This couple are Louise's Great Great Great Great Grandparents. They were both born in the first decade of the 19th century in Hertfordshire. They were married on 14th June 1828 at St. Peter's Church, St. Alban's. Soon after the marriage, they must have moved to North Mymms where George was the shepherd from the early 1830s to the North Mymms Place estate. They had nine children over the next 22 years, born in the area of North Mymms. Louise's direct ancestor, David, was the first in 1829. The only other boy to survive beyond early childhood was George, in 1839.

For the next couple of decades, the only records we have found of the family are the baptisms of their children in North Mymms church, and the burial of two infant sons at Colney Heath parish church in 1845 and 6.

On census night, 31st March 1851, the family were living at 'Shepherd's House'. David had left home by now. George senior and his son George are listed as shepherd and shepherd's boy respectively. Strangely, the box for being 'blind, deaf and dumb' has been ticked in George senior's case. We can't believe he was blind if he was a shepherd, so possibly suffered from deafness. We know that he could talk - his words are recorded later in this story. The other three wage earners in the family are the daughters Rebecca (age 20), Eliza (age 18) and Elizabeth (15) who were all hatmakers. Many women in the Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire area earned money by straw plaiting. The Scales' daughters were fairly unusual in North Mymms at this time in taking that plait and turning it into hats. They probably worked from home.

During the mid-19th century, there were several Carlist uprisings against the Spanish throne. Miguel Yzquierdo took part in one of these unsuccessful uprisings, and then fled northwards out of Spain. By early June 1853 he had arrived in southern England and he continued northwards through the home counties. By 2nd August he had become separated from his companions, his clothes were worn out and he had no money. That night, he stole a pair of canvas boots from Moffats, the home of a farmer in North Mymms. The following night he stole some bread and cheese from Brookmans, another home in the area.

On the morning of 4th August, the two George Scales were working in some fields around Courser's Farm, which was only a short distance across a stream and small wood from their home. The boy George had been sent out with a gun to shoot at small birds, to protect his employer's plantations. The estate they worked on was owned by Fulke Greville Esq. M.P. At about 10.30 that morning, Mr. Greville's keeper, William Webb, saw Yzquierdo in a barley field and assumed he was poaching. The Spaniard ran away, but Webb set his dog on him and caught him. George Scales senior came to his aid. They assumed that the blood on his stick was from the birds he had poached. Webb and George Scales took him to Hatfield police station.

Of course, all the noise had attracted others who were working nearby. George Dickins, Benjamin Baldwin, James Hardy and James Allen were all working in the vicinity. About ten minutes after the prisoner and his escort had left for Hatfield, James Hardy started to search the field and found a body, that of the boy, George Scales. He was quite dead, but still warm, with "such a quantity of blood about his cheeks and mouth" that at first Mr. Hardy did not recognise him. It is hard to imagine how George Scales senior must have felt when he returned from Hatfield with the policeman, Inspector Abraham English, to discover that they had not caught a poacher, but the murderer of his own son.

From the evidence that came out at Yzquierdo's trial, it seems that George Scales, the younger, was bird scaring in the barley field. Yzquierdo started to cross the field and George challenged him, pointing the gun at him, saying there wasn't a footpath across the field. The two struggled, Yzquierdo took the gun and beat George about the head and arms with the butt. George died from a fracture of the skull. The Spaniard then took George's braces off and wrapped them round his waist and was in the process of removing his shoes when disturbed by Webb, the gamekeeper.

At the trial, which took place nearly a year later, two of George's family gave evidence. When the father, George Scales was examined, he said (according to the Hertford Mercury): 'In August last year I was shepherd to Mr. Greville, at North Mimms. On the morning of 4th August, I saw my son George Scales: it was about 8 o'clock, he was getting some shot. He was employed to scare birds on Mr. Greville's farm; he carried a gun with him every day. In the course of the morning I went into the barley field to a man named Webb. That was about half-past 10. When I got to the barley field, Webb was kneeling on the prisoner. We took the prisoner to the station. When I saw the prisoner, I noticed some blood on his thumb and on his finger-nails. I saw that he was a foreigner, and I asked him how long he had been over in this country: and he said "seven weeks". On returning from the police station I went to the farm; and I then saw the dead body of my son in a cart, which was backed in the cart shed.' [A handkerchief saturated with blood, a pair of braces, and a gun, were identified by witness as those of his son.]

