Innholdsfortegnelse for Oct-22 i Who Do You Think You Are?

When we wanted to put an old photograph on our cover during the early days of this magazine, it was usually black and white. Adding colour was possible, but very time-consuming. Now, with new developments in technology, it has become easy for anyone to revitalise family photographs at the press of a button. However, as you can see on page 17, there are different options out there that will give you different results. Why not have a go and send us some of your best images and we will try to publish a selection in the magazine. You can see all of the photos that Nick tested and the results he got on our website. We’ve also got a fascinating guide to 19th-century Irish records that should help to fill…

Writer Charlie Inglefield is working on a book about Far East prisoners of war (FEPOWs), which is due to be published in October 2023 to mark the 80th anniversary of the completion of the Burma-Thailand Railway. He is hoping to speak with families of former FEPOWs who may have written summaries and accounts that have not been published outside of family and friends. Inglefield said, “My grandfather was a FEPOW, so there is a personal connection. There are so few FEPOWs still with us, and that number is sadly diminishing every week.” If you’re interested in taking part, please email charlieinglefield@gmail.com.…

Family history website MyHeritage (myheritage.com) has introduced Photo Tagger, a feature that enables users of its free mobile app to tag multiple photographs of the same individual in one go. Instead of requiring users to view photographs and tag faces one by one, Photo Tagger uses facial-recognition technology to identify all the photos of one individual. In a blog post on its website the company claimed, “Photo Tagger does an excellent job of identifying faces as they change over time, such as from childhood to adulthood, and even spots changes in individual appearance, such as facial hair.” Users have to give consent to the feature tagging their photographs, and photo-tagging suggestions are deleted after three months for privacy reasons.…

Military records website Forces War Records (forces-war-records.co.uk) has added a new record set for the India General Service Medal Roll (1909). The roll lists those officers and men of the British and Indian armies who were awarded this campaign medal for service in military operations in, and around, India between 1908 and 1935. However, the medal was not awarded for service during the First World War. The medal was also awarded to officers and men of the Royal Air Force from 1919, with the Waziristan 1925 clasp awarded exclusively to the service.…

OFF THE RECORD Alan Crosby shares his views on family history Two or three centuries ago, arranged marriages were quite usual within Britain’s upper-middle and upper classes. Fathers would discuss and negotiate about the marriages of sons and daughters, and ‘interested parties’ (such as wealthy relatives or family connections further up the social ladder) would make their contribution, often demanding to be consulted from the beginning. Making a good marriage was crucial - linking one’s family with one of higher status would bring increased kudos, valuable connections, maybe a title, and very often financial benefit. The potential marriage partners would not necessarily have much say in the matter. They were in theory free to make their own decisions if over 21, but in practice, it was a brave or perhaps…

w ancestry.co.uk £ Free for registered users ANCESTRY w ancestry.co.uk £ Free for registered users Ancestry’s recently added colourisation feature is accessed through your online tree or via the mobile app - navigate to the ‘Media Gallery’ and tap an image. It’s powered by the dated Photomyne engine, which produced by far the least convincing results across the test. This included frequently introducing splotches of purple and red to clothes. Photos can at least be downloaded at full resolution and without any watermarks, and it occasionally produced the best results, but the major flaws mean that it’s best employed as a secondary option rather than your primary colourisation tool. OTHER OPTIONS None at time of writing EASE OF USE ●●●●○ QUALITY OF COLOURISATION ●●●○○ OVERALL SCORE ●●●○○…

READER STORY A reader shares their discoveries Family folklore can resonate through the generations, and Jennie Long, a genealogist from Stoke Newington in Hackney, North-East London, has a striking example. She vividly remembers being told an emotive story by her dad Eddie when she was growing up. “We used to cross Tower Bridge in the car to visit my gran, who lived in Bellingham, Lewisham, South-East London,” Jennie explains. “One day as we did so, Dad told me that one of his uncles drowned in the Thames and that his father had warned him to avoid the river. “The tale of the lost uncle was in the back of my mind when I began researching Dad’s tree in 2008. I traced the Long family through my paternal grandfather Harry, who…

