My 4th great grandfather John Smyth was a Captain's Clerk on the HMS Firm when he married Sarah Osment on 13 Jul 1764 at Stoke Damerel, Devon, England.
When he was buried at Bunhill Fields Burial Ground (London, England) on 23 Jan 1806, his age was given as 66 which suggests that he was born about 1740.
In the National Archives I have found a record that I suspect may belong to him:
Reference: ADM 73/347/31
Description: John Smyth. When admitted to Greenwich Hospital School: Not stated.
Parents' names: Jeremiah and Mary Smyth.
Applicant baptised 7 May 1741 in Oxwich, County Glamorgan. Date: 1728-1870Held by: The National Archives, Kew
Physical description: 6 document(s)
The same page states:
This record has not been digitised and cannot be downloaded. Request a quotation for a copy to be digitised or printed and sent to you.
I am holding off on asking for that quotation while I try to be more sure that it is the correct John Smyth but if it is then the above documents could be something of a "treasure trove" for me because I found a Greenwich Hospital School admission documents set described at SOG-UK-L Archives as being:
Later my 3x gt grandfather applied for 4 of his children to enter the Royal Hospital, Greenwich, as it was called by then. These application records were in ADM64 (1830s).
Both sets of records included a lot of information including in my 3 x gt grandfather's application a baptismal certificate for him as well as his parent's marriage certficate (remember this was 1808).
All records included details of the father's service up to the time of application including all ships they served on with beginning and end dates. In the case of the ones from the 1830s it also had the names of all other children in the family.
From memory they were in alphabetical order, folded likes wills and piled into boxes.
After serving on the HMS Firm I have been able to find records that John worked in three inter-related government offices (Sick and Hurt Office, Transport Office and Prisoners of War Department) from at least 1775 until his death in 1806 - see Finding records of Transport-office that John Smyth worked for in London prior to 1806? These all seem to be related to the Navy.
I think my next step is to get a quotation for the contents of ADM 73/347/31 to be digitised but I am wondering if I have missed taking any obvious steps to establish the identity of my ancestor with this John Smyth first?
I am very confident of my line to John Smyth who left an 1806 Will naming my 3rd great grandparents John Stacy and Sarah Osment Smyth.