Thread: Joseph Carr (Yorkshire) and Richard Carr (Kentucky)

I have two brick walls.

I can trace my paternal ancestry with confidence back to Joseph Carr (1803-1850), born in Barkston Ash, Yorkshire. From the Sherburn in Elmet parish register, his father was John Carr. His mother was Mary Holmes or Mary Hall (she may have used both surnames) and she was illegitimate. I can find a marriage in 1790 in nearby Bramham between John Carr, a servant of the parish of Sherburn, and Mary Holmes of the parish of Bramham. The only candidate I have found in the area for John Carr was someone born in Bramham in 1772 (father William). But William appears to have had a child who died in 1773 - name on the burial register is barely legible but looks like "Ino" - I wondered if that was Latin for John and therefore suggestive of the death of the John born in 1772. Even if the John born in 1772 was my ancestor, there is no evidence as to where his father William came from. I found no candidates in the immediate area but numerous in other parts of Yorkshire.

My other brick wall is with Richard Carr of Kentucky (b. ?, d. 1824). I know from my DNA match with one of his living descendants in the USA that Richard Carr was a close relative of my UK ancestors. Richard operated a ferry on the Kentucky River near Salvisa. His first wife may have been Elizabeth. Later, he was married to Mary Margaret Freeman (in 1799) and to Dorothy McDonald in 1808. Family oral tradition is that Richard was from Ireland.

Regards.