Hidden Family Groups

Nearly all Hiddens in the UK or of UK descent can be traced back to one of a relatively small number of family groups. There are two major divisions in the distribution of the Hidden surname, one in south east England and one in Lancashire. Despite the high influx of people from all over the British Isles into Lancashire at the time of the Industrial Revolution, nearly all the Hiddens in Lancashire whose origins can be traced appear to have come from that county originally. There are particular difficulties in tracing Hiddens in Lancashire due to confusion with similar sounding names like Iddon, Edden, Eden, etc. Also there was opportunity for the movement of families afforded by the navigable rivers and canals and subsequently by the railways and a high density of population. There are a few Lancashire families which have retained the Hidden surname for two or more generations, but there are many more instances where the name has been recorded as Hidden during the lifetime of one individual, or perhaps only for one event in his lifetime. These scattered references have been collected together in a group called Lancs Strays. Of the main Lancashire family groups the Wigan and Liverpool families have kept fairly consistently to the Hidden spelling, but in the case of the Eccles group this spelling appears only fitfully and the most frequent spelling is Eden or Edden.
Under each family group heading there are one or more charts in Adobe pdf format. This requires the viewer to have Adobe Reader installed on his computer. It can be obtained as a free download from the Adobe web site. Unless otherwise stated the surname of individuals on the charts is Hidden. The abbreviation RGD on the charts is used to stand for Registration District.
There is also a pedigree style text which gives family relationships and the sources from which the information was obtained.
In the post 1837 period much of the information on births marriages and deaths has been obtained from the indexes of the Registrar General. The indexes give only a minimum amount of information about the event, and therefore in constructing the pedigrees assumptions have often been made. These assumptions could turn out to be wrong and can only be checked by obtaining the full details entered on the certificate. Most individuals have been given a personal identifier (ID) comprising the initial letter of their given name and a 3 digit number (It is thought that this is a little more user friendly and easier to remember than just 4 or more digits). In indexes to the pedigrees the spelling of the surname has (usually) been standardised, but in transcripts of souces the original spelling is always used.

See the following sections for HIDDEN family pedigrees