Written on August 29th 2001:-

I was doing some random family searching and came across your pages on the Baldry family. Very interesting! It is good to see all that information up on the web. One of my great-great-grandmothers was Isabella Baldry of Wilby Hall, Wilby, who married Charles Dallenger Chenery, aka Charles Chenery Dallenger in 1853. Some of the Ken Thurston material you have posted on that branch of the Baldry family looked very familiar.

Unfortunately, I have to say that there are a few errors in the listing of my ancestors. (These have now been incorporated - KJB). On the page <http://www.baldry.org/g73.html>, it reads in part "Isabella BALDRY (bap 10/10/1825 - 2/11/1914) = (28/8/1853) Charles Chenery DALLENGER (1810 - 1874)". The dates listed for Isabella are correct, and she was born on 3 October 1825. However, the marriage took place on 28 July 1853. By the time they were married, her husband had changed his name to Charles Dallenger Chenery. His dates are not 1810-1874, but 1819-1876.

I came across the 1810 error in 1992 when I visited Suffolk and was shown a copy of some notes by the Baldry sisters (daughters of Stanley Baldry) in Stradbroke. The confusion is caused by the fact that there was a half-brother, Charles Chinnery Dallenger Roper, who was born in 1810 (unfortunately I do not have his death date). He was the son of Charles Chenery Dallenger by Sarah Roper. The only information I have about him is contained in a Bastardy Bond and in his being mentioned in his father's will.

My great-great-grandfather was the son of Charles Dallenger by his wife Sarah Watling (the two Sarahs do tend to confuse things), and Charles Dallenger was in turn the son of Charles Chenery and Dinah Dallenger. Some of the Dallenger children seem to have adopted their grandfather's surname Chenery, and indeed, Charles Dallenger is buried beside his father in Wilby churchyard under the name of Charles Dallenger Chenery, and beside his wife Sarah Watling. My great-great-grandfather taught at Cheltenham College from 1841 to 1868 under the name of Chenery, and he got degrees from Trinity College Dublin, was married, and received a coat of arms in 1860 under that name too. You can find some of this information on my Chenery pages, now on this link. The motto on his coat of arms is "Labore Non Sorte", which probably describes how he felt he got to where he did. (See this link).

Isabella Baldry Chenery is buried in Wilby churchyard, beside her husband. There is a plaque in her memory in the church. You'll see a photo of her on my Chenery pages, as well as part of a portrait of her husband. This painting is presently in my possession. It is unfortunately unsigned, but it is very probable that it was done by one of Isabella's siblings, possibly Charlotte Baldry (the artistic gene seems to be strong in the Baldrys).

James Baldry married Catherine Roper. She was the daughter of Sarah Roper and an unknown father, and thus half-sister to Charles Chinnery Dallenger Roper, whom I mentioned above. She and James eloped to Upper Canada, and were married there on 16 December 1849. However, they returned to England, where James was with the police in Corringham, Essex. Catherine's mother Sarah Roper was with them when she died on 2 July 1853. James died in 1855, and Catherine returned to Wilby with her children, and taught school. It was said that James' aunt Emily Buxton, who had raised James Baldry and his siblings because of the early death of their mother Margaret Buxton in 1827, did not wish to receive Catherine Baldry, but that a cousin managed to find her a cottage in Wilby.

(Prof.) C. Abbott Conway, MA, PhD died on August 26th 2007