James Ryans was one of the ancestors of Silent Witness star Liz Carr (pictured). In the absence of parish registers and census returns, I was able to use Griffith's Valuation and census search forms to identify James’ parents and siblings, and locate the family home. When James married his wife Margaret Gallagher in 1867 he was residing at Dernaroyand his father was Bernard Ryans. Dernaroy is a subdivision of the townland of Aghadavoyle in the civil parish of Killevy in County Armagh. A search of Griffith's Valuation found only one Bernard Ryans in Aghadavoyle, where he leased a house and four acres from John Foxall. The inhabitants of Aghadavoyle attended the Catholic parish of Dromintee. However, the parish baptismal registers only survive from 1853. This is too late for James’…

ARCHIVE VALUATION OFFICE a Block 2, Irish Life Centre, Abbey Street Lower, Dublin 1, D01 E9X0 † +353 1 817 1000 e info@valoff.ie w valoff.ie Here you will find Revision Books that you can use to trace the occupancy of a property found in Griffith’s Valuation forward to identify other relations who took over as tenants or occupiers. The office is only open by appointment. The books have not been digitised, but Nicola can provide images for a property for a fee - see tinyurl.com/timeline-vorb. BOOKS Arhives of the Valuation Office Frances McGee Four Courts Press, 2018 Find out about the creation of Griffith's Valuation, and the records that survive. Tracing Your Irish Ancestors, 5th Edition John Grenham Gill Books, 2019 Grenham explains the range of material available if you…

ANCESTRY w ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/1590 Ancestry has the collection ‘England & Wales, Criminal Registers, 1791-1892’. Other material includes police records from West Yorkshire with promotions, disciplinary actions and injuries. BATH ANCESTORS w bathancestors.org.uk Local record offices may hold relevant material. For example, this database from Bath Record Office has quarter-session minutes, prisoner photo books and house-of-correction records. DIGITAL PANOPTICON w digitalpanopticon.org This fantastic free resource offers millions of records of London prisoners (1780-1925). FINDMYPAST w bit.ly/fmp-ewcpp The collection ‘England & Wales, Crime, Prisons & Punishment, 1770-1935’ brings together collections of prison registers, court reports and mugshots held by The National Archives in Kew. The site also has indexes to prison registers held by the National Records of Scotland. HERTS PAST POLICING w hertspastpolicing.org.uk Learn about policing in the county from officers’ journals,…

Where was Battersea Union Infirmary? Q My 4x great grandparents, Eliza and Samuel Styles, died in the Battersea Union Infirmary, Eliza in 1879 and Samuel in 1882. However, in neither case is the address of the infirmary shown on the death certificate. Can you tell me anything about it? Cheryl Styles A The couple died in the Wandsworth & Clapham Union Infirmary, which was located at the north side of St John’s Hill, Battersea, where Haydon Way now runs. The site had originally been used as the union’s workhouse, which was opened in 1840. In 1865, the medical journal The Lancet began publishing detailed reports of its inspections of the medical facilities in London workhouses, many of which were found to be abysmal. As a result, Parliament passed the 1867…

Catherine ‘Kate’ Cranston was born in 1849 in Glasgow to a progressive family experienced in the hospitality industry. Her father owned a hotel, while his cousin opened Edinburgh’s first Temperance coffee house and lodgings. For the Cranstons, the education of women was important and their inclusion in the family’s businesses a given. Kate Cranston was introduced to the tea trade through her tea-dealer brother, Stuart. It was Stuart’s basic ‘sampling room’ for his customers, opened in 1875, that sparked her idea for a beautifully designed tea room for all. Upon opening her first tea room, Cranston’s business acumen shone through. She listed herself in the Glasgow Post Office Directory as “C Cranston”. By removing any hint of her gender, Cranston was not placed last with the unmarried women, but rather…

ANCESTRY w tinyurl.com/anc-south-africa If your ancestor served in the Second Boer War, you can search the military indexes at Ancestry. The site also has passenger lists and church records. EGGSA w eggsa.org eGGSA is the Genealogical Society of South Africa’s online branch. Annual membership starts at £17, and provides access to a range of digital resources. FAMILYSEARCH w tinyurl.com/fs-south-africa FamilySearch is one of the most userfriendly sites for South African records, and it’s completely free. This was where Barbara connected with Margaret.…

