Elijah Trevethan (aka Elijah Trevethan Roberts; aka Elijah Trevallon Roberts)
The fifth child of Isabel (née Owen), Elijah Trevethan was born on 8 October 1868 [Newtown 1868, 4th qt] in Bethel Street, Llanidloes, which is where his mother was living at the time. His birth certificate states that his father was Ezekiel Osborne Trevethan, a lead miner, and his mother was ‘Isabel Roberts formerly Owens’. Elijah later adopted the name Elijah Trevethan Roberts but in all his World War I service records he was 'Elijah Trevallon Roberts'.
It would appear that Ezekiel Osborne Trevethan did not exist but there was a man called Ezekiel Holman Trevethan (pictured left) and it is interesting to compare his features with those of Elijah's son Edward James Roberts (right). (These are the only photos I have for comparison.) Though Ezekiel Trevethan was born in Perranzabuloe, Cornwall, in December 1840 [Truro 1841, 1st qt], there are reasonable grounds for suspecting he might have spent some time in Llanidloes. He was the son of Mathew Trevethan and Jane (née Holman) of Perranzabuloe. Trevethan was an unusual surname; in 1871 there were approximately two hundred people of that name in England, mainly in Cornwall and only sixteen in Wales. It would appear to be more than a coincidence that eight of those sixteen were members of a family living in Llanidloes. The head of this Llanidloes family was Thomas Trevethan, aged 47, who was also a lead miner and was also born in Perranzabuloe. In the nineteenth century being a miner could be an itinerant occupation and it is quite feasible that, between the 1861 and 1871 censuses which show Ezekiel living in Perranzabuloe, he could have spent time in Llanidloes and, whilst Ezekiel like his father was generally a tin miner, his father had also worked as a lead miner. By an even greater coincidence both Isabel and Ezekiel had a younger brother called Elijah so it would have been an appropriate name for their son.
After his marriage in Gloucestershire in 1876 Ezekiel Holman Trevethan was a Grocer (1881) and a dairyman (1891) in Gloucester before becoming a coal miner in Glamorgan (1901), where he died in 1916. (see photo) >