My one big genealogical brick wall is my paternal second great grandfather Alfred Ross Hampson. I know a lot about his life from 1876 on, see his WikiTree profile, but nothing before then. He was born about 1848 in London but his name doesn’t appear in any English census before 1881. There is one potential birth registration from 1848 with only the mother, Elizabeth Hampson, listed but she also disappears. On his marriage record his father is given as Alfred, deceased, who had been a butler, but there is no record of his existence either. All very frustrating!

Since all the records have drawn a blank, the only option seems to be looking for an autosomal DNA match. And that is where this journey begins.