On my ex-Outlaws family tree

[dotty.]

I have just found a most unusual set of marriages: The first 3 at St George in the East and the last one at Camberwell:

25 Dec 1884 Walter Samuel Meddemenn married Francis Spenn
03 Aug 1890 Bartholomew Benjamin Meddemenn married Amelia Spenn
16 Oct 1892 Thomas George Meddemenn married Clara Spenn
01 Jan 1901 Ernest Meddemenn M Sophia Spenn

The 4 grooms were the sons of William Meddemenn and the 4 brides were the daughters of Fredrick Spenn.

Very very unusual!

[cazzz1975]

a deal was made by the two families??

I notice that 2 were married on christmas day and new years day as well

[wolf63]

Did they live in one of those little villages where everyone is closely related? ;-)

I can see two brothers marrying two sisters - but, as you say, unusual.

[craft1948]

Were they Jewish..........................

[dotty.]

There's something going on there, the fathers were tradesmen and not wealthy at all, so no dowry to kick off about, but when Francis married Walter in 1884, the youngest daughter, Sophia, was just 12 , so she must have grown up close to the Meddermenn clan!

[craft1948]

I've got 2 sets of brothers marrying 2 sets of sisters in my tree, they came from small villages.

[dotty.]

They were German, they lived in the Victorian tenements in the east end, proper Eastenders really, married people from the same street!

[Barmaid]

Now you've said they are german that blows my theory out the water. I have 3 sisters marrying 3 brothera, but they were huguenots and the ALL intermarried. (And of the 3 sisters, 2 further sisters married the same man - one after the other!) There were 15 of them and none of them married outside the family circle - barring one who cleared off to Australia.

[dotty.]

That is still a possibility i suppose, though the Spenns were definately German the Meddemenns could have been Belgian maybe. Not really had chance to get into it much more yet

[craft1948]

http://www.meddemmen.co.uk/

[echokilo]

Let us know what you find Dotty - as it seems very odd - I have 2 brothers marrying 2 sisters twice in my immediate tree, all in the 1900s though and in the Black Country - 4 and 4 is odd ... must've been something else to it surely!!