Innholdsfortegnelse for June 2023 i Family Tree UK

Rachel Bellerby reports on the latest genealogy news. Got a story to share? Email editorial@family-tree.co.uk This third AGRA Conference, due to take place on 8 and 9 September, will explore the theme of navigating your family history, with topics from migration, through naval and military records, to finding your way round local and national archives and the records they hold. The event launches with an afterdinner speech by historian, author and broadcaster, Dr Sam Willis. One of Britain’s best-known historians, Dr Willis, a Fellow in maritime and naval history, has made TV series for the BBC and National Geographic and published more than fifteen books. The following day, keynote speaker Dr Helen Doe, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and vice chairman and trustee of the British Commission for…

After the legislated 92 years in the vault, the 1931 Census of Canada will be made available to the public this June. Collected during the Great Depression and at a time of significant immigration, the census provides a snapshot of the more than 10 million people living in Canada in 1931. Family historians will be able to browse the digitised census images by geographic districts and sub-districts on the Library and Archives Canada (LAC) website. Following the initial release, LAC will work collaboratively with Ancestry® and FamilySearch International to create an advanced searchable database for Canadians, and those with Canadian heritage who wish to look for their ancestors.  In this collaborative effort, LAC has digitised all 234,687 pages of the census and Ancestry will apply its handwriting recognition technology to…

Many records of births, marriages, and deaths (BMDs) can be accessed physically and digitally, in official repositories and archives, or via the websites of these organisations and others. There is often a fee to pay to search and view them, but there are many places that you can see them without charge. It’s important to be clear about the type of record you are going to be able to access via any given website or repository. Usually the choice is between indexes and the records themselves – but in some cases both are available in one place. You may be able to look at digital images of a page in an index volume or parish register, or transcribed versions of those – in which case you should seek out the…

The family history records do a grand job of telling us who, where, what, when… but what they can never tell us is why. Why did my 2x great-grandmother Emma leave her children behind when she set out to make a new life in Scotland with her second husband Jan de Neef? I can hazard a few guesses of course, but to discover what happened to my great-grandfather John and his siblings, we need to backtrack to London, 1869, and the death of their father John Anthony Riboldi, tidewaiter on the Thames. Now, we’re only two years off the 1871 Census, so that seems the most obvious place to start. I key in John Riboldi, no age, no birthplace, but name variant boxes firmly ticked. And hey, we’re in business.…

Simon Davies had long been interested in family history but it was when he was struck down by a serious case of genealogy during the Covid years that he realised that he needed to do something to ‘get the stories out of his head’ and shared out to his wider family, indeed the wider world. Simon’s background is digital product design, in particular social networking (his first company became part of Facebook way back in 2011). “Perhaps unsurprisingly,” explains Simon, “I could not resist applying my experience to the personal challenge of socialising my family history simply and effectively. “The result is WeAre.xyz, a product, but also a new approach and philosophy for expressing and preserving our family histories.” A few weeks ago I caught up with Simon Davies for…

The Local BMD Project exists to accomplish the goal of making the indexes to the local register office civil records of births, marriages and death available online. It’s a project that has been running for over two decades and covers several areas across England and Wales, which together provide access to the milestone figure of 50 million BMD index entries. Let’s look at how it began, and how you and your local family history society can help the project grow. An ‘accidental’ start In August 2000 the South Cheshire Family History Society (SCFHS) were approached by the Crewe Registrar and asked to place indexes to the local register office marriages online. These were duly added to the SCFHS website. At a similar time the Registrar from Chester had asked the…

YOUR FAMILY PHOTOS Natasha Houseman writes: I wondered whether Jayne Shrimpton might help in my quest to uncover the Booth family as I recently discovered this wonderful photo (see right) which may contain Samuel’s son Thomas, my 2x great-grandfather, and other family members. The young man seated on the right is my great-grandfather, Arthur Booth (b. 1900), son of Thomas and grandson of Samuel. The back of the photo is unfortunately blank but I’d love to know more about it. I have a second, very dark photo (see below), on which, as a child, I wrote “Thomas Booth?” Thomas being Samuel’s son and Arthur’s father. My Mum and I think that the man standing second from the right in the group photo could be the same person. Thomas was born…

When did you last hear someone whistle? The postman, milkman, paper boy? I ask because during an afternoon bingeing on British 1940s black & white films recently, I couldn’t work out what was different. Apart from the over acting, the excruciatingly posh accents, and the cheery subservience of the peasants, that is. Eventually, I realised all the men whistled while they worked. And now almost nobody does. Thinking about it, almost no women ever did. Naturally, being a keen delver into social history, I wondered why. Despite failed attempts to learn as an urchin who thought herself as good as any boy at climbing trees or building dens, I never could produce more than a soggy phffft. I’m trying now and the cat beside me on the desk is scowling…

