I'm searching a mystery man... I have one detailed record, but can find nothing else!
On 14 December 1905, at St Giles, London, Eva Mary Lloyd (a relation about whom I know quite a lot) married Isidor Lasker, a 38-year-old (hence born c. 1867) bachelor diamond merchant residing at the Bedford Hotel, Southampton Row, Bloomsbury, London. His father was Aaron Lasker, a general merchant, deceased at the time of the marriage. Apart from the bride’s mother, the other witness was one unidentified Florence Chambers. Eva remarried on 2 July 1918, by which time she was a widow. I can’t find her in the 1911 UK Census, either under Lloyd or Lasker, so I can only guess she was abroad, perhaps with Isidor, or perhaps already widowed. I don’t believe they had any children. Searching GRO indices for 1905-1918 finds no Lasker/Lloyd births, and no male Lasker deaths (there’s also no sign of an Aaron Lasker death going back to 1865).
I’ve scoured Ancestry and other websites - including www.jewishgen.org - for “Isidor/Isadore/Jsidore Lasker/Lascar/Laskier/Lisker” etc., and found a few records from around that time, but 99% seem to involve the same 3-4 Jewish people in the US (with origins in Russia or Germany – one possibly South Africa; some travelling via the UK), with most of these showing US marriages, naturalization, residence, children, deaths and so on. Although it’s theoretically possible our Isidor left his US wife, came to the UK, pretended to be a bachelor, married Eva, went to New York again and died… it doesn’t seem likely. It's also theoretically possible he left Eva and she simply claimed he was dead when remarrying... but again, that seems rather far-fetched.
So if anyone has any leads on an Isidor Lasker 1867-1910 (+/-10 years), or even an Aaron Lasker 1840-1895 (+/- 10 years), who might fit the descriptions above, I'd love to hear from you!
Ben Jones
