UK family history records

"Lest we forget"

This website will close down September 2026

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Items for debate :   For some years the 1806 marriage of William Morledge to Martha Scott at Berwick on Tweed, Northumberland, has been considered to the same couple who are recorded as having started a family in Derby. This family starting in 1815 with the birth of son Thomas in Derby who died unmarried in 1843. William seems to have been the one in the militia, so that may explain the only Morledge sighting in Northumberland in the early 1800s. Then there is the unexplained gap between 1806 and 1815 where no children are recorded as having been born to William and Martha could be because he was serving outside of England. Was Martha, the mother of the 1815 Thomas, and several other children, other than nee Scott, and if so where did this second Martha and William marry ? A William Morledge of the militia is recorded as been born circa 1775 and may be the same one who was buried at Markfield, Leicestershire 1831 aged 55. Markfield is not far from Derby. Seemingly he was NOT the one who married Martha Scott at Berwick on Tweed in 1806. William in the document to the right was aged 22 at enlistment, or so he said, and had served 8 years by 1813. This would have him born circa 1783, so if the son of William and Ann (STANLEY) MORLEDGE he was born before they married, and baptised after they wed. Not impossible. He was 5' 9" tall, had brown hair, grey eyes, with a fair complexion. William is described as a confectioner which meant that as well as bread he made biscuits, cakes, etc.. A confectioner in more recent times is associated with the selling of sweets.

In 1841 William and Martha Morledge were living at the same address as their daughter Ellen (now Mrs Henry Smith) in Liversage Street, Litchchurch, Derby. He is described as a baker aged 55, so born about 1786, his 1844 burial record has him aged 64, so born about 1780. The new GRO death index records him as being 84 so needs challenging. The 1841 census had ages rounded down to the nearest 5 years. If this William was born circa 1786 then he may have been the son of William and Ann (Stanley) Morledge who married at Breadsall in 1885, and had their first child Mary baptised there 4 Jun 1786.

The parentage of the older William has thus far eluded efforts to find his birth or baptism records. William 1759 - 1811 may well have been the son of Sarah MORLEDGE 1724 - 1760 who died a spinster. Sarah's brother Matthew MORLEDGE and his wife Patience nee MERRY, of Breadsall, may have raised him as their son.

William 1759 - 1811 named two of his children Matthew and Patience, perhaps for his adopting parents ?

Matthew MORLEDGE of Breadsall, a baker, married Patience MERRY at Ticknall, Derbyshire, 24 Jul 1751. At Breadsall they had Catherine 1752 - 1763, Elizabeth 1753 - ?, Mary 1756 - 1760, Patience 1759 - 1829, Mary 1762 - 1812, Joseph 1768 - 1770, John 1771 - 1771, Matthew 1776 - 1840. It's odd that there is no William named for  Matthew senior's father, William Morldge 1681 - 1755.

My Morledge connection.

My Morledge families lived in Breadsall for several generations, likely going back to Thomas Marledge of that town in the early 1500s. Breadsall is a short distance from Derby, Derbyshire, England.

Although I have recorded my family tree I have also generated lists of others recorded in the UK. Not all the people of same surname in the lists are related to my Morledge families.

As many other researchers will have observed the surname MorlEdge and Morlidge can be interchanged, and the spelling within families may not have always been consistent. Robert Morledge born Breadsall 1830 moved to West Bromwich in the 1850s and being illiterate likely couldn't write his surname. The locals wrote it as it sounded to them, and with their dialect being different from his then some obscure variants Mauledge, Maulege, and others were recorded.

Most of the database entries were compiled from General Register Office indexes. Births and marriages 1837 - 2005, deaths 1837 - 2007 with a few post that date to 2013. The list has a column named "Other" and this suggests the year of another event for the person recorded. I use the word suggests as I have NOT researched the families in detail.

There are several entries for Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire where the Morledge spelling was most common, but the GRO has Morlidge. Several Macclesfield entries have the Morledge spelling, as do a few for those registered in Lancs, but in this region Morlidge was the common. 

Where you see a female listed, mainly as a death reference, with a surname in brackets, e.g. Elizabeth (White), this means that Elizabeth had that surname shown before she married a Morledge/Morlidge.

If anyone is interested in collaborating in the research to fill in the many missing names for parents and spouses then their work will be of benefit to all Morledge/Morlidge researchers.

Some county references are as per structure as it was before the mid 1970s re-organisation of them. The wider London area has been listed as Greater London rather than Middlesex, Surrey, north west Kent.

Corrections and additions, which are always welcome, will appear in the regular updates I will post to this site.

Searching the data: You may need to have Adobe Reader running on your system to be able to open and read pdf files which display. If you don't see the Search function the press Ctrl and F keys together to open a search dialogue box.

The 1841 census did not include the relationships between those in same house, place of birth was simply "born in county of residence at census time YES or NO". Ages were rounded down to the nearest 5 years for those aged over 16 Using 1851 census and other information, data shown here for 1841 has been "constructed" to add in data missing from the original. The 1939 census was actually just a record of who lived where, their birth dates and their occupations. Using other data the relationships shown have been "constructed" and where known places of birth included.

MORLEDGE/MORLIDGE surname spelling varies from census year to census year for same individuals, and with MORLEGE, MAULIDGE, MAULEDGE, MAULDRIDGE variants appearing too. Not all people can be found each census year they were alive in. Some 1851 census pages for Manchester and nearby towns were later water damaged and some of them are illegible.

Census data updated to include data for England, Wales and Scotland. 1901 and 1911 Scotland census data added. General Register entries added to. 

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