The LARKHAM's of Salisbury
Family History

Also includes LARCOMBE, LARKAM, LARCUM, LARKOM - and other variations!

 
{short description of image} Hello, and welcome to my Family History web site. This site focuses on the LARKHAM's currently living in Salisbury, England, and their forebears. You will find links to several hundred individuals that make up my ancestors, who mainly came from the counties of Dorset and Somerset. Please take a look round, and if you find anything of interest, let me know. You will find a contact e-mail address at the foot of this page.

Thats a photo of me opposite, taken just a couple of years ago now. Unfortunately the grey hair is starting to catch up - but vanity prevents me updating the photo.
Andrew LARKHAM {short description of image}  Quick-Link to my Family Tree
So, whats all this LARKHAM and LARCOMBE (and LARKAM!) business? Simple, my Great Grandfather ELI was illiterate - like so many of his generation. He was born on the 20th November 1859 in Axminster, Devon. This information is contained on the fly leave of (Eli's Father) Esau LARCOMBE's bible, and confirmed in the 1861 census for Axminster. There were several families with the Surname LARCOMBE in the area at that time, so the surname would have been well known, and the spelling possibly based on the villages of YARCOMBE and others ending COMBE. Interestingly, although Eli's birth is recorded in the 1861 census, there is no trace of his birth having been registered at the Family Records Centre. His older brother John is shown in the same census, and his birth was registered. Strange . . . . . . just another family oddity, that will probably never be resolved.

ELI moved to Salisbury sometime before the 1881 census, and he is shown as one of 5 people boarding at 8 Park Terrace, Salisbury. His occupation was given as Railway Labourer, and his surname was spelt LARKHAM. At that time there were already a number of LARKAMs in Salisbury, with one Henry LARKAM and his son Henry owning Hosier shops within the city. It is therefore surprising that the census taker spelt his surname LARKHAM and not the more familiar way for Salisbury - LARKAM. However, by the 1891 census Eli is shown as LARKAM. By this time he was 31 - and married - with at least 3 spellings of his surname. His marriage certificate shows him as Eli LARKAM, but as neither he nor Harriet were literate, they both signed the marriage certificate with an 'x'.

But the story doesn't end there. Eli had 9 children, and as far as I know all were registered with the surname LARKAM. My Grandfather's birth certificate shows him as Samuel LARKAM - his marriage certificate as Samuel LARKHAM and his death certificate as Samuel Cecil LARKHAM!

. . . . and the mystery continues. Eli's first wife Harriet died in 1924, and there is a difference of opinion as to whether he married a second time. The photo opposite shows Eli with Nellie, and although there is no record of their marriage in the Family Record Centre, a Mrs N Larkam is shown at living in the house after he died. . . . . . .curious !

Eli and Nellie

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