WOOLER FAMILY HISTORY RESEARCH
John H Wooler
Began 1982
My interest in genealogy began by chance in 1982 when I was a Radio Officer at Culmhead Radio Station near Taunton. I remember being on a night shift and while sitting in the rest room during my break I noticed a pile of books left on the table by a colleague, being nosey and not having anything to read, I had a look at one of them. This turned out to be a book on Genealogy and I was intrigued by what I read and from then on I was hooked I spent the next 15 years researching the Wooler and associated names.
I went and found the owner of the books and plagued the poor chap with questions and during the next week more and more questions. Eventually he sent me to the library. He was of a grumpy disposition so I decided I had got all I could out of him and went my own way.
My only living relative on my father’s side was his twin brother, Uncle Fred, a retired sea captain, living in hull. He was now in his eighties, and I had met him just the once when I was a teenager. He and my father had never seen eye to eye and only met up once in fifty years. I thought he might be my best chance of first-hand information.
The letter I got back from Uncle Fred was most interesting and contained information and photographs of his parents and grandmother although there was little detail. He said his mother was Beatrice Stolber and his father was Harry Douglas Wooler who was killed in the First World War while serving in the Royal Navy.
CAPTAIN FRED WOOLER
I decided to get the actual service record if I could and got the address of navy records from the local library. I wrote off to them asking for more information. The reply I got was not very helpful as they said I could not have any information unless I was the next of kin. I thought about this for a while and them wrote back telling them that I was to all intent and purposes the next of kin and that I did not want them to divulge any state secrets only a few details on my grandfather’s service.
I am pleased to say this worked and they eventually sent me a copy of the service record for Harry Douglas Wooler. The details in the report gave me more information than I had hoped for. For the record I think it important to include the details of the report.
HARRY DOUGLAS WOOLER
Born 13th October 1887 on the Isle of Man
Official number B4346
Branch – Royal Naval Reserve
Rating – Leading Seaman
Date of entry – 30th July 1906
Height 5ft 4 ins
Chest 35 1/2 ins
Complexion dark
Eyes brown
Marks – Blue jacket on right arm, steamship on left (tattoos)
Called up for service in the Royal Navy on 16th October 1914
Served on – HMS BRILLIANT – HMS PEMBROKE – HMS PEKIN AND HM ORCADES.
Reason for termination of service – Killed when HM Orcades a minesweeper
(converted fishing boat) struck a mine on 14th April 1916.
Buried at Lambeth cemetery, Blackshaw Rd, Tooting London SW17
Plot H Row 3 Grave 317.
With this information and a portrait photograph that Uncle Fred had sent it was almost as if I knew my grandfather even though he died almost 30 years before I was born. His stature and colour of hair and eyes were almost the same as mine which I found uncanny. I still think how sad it was that so many young men died and never saw their children grow up.
I decided that the birth place ‘Isle of Man’ was the next place to research and wrote off immediately to the general Records Office in London for a copy of the birth certificate and they were most helpful but explained that the Isle of Man had there own records and kept them on the island.
My next letter was to the Isle of Man Records Office. From them I obtained the birth certificate for Harry Douglas Wooler he had indeed been born there at 9 Murray Road Douglas IOM His father being Sam Wooler and mother Annie Smith.
Enter ‘SAM’
I was not to know at the but it was to take me another twelve years before I could establish where he came from and prove his identity in my families history.
While searching for the ‘Wooler’ connection, which took months in some cases, I decided to research the other three grandparent names. This decision has governed the research that I have undertaken since 1982 and will continue to do so.
Some people stick to just their own surname and some take it further. I decided that four names were enough for one lifetime and I have extensively researched the BELL – WOOLER – FOXWELL – STOLBER names, which are my four grandparent’s names.
To continue with the search for ‘SAM’ – From the Mormon chapel in Plymouth I obtained a copy of the IGI for the Isle of Man. This had just one entry for Wooler – Sam Wooler to Annie Smith on the 24th June 1883. This was it, success at last. I wrote off again to the IOM and obtained the marriage certificate. The information on the certificate gave Sam Wooler a Printer ‘ full age’ of Princes St. Douglas father Samuel Wooler engineer to Annie Smith father Smith watchmaker of Athal St Douglas IOM.
The fact that there was no other ‘Woolers’ recorded anywhere on the Isle of Man, before or since did not register at once, it was only when I joined the Isle of Man family history society and began searching the records with the help of the other members that it became apparent that my ancestry was not going to be found on the island. I did uncover some information and further details. Sam and Annie had a son Harry Douglas in 1887 and the following year 1888 Annie Wooler died aged 27 and was buried in the grave plot with her adopted parents Catherine and William Fargher in the Old Braddon Cemetery IOM. I looked for more details on the Smith family but apart from the fact that Annie’s father was called John Smith I got nowhere. This was the end of the Isle of Man connection.
