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GAFFEE!!

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 28 Sep 2012 7:22AM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gaffee
Hi Angi,

I have come across the Gaffee family whilst researching the Yeatmans for a friend. I'm a bit bemused by Francis / Frank Coles-Gaffee 1879-1918 (with or without the hyphen!) and wondered if you could shed any light on how the name developed and whether one or other of the names were aliases?

It's quite peripheral to my friend's line but it has got my curiosity going!

regards

Christina

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 28 Sep 2012 6:40PM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gaffee
Hi Christina,

Right where do I start!

The story has it that he was banished from Banbury and went to join up and on the way to sign up he saw a coal lorry and so as not to be traced he added "coal" to his name and it drops on and off throughout his life.

How true this is we will never know but that's the story my father in law had been told lol.

Hope this settles your curiosity, if there is anything else I can help with you know where I am.

Kind regards
Angi

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 29 Sep 2012 10:25AM GMT
Classification: Query
Hi Angi,

What a fantastic story. But "Banished from Banbury" makes this even more intriguing! Do you know why he was banished?

The Yeatman lore about Frank Coles/Gaffee is that he was "a bounder who took [Florence] for a ride in the snow and she died from the effect". However, her death at age 21 is recorded as being from diphtheria so perhaps this story may also be apocryphal rather than literal? I was also intrigued by the idea that he married again and out of the five children from the two marriages only one survived beyond the age of one. Do you know the cause of death for Frank as he was only 39 when he too died.

If I am being *very* nosy then huge apologies! It just sounds like there is a really intriguing story behind all of this.

regards

Christina

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 29 Sep 2012 1:56PM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gaffee
Hi Christina,

"Bounder", sounds about right. Gaffee folklore has it that he was banished for interfering with a young girl a story retold to us by Gaffee offspring in Banbury as well as my father in law (Frank's grandson). Of the five children from both marriages, one child from each marriage was all to survive.

Frank was medically discharged from the army due to syphilis in 1902. Our theory was that Florence was already pregnant and my father in law's dad isn't actually Frank's son as the other two son's died young. Frank's daughter from his second marriage, we also can't be sure is his. Eliza, Frank's second (actually 3rd marriage but that's another story) marriage already had a son by an unknown father and was not a nice person. But like I said we surmised.

Interesting that the Yeatman believed Florence died because of the snow, I'm wondering if that's how Frank got her away and how they ended up in Leamington Spa where they married and 3 weeks later Francis was born.

On the 1911 census Florence's brother Charles Edward was living with her and Frank in Northampton however they had dropped the Gaffee and were living as Mr & Mrs Coles.

Incidently, my father in law was born and grew up in Piddington the village where Frank died and is buried, however my father in law did not know he was buried there until we started researching. Also, my father in law went through school being called Tony Coles even though he was registered as Gaffee as everyone in the village knew the family as Coles-Gaffee.

If you can get on my tree there is a lot of info on there, media stuff etc, but if there is anything else you would like to know or can tell us about Frank & Florence's meeting and relationship please keep in contact.

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 8 Oct 2012 8:04AM GMT
Classification: Query
Hi Angi,

Thank you ever so much for this. It all begins to make sense now about the children dying so young etc. I guess the first marriage was in Dublin as this shows http://churchrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/details....

It certainly is a small world, isn't it? Amazing how things come full circle even centuries later.

This has been a really fascinating episode but must have been pretty horrifying for the women involved. He must have been one charmer.

regards

Christina

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 6 Sep 2014 9:39PM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gaffee
Hi Angela,
I am a descendant of Ada Elizabeth Gaffee (b. 1870 in Banbury) to John Henry Gaffee and Jane Robinson. I am trying to trace the Gaffee line back to find J.H.'s parents etc but am having trouble finding them in the census records. Ada is my g.g.grandmother.
Any help much appreciated.
Lucy

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 18 Sep 2014 4:49AM GMT
Classification: Query
Hi Lucy,

Is your John Henry also known as Henry John, born Bethnal Green, 29 Sep 1844, baptised 22 Dec 1844 at St Matthew Bethnal Green. Henry J married Jane Robinson in Banbury in 1865.

If this looks likely his parents were George Gaffee 1816-1892 (died Banbury) and mother Elizabeth Coney.

Christina

Re: GAFFEE!!

Posted: 18 Sep 2014 9:03PM GMT
Classification: Query
Hi, yes that's definitely him, thank you! I'm still struggling to find him or his parents in the early census' though!
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