Dr Harrison has been involved in genealogy for over four decades. She is an academic historian with wideranging interests, primarily in relation to European migration to what became the state of Queensland, Australia. Her work has been acknowledged with the Fellowships of the Federation of Australian Historical Societies and the Royal Historical Society of Queensland. Her study of Irish migration to the state has resulted in an extensive body of published work in the form of books, chapters in edited works and articles in academic journals. In addition, since the foundation of the quarterly magazine Irish Roots in 1992, her regular column on the Australian connection had appeared in every single issue.…

While the complete saying ‘where there’s a will…’ has to do with having a strong desire to accomplish a goal, it may not be a stretch to apply it to a formal document that declares the wishes of a person regarding the disposal of their assets after death. The original phrase was written by George Herbert (1593-1633) and published in the 1640 book, after his death: Jacula Prudentum or Outlandish Proverbs, Sentences, etc. and later in a compendium of his poems in 1891. Among his almost 1,200 proverbs: ‘To him that will, ways are not wanting’.* Perhaps a similar purpose may be ascribed to the writing of a last will and testament, that is to ensure that the assets of a person may be used to benefit family members when…

England in the Age of Dickens 1812-70 by Jeremy Black Placing early 19thcentury London, ‘the stage of all’, at the heart of the story, esteemed historian Professor Jeremy Black takes us on a journey into the world of Charles Dickens, following in the author’s footsteps into the societies of the popular, middle and elite classes that were portrayed with such panache in his unforgettable novels. Each decade, from the 1810s to the 1860s, has its own chapter and there are also sections on the world of steam, 19th-century government, crime in England and – crucially for family historians – the condition of the people. Dickens’ life spanned the reigns of two kings and a queen, and Professor Black cleverly explains how not only did Dickens describe a culture through the…

Anyone with a tree on FindMyPast can invite friends and family to view their progress. Those invited to view a tree won’t need a subscription; they will just need to create a free account to access the shared tree. Tree owners can share their tree risk-free, as only the person who owns the tree can make any changes. There are two ways to share your family tree with friends and family when logged in to your FindMyPast account: 1. If you want to share with selected individuals, simply generate a unique link for each person as needed and share this to grant them access 2. Alternatively, you can generate a temporary link which expires after seven days Those with a link will be able to see all deceased people in…

With over half a million clips, the archive, which is housed within the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth, includes digital access to material that has been preserved in various formats throughout the decades and scripts from the period from 1932 onwards. Once you’ve registered as a user you can view or listen to the broadcasts at the Library’s Broadcast Archive Centre. There will be 160,000 broadcasts available initially, and this number will increase by 2026 to more than half a million. Find out more at https://www.library.wales/nationalbroadcast-archive…

By the time you are reading this article, we will have witnessed our own unique piece of history with the coronation of a new king, Charles III. Throughout history, the crowning of a new monarch has been followed by a change in name trends, to reflect the name of the newly-crowned king or queen. Will it be the same this time, I wonder? I’m not doubting that thousands will line the streets or sit entranced in front of their TVs, but will family historians of the future be able to make a credible guess at their ancestor’s year of birth, just from that person’s given name? Naming patterns Naming patterns don’t just stop with newly-crowned monarchs. Ann Kilbourne was recently researching an ancestor who was born in Somerset in late…

In 2021 I wrote an article for Family Tree pleading for the Baby Boomers of my generation to make sure their stories were passed on. Many of us regret not asking our own grandparents about their lives, times and experiences before it was too late, so let’s not leave our descendants in the same predicament. Fortunately for me, both my parents and grandparents, who saw active service in the World Wars, were proactive and left me well-organised and detailed accounts of their deeds – so I really appreciate how precious these personal accounts are. Easier said than done, though. How do you actually go about writing up your own life, and that of your ancestors? Well I think I may have something to help. While tidying up some old cupboards…

The official records of our ancestors’ marriages, along with those of their baptisms and burials, were first kept in England and Wales in 1538, as a result of Thomas Cromwell’s ‘Order for Keeping Parish Registers’. About these early registers As with the other entries in our earliest parish registers, records of marriages were sparse in detail. Before the mid- 18th century, it is relatively unusual to find more than just the names of the bride and groom (by default the groom’s name appears first) and the date of the marriage. Have a go! Look out for the questions on the Academy pages, suitable for beginners, intermediate and more advanced. For the answers, please visit www.family-tree. jun-2023-the-answers If one or other of the parties belonged to a different parish, this was…

An intriguing story about the discovery of three medals that had been hidden away in the writing slope of an antique Victorian desk featured in the November 2022 issue of Family Tree magazine. Ingeniously concealed in a secret compartment, they were auctioned in London last September. Sergeant Edward Webb’s Crimea medal, (with three clasps), Army long service medal and good conduct medal were found along with a swivel locket brooch containing his photograph and a lock of his hair. Also a watch fob, no doubt a parting gift, engraved with the words: ‘To Armor Sergt E. Webb from The Sergts XCI AH June 9th 1874’. But who was this veteran, and did he have any descendants? Tracing back through the censuses Since Sergeant Webb appeared to have left the Army…