At this point the significance of the entry ‘full age’ on the marriage certificate became apparent. I knew, from the information that Uncle Fred had given me, that Harry Wooler lived in London around 1905 and was married to Beatrice Stolber on 31st January 1909 at St. John’s Church Newington London, but were did Sam go? More intriguing was where did he come from? The ‘full age’ meant that he was over 21 years of age when he got married and we know he was not born on the Isle of Man. If it has said 21 or 25 years of age I could have looked at the national records and obtained his birth certificate and parent’s names. What now? Where to start? He could have been 21 or 51 or anything in between and he could have come from anywhere in the British Isles.
I spent a long time considering my options. I could just give up and do something else or search all the records until I found him. Being one of the “stubborn” Woolers I decided I would not give up. I began at 1862 and soon realised the enormousness of the task I had undertaken. Each year was on four rolls of 38mm film and in alphabetical order. Wooler being at the end of each roll. Each roll having to be wound by hand onto a second spool and then wound back after use. I manage ten rolls in the first day before my arm and eyes gave up.
The records library was fifty miles from home and I could only stand to read the films for one day a month at most. I made slow progress. After almost ten years I had reached 1837 without finding a positive match for Sam Wooler. One major decision I made at the beginning was to write down all the names of a;;; the Woolers that I found during my research. I had the sense to realise that if I did find Sam I did not want to start searching the same records all over again for the next generation of Woolers.
During 1993 the Mormons allowed access to their computer records of the IGI. This gave immediate access to all the Woolers in England and Wales. I took full advantage and obtained fifty pages of Wooler names 1,500 in all. By this time I had acquired a computer with a hard disk and bought a copy of Brothers Keeper an excellent Genealogical programme for storing and recording family records. I entered every name and piece of information collected.
Now that I was using the computer for online research, I felt it would just be a matter of time before I found SAM. The computer threw up six possibilities and one from the IGI records tied up with one that I had from earlier records. I wrote off for several birth certificates, all indications pointed towards Bradford in Yorkshire. I decided to join the Bradford Family History Society, the members of which were most helpful.
I established a link with a Samuel Wooler of Bradford and began to build a family tree based on his family by searching the records for Bradford. This Samuel Wooler had an extensive family and I soon had several generations listed. I ignored the fact that he was not a printer because he could have been anything before becoming a printer, couldn’t he?
This is one of the facts about family research, like a detective working on clues, you can not afford to ignore relevant facts and I was soon proved wrong. One of the members of the Bradford Society, A really helpful lady called Barbara Swift. She had family connections and Wooler family ancestors and by chance spotted an entry in the Bradford census for a SAM WOOLER – occupation PRINTER with father SAMUEL WOOLER occupation ENGINEER!!
I had been following the wrong line and this was proof beyond doubt that I now had the right SAM I was over the moon, at last after twelve years the search was at an end. I will forever be grateful to Barbara for taking the trouble to send me the details. As a matter of interest this Sam Wooler was NOT entered in the records and I would probably never have scanned all the census records for Yorkshire and never found the right SAM.
Other facts and other Woolers
I understand that the original Woolers came from the North of England near the Scottish Borders and had, in their line of decent reached a stage where the last owner of all the lands and estates was an unmarried woman a Miss Wooler. There being no male heirs to inherit the properties. She married a gentleman of the FAIRFAX family who changed his name to WOOLER by deed poll and the line continued as Wooler. What happened to the lands after this is a mystery and these facts have yet to be established.
I discovered a THOMAS FAIRFAX WOOLER and five other FAIRFAX WOOLER in the north of England Sir THOMAS FAIRFAX 1612 01671 was the famous associate of OLIVER CROMWELL
In 1790 ELIZABETH WOOLER married EDMUND TEMPEST. The TEMPEST family originated at Tong near Bradford. In the 14th century JOHN-DE-TONG of Cowling Manor and the subsequent TEMPEST family were lords of the manor until 1933 when it was acquired by the Duke of Devonshire.
Margaret Wooler was a witness at the marriage of CHARLOTTE BRONTE. Charlotte went to Margaret Wooler’s school at Roe Head and in 1853 Charlotte stayed with her at Hornsea.
Update- this report was written in 1994 since that time I have researched and collected data on several associated names and have a database of some 8,000 Wooler/Foxwell/Bell/Stolber names.
At this stage I had established a database of 4,000 names and become a member of the Society of One Name Studies providing information to researchers interested in the Wooler name worldwide.
ANNIE BELL C1900
MARION WOOLER NEE’ FOXWELL AND EDNA FOXWELL C1928
THE WOOLER MOTORCYCLE BUILT BY JOHN WOOLER C1950 (not related to my family)
THE WOOLER FAMILY 