the distance between Balla Mona and Castletown. And there are 2 better candidates in Castletown who could be the “right” father of JR/S.

They are:
Candidate 1 --- in 1841 the 20 yr old on Queen Hithe St, no occupation stated:

Robert Skelly 60 fisherman
Catherine 40
John 20
Margaret 15
Mary 12

Candidate 2 --- in 1841 the 23 yr old man servant in the Clarke household on Market Street.

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It’s likely that C1 or C2 married Elizabeth Duke:

Name: John Skelly • Edit
Event Type: Marriage
Event Date: 28 Apr 1842
Event Place: Braddan, Isle of Man
Gender: Male
Marital Status: Single
Spouse's Name: Elizth Duke • Edit
Spouse's Gender: Female
Spouse's Marital Status: Single

Witnesses John Broome and Sarah Radcliffe

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1851
School Lane, CT
NameAge

John Skelly 36
Elizabeth Skelly 37
Elizabeth Skelly 7
Sarah Skelly 5
Margret Skelly 1 Mo
Mary Gelling 19

JS 36 labourer b CT
ES 37 b Arbory
all others b CT

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1861
Queen St, CT

Ancestry’s transcription.
Actually written as Kelly, but looks like the same family as the Skelly households in 1851 and 1871.

NameAge

Elizth Kelly 46
Sarah Kelly 14
Margt Kelly 10
Esther Kelly 6
John Kelly 3

Eliz 46 widow b Arbory
all chn b CT

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1871

NameAge

Ancestry’s mistranscription (Kelly should be Skelly):

Elizabeth P Kelly 56
Esther Kelly 17
John Kelly 13

Elizabeth Skelly 56 widow, no occupation, b Arbory
chn both b CT

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1881
Queen St, CT

Elizabeth Skelley widow 66 mariner’s widow b Arbory.

She was buried 25th Feb 1883 age 68 in Castletown.

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I was intending to try to find out what happened to C2 after 1841 (the 23 yr old man servant on Market Street, CT), and then I made a discovery.

By entering the following details into Ancestry Public Member Trees search facility, you get to “Gill Family Tree”:

Esther Skelly b 1854 Isle of Man---and nothing else.

The tree “home person” is a g g g granddaughter of Esther Skelly b 1854 Castletown, daughter of John Skelly and Elizabeth Duke. She has a lovely photo of Esther which struck me as being a similar sort of face to your image of Cornelius Radcliffe. I took screenshots of both, made a mirror image of Cornelius, and combined them. Do you see the sort of likeness which you might find if Esther was a half sister of Cornelius’s father ?

DNA test comparisons might be useful....

Jean C
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