During the height of the pandemic, Warwickshire’s heritage community rose to the challenge of lockdown, empowering the Warwickshire online volunteer network - or ‘WOVeN’ - to generate useful content. “We made adjustments, like everyone during lockdown,” says county archivist Rob Eyre. Events at the record office moved online, along with staff and stakeholder meetings, and a new remotebooking system was introduced. Meanwhile, drawing on their volunteers, staff greatly increased their capacity to digitise, index and transcribe by using Google Drive to share historical data. “During the first lockdown we completed a database of compensation records from our coal-mining collections, a significant industry in the north of the county.” It’s at dhi.ac.uk/miners-health/mcomicSearch. We have completed a database of coal-mining compensation records Now staff are shining a light on Warwickshire’s important quarter-sessions…

BLOXHAM This name and its variants are relatively common in Warwickshire and Leicestershire. CASHMORE In the 1881 census this surname crops up most frequently in Birmingham and Stourbridge. HANCOX Hancox derives from the personal name ‘Hann’. HANDS This surname is found across the West Midlands. HIRON(S) This name is related to the surname ‘Iron’, which itself may derive from the Middle English avian words ern (eagle) or heroun (heron). KIMBERLEY This locative surname is thought to originate in Kingsbury in Warwickshire, in addition to places in Norfolk and Nottinghamshire. NEWEY Newey is another locative name that has multiple places of origin. In 1881 Newey hotspots included Aston, Birmingham and Kenilworth. SHEASBY This is the local variant of the surname Shearsby, taken from a village in Leicestershire. WOODFIELD According to The…

The Royal Mint traces its origins back to the reign of Alfred the Great. The mint moved from the Tower of London to nearby Tower Hill in 1812, then relocated to Llantrisant in South Wales in 1968 as part of the plan to decimalise Britain’s currency. The mint’s museum holds plenty of records of the men and women who have worked there over the centuries, which show that despite their weighty responsibilities, they found time to have fun. Sarah Tyley, its collections manager, shares a programme from a Costume Entertainment evening in 1898 that was arranged to raise money for the mint’s swimming club. WHAT WAS THE ROYAL MINT SWIMMING CLUB? The mint has long been home to a strong community of workers, and the museum cares for many items…

Pen & Sword, 272 pages, £25 WW2 Two remarkable women feature in this book, with the first section detailing their formative years. Their lives prior to captivity were very different. Margaret Dryburgh had trained as a missionary and teacher, while Shelagh Brown, daughter of a businessman, worked as a secretary at Singapore Naval Base. Through their shared love of music, they formed a close bond in captivity and helped encourage other internees to cope with their truly terrible situation. Barbara Coombes’ book details their flight from Singapore after the Japanese invasion of 1942 and their subsequent capture and internment, initially at Palembang, Sumatra. All the women experienced great hardship and many died during their captivity, but it is apparent from reading this book that the formation of a vocal orchestra,…

REVIEWS Why did you write this book? My father gave me a document that I ignored for about 20 years, although it looks really lovely - it’s bound in leather, and has gilt edges. It’s a record made in 1848 of my great great grandfather Edward Curling receiving a gift from the town where he was living, because he was moving from Mildenhall in Suffolk to County merick in Ireland. As I say, I ignored it for a long time and then I thought, “Well, I must do something about it.” It has Edward’s birthdate in it and where he was born, which was really helpful. I traced him back and found out that his father’s name was Thomas Oakley Curling. That middle name proved to be invaluable in a…

Two Roads, 448 pages, £20 JEWS IN WW2 Here celebrated author Deborah Cadbury shares the extraordinary true story of schoolteacher Anna Essinger who foresaw and then defied Nazism, smuggling her entire school and many other Jewish children from Nazi-run mainland Europe to the relative safety of rural England. The book features emotional eyewitness testimonies and draws from letters, diaries and interviews, giving a unique child’s-eye perspective of Nazi persecution and the Holocaust. It describes Essinger’s refusal to allow her belief in a better society to be overtaken by the evil surrounding her. Essinger reestablished her school initially at Bunce Court, a rundown manor house in Kent. She helped numerous refugee children who had endured horrific wartime experiences, offering them security and the ability to rebuild their lives. She later relocated…

