Chicken Family Tales

In the News Local newspapers can be a source of long forgotten stories about ancestors who are not usually thought of as "famous". One such is this story of young Thomas Chicken. Thomas was born in 1879 in County Durham, the son of a coal miner. By the age of 12 he was working as an assistant to a newsagent, selling newspapers at the railway station. On 14th January 1892 the big news of the day was the death of the Duke of Clarence, second in line to the British throne. Newspaper sales were brisk. Young Thomas sold a paper to a Mr Wood, a farmer. As soon as he handed over the paper he dashed away down the platform to make another sale. A little later Mr Wood approached him and said that he'd given him a shilling and expected eleven pence ha'penny change. Thomas rooted in his pockets, examined the money he had there and said that he hadn't received any shillings. Mr Wood then went to Thomas' mother and eventually brought a policeman to the door, claiming "...

  New Year's Day Birthday New year, new day, new baby. My GG-Grandfather, Stephen John Chicken, was born on 1 Jan 1812 and baptised 3 weeks later. Within 3 months of his birth the French army was led by Napoleon into an invasion of Russia and before Stephen John's first birthday had been defeated. Tchaikovsky celebrated that event in his 1812 overture. Back home, on the day of his birth Bishop Barrington of Durham ordered troops to break up a miners' strike in Chester-le-Street, less than 10 miles south of Hebburn where Stephen John was born. His father, Thomas, was an engine man in the Colliery so knew of the hardships which had led to the strike. Did he hear of the troops being sent in the midst of celebrating the safe delivery of his second son? Did he perhaps know some of the men involved? This was the Regency period in England, with King George III in the grip of severe mental illness and his son George acting as Regent.  As a result of the war with France Britain ende...

Website Goes Live  There's now a website for all my Chicken research, whether or not I can directly relate it to my own ancestry at present. The Guild of One-Name Studies enables this for me and I'm very grateful because my own website creating skills are very tiny indeed.  It's a work in progress and I hope it's going to grow over the coming months into something that will enable other Chicken researchers to contribute information and to find material that helps their searches. The first tree up there is my own family.  My father's direct ancestors were coal miners and stayed in the County Durham Coalfield in North East England. Branches moved outwards from there, including some of the Featonbys (related through Anne Chicken b 1808) who joined the gold rush to Victoria, Australia; some of the Ritcheys (related through Mary Chicken b 1840) who went to Canada in search of a better life; David Chicken b 1864 who moved South to join the Metropolitan Police; William b...