Paul O'Brien Twigg, Born 1824

One of the sons of the Paul Twigg I wrote about in my last post was Paul O'Brien Twigg, my 2nd great-grandfather.

When he was a young man, Paul O'Brien Twigg ran off and joined the military. Because he did not have any money to buy a commission and become an officer, he joined as an enlisted man. He knew that his father would not allow him to remain an enlisted man and would pull him back to Dublin if he could find him so he enlisted under an assumed name, Edward Hammill.

We have records of his marriage to my 2nd great-grandmother, Ann James under that assumed name while he was in India with the military. One of the curious things about the certificate is that he listed his status as "widowed" but I had always assumed that all of the information on it including this was made up since his name, his father's name and his date of birth as listed on the marriage certificate were all fictitious.

The book I am currently reading, "Who Do You Think You Are" by Megan Smolenyak, reminded me that, as well as their main genealogical site, familysearch.org, the Mormon church also has two other sites with different information: pilot.familysearch.org and beta.familysearch.org .

Browsing on those last night I found a record for what might be a previous marriage of his!

This record lists an Edward Hammill as having married one Elizabeth Robertson in Meerut, Bengal, India in 1852.


Of course it is always possible that it is a different Edward Hammill. But it does not seem from what I have seen that there were many or any other Edward Hammills in India at that time, his father is listed as George Hammill in both of them and his birth date is listed as 1824 so I think there is a good possibility that it is the same Edward Hammill.

Of course, if this is indeed the same person, that brings many other questions to my mind. Another record shows that Elizabeth died in 1854. What did she die of? Did they have any children? Did those children survive? I seem to recall that another record I found a while back indicated that Edward Hammill had a son who died at two years old. Was that a son from the first marriage or the second? Elizabeth Robertson's father is listed as Matthew Campbell. Why is his last name different from hers? Where did either of the women come from? How long did they live in India before they married Edward Hammill (AKA Paul O'Brien Twigg)?

Ah, here is the record I found a while back. It is a record of a son being born to the wife of Edward Hammill in 1858 so I guess that would have to be to Ann James.

http://search.fibis.org/frontis/bin/aps_detail.php?id=876706