TORN: A NARRATIVE HISTORY OF FASHION What we wear is important to understanding who we are. Such is the premise of Torn, presented by Gus Casely-Hayford and first broadcast on Radio 4 in August. In a fascinating series, the cultural historian and director of V&A East looks at the stories behind items of clothing that have become staples of our collective wardrobe. The 10 episodes, each 15 minutes long, include calico cotton, viscose rayon, the fisherman’s jumper, the mini skirt, Ray-Ban sunglasses and Nike Air Jordans.…

Email wdytyaeditorial@ourmedia.co.uk Write to WDYTYA? Magazine, Eagle House, Bristol BS1 4ST WIN an AncestryDNA test kit from ancestry.co.uk WORTH £79 The writer of our star letter wins an AncestryDNA test worth £79 - so drop us a line and share your thoughts with us. A TREASURED GIFT STAR LETTER I wonder if your other readers might be interested in a suggestion for presents for their family? Last year I created a Mixbook project (mixbook.com) that I gave to each of my family for Christmas. I called it World War Two and Our Family. I created a page for each member of the family who was alive during the Second World War - my sister and I are the last remaining members of the family who remember it. Each of the pages was…

York electoral registers published on Findmypast Family history website Findmypast (findmypast.co.uk) has added a new set of 1,723,690 electoral-register records from the City of York, dating from 1848-1938. Electoral registers were introduced in 1832, when the Reform Act increased the numbers of men who were allowed to vote. They were published annually in order to keep track of who was eligible to vote by criteria such as property and income. They include the names and addresses of eligible individuals, and are a good substitute for census records in family history. TheGenealogist makes Map Explorer available to more subscribers Family history site TheGenealogist (thegenealogist.co.uk) has made Map Explorer available to its Starter and Gold subscribers. The tool, previously only available on the Diamond subscription tier, allows users to compare maps of…

Free family history website FamilySearch (familysearch.org) has launched a collection of parish and civil records from the department of Hautes-Alpes in south-east France. The collection consists of 4,560,838 records dating from 1583-1902, and includes births, marriages and burials plus digitised images. The people featured include Claude-Sylvestre Colaud, a general under Napoleon Bonaparte and senator, whose baptism took place in Briançon on 12 December 1754.…

The number of emigration records from the Jewish community in Vienna that are now available on myheritage.com Daughters of the American Revolution The US nonprofit has awarded an ‘Excellence in Historic Preservation Award’ to family history organisation familysearch.org 12,115 The number of sheets from Ordnance Survey plans of towns in England and Wales (1840s-1890s) that are now available tor free at maps.nls.uk The Met London’s Metropolitan Police Service is leading an investigative geneticgenealogy pilot similar to the one used to catch the ‘Golden State Killer’ in the USA 141,000 The number of Staffordshire baptism records that have been added to findmypast.co.uk…

PHOTO COLOURISATION The ability to convert sepia or black-and-white photographs into colour is not a new one, but thanks to artificial intelligence (AI) it’s a technique that can now be applied to any digital photo with just a few clicks. But how does the technology work, how accurate are the results, and which are the best services to use to bring some actual colour into your ancestors’ lives? Colourising old photos didn’t begin with the advent of computers, of course. Handcoloured techniques date back to the 19th century - almost as far as photographs themselves. You can find a potted history on US photo-retouching specialist InstaRestoration’s blog at instarestoration.com/blog/history-of-photo-colorization. The arrival of computers then made it possible to scan and manipulate old photographs digitally using software such as Adobe Photoshop.…

ANCESTRY w ancestry.co.uk The user-submitted trees on Ancestry introduced Jennie to Steve Fowler and other relatives of Edgar Cheesman. DECEASED ONLINE w deceasedonline.com Jennie used this database of UK burials and cremations to locate George and Edgar's final resting place. Searching is free, but you have to pay to see results in full. SOUTHWARK ARCHIVES w tinyurl.com/southwark-arch Discover more about the borough’s people, places and maritime history at the archive. Its holdings include records from churches, labour organisations, families and estates.…

