1841 census:

Two David Harrys in Llangendeirne. One is a 75 year old ag lab and his likely wife is the same age. The other one is 55 with a 35 year old wife and is a shoemaker.

Only one David Harris listed in Llangendeirne and he is listed as 15, but I suppose he could be 19. Occ mason.

So that's not helped at all!

It seems entirely plausible that people could have changed their surname from Harry to Harris around that time anyway. Harris means "of Harry" and would have started out as the patronymic surname of someone whose father was called Harry, like so many Welsh surnames. If you look at families with the surname William on the 1841 census and follow them through onto the 1851 census a lot of them have become Williams, so I can well imagine the same thing could happen with Harry / Harris. (Also it would be easy to scrawl the "is" at the end of Harris so it could look like a "y")

There are even more 'Harries' than 'Harry' and 'Harris' in Llangendeirne in 1841, but none of them were farmers, as far as I could see.

Well, I had a chat with the very nice Welsh lady today and she confirmed that when she did the search for me it was a) with a five year leeway, b) covered all possible spellings (Harry, Harris and Harries) and only came up with the two aforementioned Anns, both of which had fathers named David who were Farmers, and both of which were born in Llangyndeirn.

She offered to have another poke around this afternoon in case she had missed something, but as there is no email from her tonight then presumably that is that.

It rather looks as if I have come to a dead end with this one, because even if I sent for both certs I would still not have a clue which was the right one.

Irritating in the extreme.;( thank you Kite and Merry for helping

Did you say this was part of a Christmas present? I would say keep a record of what the lady told you and move on to another part of the tree. It could be that something will crop up at a later date to help this part, but I doubt that will happen 'any day now', so tell yourself you have done well to get this far! lol

Have we finished with John as well?

Thanks Merry - I think that you are right, and I will include the email in the write up for son in law. It was originally going to be Christmas, but now it is put back for his birthday in May..........I need more time!!!

As to John, well I will keep having a look at him from time to time but finding the right John Jones in Liverpool is like the proverbial needle in a haystack;(

hi Girls i have read this thread and you have my deepest admiration trying to find a Jones in Wales, i have spent most of my researching looking for a David jones with no birth date to go by when 1911 came on line i did manage to find him so i do understand your frustration . but please dont hate wales we really are lovely people xxxxhowie lol

XXXXXXXXXXXX to Howie!!!!