George Scales' daughter, Elizabeth, also gave evidence. This is what she said: 'In August last I was living at home with my father. The deceased was my brother. The braces produced were my brother's. I know them by a piece of blue upon them. He had no other braces. The percussion cap box produced was my brother's. The handkerchief also was his. I tied it on him on the Sunday.'

Yzquierdo was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. However, there was such a public outcry that his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. Even at his trial, the jury had asked if there were any mitigating circumstances, if George had provoked Yzquierdo in any way. It was only after the judge said there were none that they found him guilty.

According to information sent to me by a relative, four years before their son's murder, George and Rebecca Scales had become Mormons. I had heard before that the Mormons were active in the UK in the 1840s and 50s. In fact, I seem to remember reading that at one point, there were more Mormons in the UK than in the US. However, I had always thought that this was mainly in the industrial areas of the north of England, not in such a rural area as North Mymms.

During the 1850s, the Mormon church encouraged their followers to emigrate to their new homeland in Utah (which had been established in 1847). In 1856, George and Rebecca became part of this exodus with their three youngest children, Elizabeth aged 20, Sarah aged 14 and six year old Sophia. On 14th February they boarded the ship Caravan at Liverpool with about 457 other Mormons. Because of storms in the area, they did not start the voyage until the 18th, and they arrived in New York on 27th March, a journey of about six weeks. During the voyage, three babies were born, a three year old child died, as did a sailor when he fell head first from the foreyard during a storm.

It seems that some of the Mormons who travelled received financial assistance. These ones were able to travel straight onwards to Utah. Others, however, and I haven't yet established if this included our family, had to pay their own way overland to Utah, so they settled in and around New York, got jobs and started saving. One way to travel further across the continent was to go by boat up the Hudson River to Albany, then either overland or using the canal system to a port on the Great Lakes and right into the heart of the continent by boat. This was much easier than going by wagon overland. It seems that George and Rebecca started to make this journey, but stopped in Catskill, which is on the Hudson River, just over one hundred miles north of New York city. They were settled there by the time of the 1860 US census, and they stayed there for the last 20-25 years of their lives. George was shown as a farmer on the 1860 US census, and a farm labourer in 1870 (and incidentally, illiterate). He took US citizenship in 1880. He died in 1884 and Rebecca in 1880. They had been married for 52 years. Of their children in the United States, Elizabeth married Joseph Archer, and Sarah married William Martin. Young Sophia died when she was just 15. Among their descendants living in the Catskill area, it came as a complete surprise to find that the family had once been associated with the Mormon church.

When they emigrated, George and Rebecca left one grown up son and two grown up daughters in the UK. We do not know what became of Rebecca, who was born in 1831 (the last reference we have to her is in the 1851 census). Eliza had married William Hampton in 1855. They had several children, then she died in 1867 at Potter's Bar. She also must have become a Mormon because in 1870 her husband sailed for the USA with their three children, Eliza, Emily and Elizabeth and he settled in Utah. Unfortunately, he died only 18 months later in Salt Lake City - it must have been very hard for the children, the oldest of whom was only 16. (Two more of William and Eliza's children seem to have emigrated with the Mormons, Rebecca and Sarah, but they each went on a different voyage from their father, but when they were still very young children.)

And that leaves David, Louise's Great Great Great Grandfather. He was the oldest child, born in 1829. He was not with the family at the time of the 1851 census, and there is no reference to him at the time of George's murder. We do not know if he became a Mormon, but in 1858 he got married in North Mymms Church of England parish church to a local girl, Sarah Longstaff. Their oldest child, George William, was born in 1861 in Friern Barnett. Friern Barnett is now part of greater London, but at this time would have been a small village. On the 1861 census, David is listed as an agricultural labourer. We have found the family in the 1881 census, living closer to central London, in Tottenham. According to this census, several of their children were born in Wood Green, so they must have lived there for a while. By this time David and Sarah had been married for 22 years and they had five of their children living with them. Their son, George William got married later in 1881. His oldest child was Edward (Ted), born in 1882, and his story is told elsewhere in this history - along with many photographs.

Acknowledgements and Sources:

I would like to thank my distant cousin, Barbara Roe Simpkins, who sent me much of the information about the family in the United States.

GRO indexes
Parish registers: St. Peter's, St. Albans; parish churches of North Mymms and Colney Heath.
1851 census for North Mymms HO 107 1712 folio 76
Hertford Mercury
Brookmans.com website - see links
Mormon Immigration Index, published by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Utah
1861 census for Friern Barnet
1881 census for Tottenham RG11 1386 folio 91 page 47