1 APPLICANT This section shows the name of the person applying for the pension and applying to have the census searched for evidence they were alive in 1851. For married women this can include both their married and maiden name. 2 ADDRESS This is the current address of the applicant or their agent - in this case, a clerk at an insurance company. 3 PARENTS Helpfully for family historians, the details of the applicant’s parents include their mother’s maiden name. 4 ADDRESS IN 1851 The family address in 1851 includes the townland in which they were living. 5 OTHER RELATIONS The names and ages of other family members were occasionally noted on the search form. These are John’s siblings’ details. 6 RETURN SEARCHED This section confirms that John’s census return was found and…

TECH TIPS How can you make your family’s history interesting to others? One approach is to tell their stories as if you were writing a novel, even though they are fact not fiction. The novel-writing process forces you to organise your research, and ask the key questions required to transform your discoveries into a compelling narrative. For this month’s ‘Tech Tips’ article, we’ve found a creative-writing tool called Bibisco that will streamline everything from planning and structuring to writing your story. It works across Windows, macOS and Linux, and comes in two versions: a free Community Edition, which we’re focusing on in this tutorial, and a paid-for Supporters Edition that costs around £24. The Community Edition serves as a 30-day trial for the paid-for edition - you’ll see a warning…

BOOKS British Genealogical Periodicals: A Bibliography of their Contents; 5 vols Stuart A Raymond Federation of Family History Societies, 1991 Here Stuart lists the articles in the mentioned journals. British Genealogy in Miscellaneous Journals Stuart A Raymond Federation of Family History Societies, 1994 Stuart’s guide reveals the genealogical material that was published in older antiquarian and archaeological journals. He has also written a series of bibliographies for different counties listing thousands of genealogical articles; for advice, email him via samjraymond@btopenworld.com. The Genealogist’s Guide George W Marshall George Bell and Sons, 1879 This bibliography from the editor of The Genealogist listing pedigrees in print remains an essential resource. The first and later editions are available from the Internet Archive at tinyurl.com/arch-marsh.…

BOOKS A Social History of Tea, 2nd Edn Jane Pettigrew and Bruce Richardson Benjamin Press, 2015 Find out about tea’s influence on culture in Britain and the USA. Empire of Tea Markman Ellis, Richard Coulton and Matthew Mauger Reaktion, 2015 Delve into the complex history of the infamous tea trade. Tea: A Very British Beverage Paul Chrystal Amberley, 2014 Explore our love affair with tea. VENUE MACKINTOSH AT THE WILLOW a 215-217 Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow G2 3EX t 0141 204 1903 w mackintoshatthewillow.com Tea and tours are available at Kate Cranston’s fourth tea room. WEBSITES BOSTON TEA PARTY SHIP w www.bostonteapartyship.com/tea-blog The website of the Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum in Massachusetts has a good blog. HISTORY OF TEA w qmhistoryoftea.wordpress.com Read articles from a research project conducted by…

• Ask your relatives to scour for old documents and photos. Beg everybody not to throw out stuff from Granny - someone will want to use it in future. • Go back over previous research to see if more experience sheds new light. You may notice a mistake that you made earlier. • Social context can make sense of changes in your ancestors’ lives. Some people may have migrated for work, or because of illness - tuberculosis was a major threat in Victorian times.…

LISTEN FINDING QUEER STORIES IN ARCHIVES - SEMINAR SERIES 2021 anchor.fm/brokenfutures Free Launched by ‘Broken Futures’ - a community-based project researching the lives of men who were convicted of “gross indecency and buggery” In rural Berkshire - this podcast features academics and archivists discussing different aspects of queer history. WATCH SHROPSHIRE MUSEUMS AND ARCHIVES tinyurl.com/yt-shrop-museum-and-arch Free Shropshire Museums and Archives’ YouTube channel is a great example of how local archives can use the site to make their holdings more accessible to those not in their local area. The most recent upload is Shrewsbury’s Fields of Dreams, a 39-minute documentary tracing the changes in a riverside area of the market town over the past 150 years. Other videos include guides to the records held by Shropshire Archives. WEBSITE ARC MAGAZINE ara-arc.past-view.com…

