My system of Tentative Identifications is fine when there are two or three individuals involved, but in the case of John Shorter there are five! So rather than create a complicated network of links, I’ve listed below a selection of the relevant records.
1792: John son of George and Elizabeth Shorter baptised in Bromley, Kent
1795: Timothy son of George and Elizabeth Shorter baptised in Bromley, Kent
1797: James son of George and Elizabeth Shorter baptised in Bromley, Kent
1810: John Shorter and Anne Wakeling married in Chislehurst, Kent
1813: John George son of John, Working Gardener, and Ann Shorter baptised in St Mary Cray, Kent.
1815: James son of John, Labourer, and Ann Shorter baptised in St Mary Cray, Kent.
1817-1825: Children of John, Gardener/Labourer, and Ann Shorter baptised in Foots Cray, Kent.
1817: George Shorter of Bromley writes a will leaving bequests to grandsons George, Timothy and James, sons of George.
1818: A John Shorter witnesses the marriage of Timothy Shorter to Eleanor Quin in Camberwell, Surrey. (The signature looks similar to the one in the register entry of John and Ann’s marriage, but the J and S are formed differently.)
1841: John Shorter, Ag Lab born Kent c. 1786, at Black Horse, Foots Cray, Kent.
Ann Shorter living alone in Woolwich, Kent.
1844: Ann Shorter, wife of John Shorter, Gardener, dies in Woolwich, Kent
1851: John Shorter, Hostler born Eltham, Kent c. 1785, widower, at Lee Green, Eltham, Kent. (The Greenwich Heritage Centre have advised me that there is no entry for a John Shorter baptised in the mid-1780s in their Eltham parish records index.)
1861: (I’ve been unable to find any likely-looking record. I wonder if some of the pages of the Eltham census are missing in the collection I’m looking at – the schedule numbers for district 1 start at 37.)
1863: John Shorter, charged to parish of Mottingham, admitted to Lewisham Union Workhouse
1864: John Shorter, General Labourer born c. 1789, dies in Lewisham Union Workhouse