James Bird Kitchen

The date of marriage for James Kitchen and Sarah Howell, 9 October, 1842, is taken from Warner & Beers 1883 History of Brant. It appears in the biography of James Bird Kitchen on page 666 of the history. The biography does not state the location of the marriage.

Which brings us to an interesting anomaly.

Dumfries Township was in the Gore District. There is in fact a Gore District Marriage Register which the Archives of Ontario identifies as being recorded on microfilm MS248 reel 1. This is said to begin in 1842 and there are in fact one or two marriages shown recorded as being in 1842, though, with these odd exceptions, the registrations begin in 1843. It is believe that an earlier Gore register existed, but is now long lost.

The marriage for James and Sarah, however, was probably never entered in a Gore register. It almost certainly appears in the Talbot District marriage register which covers what mostly became Norfolk County.

What we find in the Talbot District marriage register appears as follows:

MS248 reel 4, Vol. 22, page 28
Talbot District Marriage Register

Extracted from a list of marriages solemnized by William Smith, a minister of the Baptist Church in Dumfries (1842-43)

James Kitchen and Sally Howell, both of Dumfries, on October 30th, 1842, by banns. Witnesses Edward Kitchen and Isaac Howell.

The above marriage is one of a list of several submitted to the Talbot District registrar by Rev. Smith. All couples listed, with the exception of James and 'Sally', are resident in townships of the Talbot District. The above referenced Talbot page identifies Rev. William Smith as being of Dumfries. At a guess, Rev. Smith was a circuit rider and these marriages represented his Talbot District list. Just how James and Sally, or Sarah, were listed here is something we can only guess at. It does seem reasonable, however, that the above marriage does indeed represent the marriage of James and Sarah, if for no other reason that when James' brother Alfred was married to Rachel Howell two years later the witnesses were, again, Edward Kitchen and Isaac Howell, almost certainly the fathers of the contracting couples.