The Penzance-Aberdeen express train was steaming its way between Leicester and Banbury on a summer’s evening in 1921. Albert Harris had just become a fireman on the railways, and was stoking for driver Walter Saville. Just after the train had rounded a corner, Albert was horrified to see the right-hand ‘big end’ rod - one of the main rods that powered the wheels - clatter down, sending pieces of sleeper flying in all directions. Walter managed to bring the train to a standstill and Albert, in his own words, “did his bit with the handbrake and sand”. They were fortunate that the train didn’t come off the tracks, especially as they were on the top of a high embankment. Dad worked extra time so that I could stay on at…

Email wdytyaeditorial@ourmedia.co.uk to feature your event here for free IN PERSON EXCAVATION-CONFRONTATION-REPAIR? FAMILY HISTORIES OF THE HOLOCAUST Until 31 October a The Reading Room, The Wiener Holocaust Library, London t 020 7636 7247 w wienerholocaustlibrary.org/exhibition/excavation-confrontation-repair-family-histories-of-the-holocaust This exhibition draws upon the archives of The Wiener Holocaust Library to focus on the renewal of Jewish communities after the Holocaust. It will feature material from postwar Displaced Persons camps relating to the experiences of Holocaust survivors, and uncover stories of births, weddings, family reunions and migrations to new lives. Free. HUNTLEY AND PALMERS DAY SCHOOL 24 September a The Centre for Heritage and Family History, Reading t 0118 950 9553 w berksfhs.org/whats-on Explore the origins of iconic biscuit manufacturer Huntley and Palmers and the reasons behind its growth into a major local employer…

National Records of Scotland (NRS) has purchased thousands of items from the family archive of Conservative prime minister Arthur Balfour (1848-1930), who was born in East Lothian. The items in the collection date from 1577-1956, and cost just over £500,000. Balfour’s tenure as prime minister ran from 1902 to 1905. He later served as foreign secretary (1916-1919), and was a delegate at the Paris Peace Conference that negotiated the peace treaty with Germany after the end of the First World War. He was also the author of the 1917 Balfour Declaration, a letter in which the British government expressed its support for “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people”. The prominent Scottish family had important connections in scientific, artistic and political circles. Several members were…

HOTPOT AI w hotpot.ai/colorize-picture £ Free, or $10 per month for 1,000 credits Hotpot AI allows you to apply a limited amount of customisation to your colouring, and results are generally pretty good. Size-restricted images can be downloaded for free; full-size images costs 25 credits per photo. IMAGECOLORIZER w imagecolorizer.com/colorize.html £ Free, or free with in-app purchases (iOS and Android apps), or $29.95 (apps for macOS and Windows) ImageColorizer’s web-based tools are free, but apps are also available. The tools deliver good results, and you can edit your uploaded photographs using its many online tools before colourisation. MACFAMILYTREE 10 w syniumsoftware.com/macfamilytree £ £59.99 Our favourite macOS genealogy app has a colourisation feature courtesy of an older version of the DeOldify model. Results are solid and there are enhancement tools built-in,…

ASK ABOUT IRELAND w askaboutireland.ie/griffith-valuation You can search Griffith's Valuation here. The site also has links to relevant Valuation Office maps and Ordnance Survey name books. NATIONAL ARCHIVES OF IRELAND w titheapplotmentbooks.nationalarchives.ie You can browse the TABs for the Republic of Ireland here. Avoid the name-search tool, as the database is full of spelling errors. PRONI w tinyurl.com/proni-cat You can download the TABs for Northern Ireland via PRONI’s online catalogue, and they are indexed at Roots Ireland (rootsireland.ie).…

Throughout my career researching and writing about the history of crime, one website in particular has been invaluable. Old Bailey Online (oldbaileyonline.org) contains the details of 197,745 trials that took place at the Central Criminal Court of England and Wales in London, also known as the Old Bailey, between 1674 and 1913 - and the site is completely free. The online resource - a collaboration between three universities - has a wealth of information, and this goes beyond the basic details of crimes and trials. You can use the search page (oldbaileyonline.org/forms/formMain.jsp) to look for an individual, an offence, a verdict, a sentence or even time period, but you can also search for a keyword. So if you want to know how often a particular profession is mentioned in the…

