SEARCHING FOR KATHLEEN

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My father George William Lindley was born 29th December 1902 and died on 5th September
1986 had several brothers and sisters. I had found out about all of them except Kathleen and
no one seemed to know much about her.

I decided to start from basics, first I checked the Conisbrough Parish Records held at Doncaster Archives. I discovered that Kathleen was born on the 8th July 1899 at Westfield Terrace, Conisbrough. I next asked my mother Johannah Lindley, who is 89 if she could remember anything about Kathleen, I gleaned the following information.

Kathleen had worked in the Post Office at Conisbrough in the 1920's she then applied for a job to work away from Conisbrough. My mother recalled her marrying someone called "Headley "who lived in Wolsingham, Durham. My mother also said that Kathleen had married before herself, which was in 1924.

Armed with this information I contacted the Durham F.H.S. to see if they had anyone researching the name, no such luck; but, they had a Mr. Davey who was willing to check the Wolsingham Parish Records for me. I sent Mr. Davey

 what information I had and he duly checked the Parish Records, but drew a blank. In his reply he came up with the obvious; why not try the St. Catherine's House Indexes for the marriage of Kathleen?

I am a member of the Y.A.S (Yorkshire Archaeological Society- Family History section http://www.yorkshireroots.org.uk ) and so I made use of the facility to use a" Link Person" and asked for the Indexes at Leeds Library to be checked. This was done and it revealed that Kathleen had married an Eric Headley at Molton in North Yorkshire in 1923. I sent for the copy marriage certificate and from it I found Eric Headley's age and his occupation, his father's name and his occupation, they had both worked for the Post Office. One of the witnesses at the wedding was Doris Lindley, my father's sister.

I still had not found what the connection with Wolsingham was, I also did not know whether Kathleen was still alive or not, so I contacted my link person at Leeds and asked once again for
the Indexes to be checked, this time to see if an Eric and Kathleen had died. My father, his brothers and sisters had all lived into their eighties so I gave the link person an approximate date to start checking, although she could still be alive. Two weeks later I received information that Eric Headley from Weardale, Northumberland had died in 1976, but nothing of Kathleen. The

Indexes only went to 1980.

The link person also found the births of two children, Kathleen Mary born 1928 and Peter born
1932. With this extra information it made me more eager to find what had happened to
Kathleen.

I then wrote to the North Tyneside Registrar to ask if they had recorded a death of a Kathleen Headley between 1980 and present day. They replied a Kathleen Headley had died in 1986. I immediate sent for the copy Death Certificate and sure enough it was indeed "my Kathleen". I felt a little sad at this discovery as she was my father's last remaining sister and the last of his generation.

On checking the Death Certificate S discovered that Kathleen had died only days before my father in 1986 and that her daughter Kathleen Mary Wilson was the informant and of course, it gave her address.

I wrote to Kathleen Mary hoping for a favourable response and after three weeks I received a letter and to my joy she was delighted to have heard from me, she

told me more about her

Mother and that the Wolsingham connection was that her father and mother had a Sub-Post
Office there in the 1920's and 30's.

 Since our first letters we have corresponded quite often and she has sent me some photographs of her Mother and father and I have reciprocated with details of my family, of whom she new very little, one day we hope to meet

 My search for Kathleen is now at an end but it only goes to show that a little curiosity and a lot of patience has finally paid off

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