My Family Tree

In the 1871 Census Edward Nott is entered as the head of a household and unmarried. The others in the household are Elizabeth Nott (widow), designated as his mother-in-law, Frances B. Nott and Walter A. Nott as his brothers-in-law and Emma B. Nott as his sister-in-law.

Edward Nott had been living at the same address in the 1861 Census when he was a 14-year-old confectioners apprentice to his father, John Nott. John Nott was already a widower at that census, married for the second time, to Elizabeth Smart. Their first child, Frances Burgess Nott, was already born. Thus the interpretation of the 1871 Census would seem to be that Edward was a child from John's first marriage to Elizabeth Lithaby (confirmed by 1851 Census), and that Edward's mother-in-law, Elizabeth Nott, was in fact, his stepmother. Frances B. Nott and Walter A. Nott would be his stepbrothers and Emma B. Nott his stepsister. His father John Nott had died before the 1871 Census, explaining why Elizabeth was herself now a widow.