WIN! PHOTO RESTORATION WORTH £75 My grandmother Olga left Germany in 1907 and became a German governess to a well-to-do Glasgow family. She married my grandfather in 1908 and never returned home. Olga suffered a lot of prejudice during the world wars. Three siblings Here is Olga (right) as a girl in Germany, photographed with her brother and sister. Two brothers I This picture of my father (left) and uncle dates from c1918. Both trained as pharmacists. SHARE YOUR FAMILY ALBUM Send us your photographs and you could receive a £75 discount off getting a favourite photo restored or coloured by Image-Restore.co.uk. Email our art editor on robbie.bennie@ourmedia.co.uk using the subject line “Family. Album”. We need between eight and ten goodquality, high-resolution images. Each should be accompanied by a caption…

Finding remarkable coincidences is one of the joys of genealogy, and these can help you to forge new connections. This has certainly been the case for Barbara Smith, who chanced upon an old picture online… MY BRICK WALL In 1890, two brothers, John and Frederick Goodhead of Manchester, set sail aboard the steamship Duart Castle for South Africa. The move was instigated by their father, because John had tuberculosis and medics advised him to move to a drier climate that had less pollution. Their siblings stayed in Manchester, including my grandfather Isaac William Goodhead. On arrival, the brothers lived in Pietermaritzburg, near Durban. They later moved to Barberton in the Mpumalanga province, where they ran a general store. I have many old family photographs and documents relating to the Goodheads,…

BMDs w ancestorsofbirmingham.com This site has transcriptions of baptisms, marriages and burials, as well as names and gravestone photos from a number of cemeteries. DIRECTORIES w tinyurl.com/sco-warwickshire As well as some countywide directories, the University of Leicester’s website Special Collections Online includes directories of Birmingham. INDEXES w tinyurl.com/warwickshire-data The free indexes and transcriptions available on the county record office’s website include a database of victuallers, Civil War Loss Accounts, calendars of prisoners and tithe apportionments. PARISH REGISTERS w tinyurl.com/fs-war-reg FamilySearch offers Warwickshire parish registers (1538-1963), including images. SCHOOL REGISTERS w tinyurl.com/rug-arch Digitised material from the Rugby School Archives includes issues of the school magazine The Meteor, registers, a roll of honour and a war diary dating from the First World War.…

ARCHIVES AND LIBRARIES BIRMINGHAM ARCHIVES & COLLECTIONS a Library of Birmingham, Centenary Square, Broad Street, Birmingham B1 2ND t 0121 242 4242 e archives.heritage@birmingham.gov.uk w tinyurl.com/bhm-arch The Wolfson Centre for Archival Research is the reading room of Birmingham Archives & Collections, which is located at the Library of Birmingham. CADBURY RESEARCH LIBRARY a Lower Ground Floor, Muirhead Tower, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT e special-collections@contacts.bham.ac.uk w tinyurl.com/uni-bhm-crl The library’s material includes the university’s own archive and records from the confectioner. COVENTRY ARCHIVES a Coventry History Centre, The Herbert Art Gallery & Museum, Jordan Well, Coventry CV1 5QP t 024 7623 7583 e archives@culturecoventry.com w tinyurl.com/cov-arch You’ll find a range of material here including medieval manuscripts and an automotive collection. SOLIHULL HERITAGE AND LOCAL STUDIES a 1st Floor, The Core…

Amberley, 288 pages, £20 ANGLOZULU WAR The 1879 Anglo-Zulu War is mainly remembered for two early battles - Isandlwana, where the Zulu Army slaughtered a British column, and Rorke’s Drift, when a company of British infantry defeated a Zulu regiment. Of the fighting before the British victory at the Zulu capital Ulundi months later, little is remembered. This excellent book covers the actions of the one British column still at large, led by Colonel Evelyn Wood and Major Redvers Buller. It was a difficult campaign against local Zulus, who were expert guerrilla fighters. They slaughtered most of a British wagon convoy and attacked white settlers, stealing cattle. In turn, Buller led British mounted infantry and white and native irregular cavalry against them. At Hlobane Mountain a big British raid was…