I have believed for quite a while that my great-great grandmother was Louisa BURROWS; I have a copy of her marriage certificate to my great-great-grandfather, Stephen CASTLE, and she was indexed as BURROWS. Her certificate is ambiguous – the ‘u’ in BURROWS could be an unclosed ‘a’. Yet I was not able to trace a birth record. I recently revisited this predicament, and believe I have solved it.

I took a pot luck and did a wildcard search online for Louisa B*RROWS, and struck gold. Various sources indicate Louisa BARROWS was born Q3 1852 in Stelling Minnis, and appears to be the daughter of George BARROWS and Mary SUTTON. This fits well, since a witness at Louisa’s wedding was one Jane SUTTON, possibly a cousin or aunt (yet to be determined). In 1861, Louisa was at the home of her SUTTON grandparents, but in 1871 was at her parents’ home, along with her grandfather, Henry BARROWS.

I can finally trace further back on my mother’s line …

A new website called HistoryPin uses clever features, in partnership with Google, to add historic photos and stories against places and a timeline. This allows you to, say, find photos of your home town in 1910 (if anyone has posted any!). These can then be overlayed on a Google Streetview to compare the location with the modern view.

Give it a try!

Dave Dixon at Faded Genes has come up trumps again – the latest update surrounding the family of my gt-gt-uncle, Arthur Daniel HATTON. This will enable me to fill in some further holes in my tree.

One revealing fact was a marriage of his sister Margaret to a William John FRIEND. I am already investigating family links involve FRIEND, CHURCH, KEMP and FAGG. First thoughts suggest illegitimacies and other inter-family connections. Use of FRIEND as a middle name for KEMP family, similar use of CHURCH as a middle name, suggest possible maiden names and/or fathers of illegitimacies.

I’m getting into a right tangle!

A new family history magazine has hit UK shelves this month, filling the void recently created by The National Archives‘ Ancestors magazine, whose contract with the publisher has ended.

The new magazine is called Your Family History and has been established by leading historian and genealogist, Dr. Nick Barratt. The editorial team includes members from his own research company, Sticks Research Agency, and aims to focus on readers’ personal stories and contributions.

YOUR stories, YOUR discoveries, YOUR mysteries and YOUR documents

The website provides a means whereby contributions (pictures, documents) can be sent for consideration in the publication. Readers who subscribe via the magazine are currently being offered a free copy of Nick’s new book, Guide To Your Ancestors’ Lives.

With Nick at the helm, I’m sure the magazine is in great hands and we wish him every success!

Those of you who follow my blog may recall a previous posting where I had located two additional children of my great-great-grandparents. One was Ino Kate HOLLANDS. The 1911 census hinted that these may have died young, since it indicated only 7 of 9 children had survived till census.

However, researching this weekend , I discovered that Ino had two marriages, also had another middle name (Fanny), and seems to have died in 1942 aged 60. This has been determined via FreeBMD and Ancestry.co.uk. The resource tree I located on Ancestry revealed two other names I did not have  - Ada Ruth (died aged 1) and Edith Agnes (died aged 2).

I now strangely have ten children to this family. Curiously there is a Frank and an Uno appearing in the 1891 census, one aged 7 and one aged 5, both listed as sons. FreeBMD reveals birth of an Uno Frank (mistranscribed as Una Frank) in Q1 1884. So where did the other Frank appear from? And did the family incorrectly note their total children on the 1911 census?

The information from Ancestry on Ada Ruth and Edith Agnes would suggest that these were the two children which did not survive till 1911.

I think I need to rigorously check BMD records for this elusive other Frank ….

I recently discovered a website on the Garlinge family of Nonington, thanks to Clive Webb, who tells me the family name appears in the same local area for at least 250 years.

My gt-gt-gt-grandmother, Margaret GARLINGE, is indeed listed and with more detail. I can now populate my tree further, including WEBB and ROGERS families.

The subsidiary webpage here takes records further back to the late 1500’s !

Wow! This may mean I have two definitive direct lines back to the 16th Century!

This morning I had an epiphany – which revealed how stupid I have been in my 18 months of naivité as an amateur genealogist.

It was whilst watching a re-run of the Coming Home series about celebrities’ Welsh ancestry that all was revealed – base-born meant illegitimate! I had believed that base-born meant still-born!

I now find myself searching through my GEDCOM file finding occurrences of “base born”, “bb” and the like to make sure I have not added a death date to match!

Call me stupid, call me anything similar (or stronger!) – but call it lesson learned (I hope!)

Well, I attended the WDYTYALive family history show in London on Friday 26th February. A busy and tiring day, but I managed to visit most of the stalls I had prepared questions for, and received welcome advice, before my first day’s seminar at 12:30am. The remainder I visited dodging between the seminar schedules.

Tony Robinson signing autographs

The actor and historian, and UK face of Ancestry.co.uk, Tony Robinson, presented The Journey of a Record at the Ancestry Academy, and visitors through the day could hear beginner, intermediate and advanced talks, with the main advanced presentation being given by genealogy and history expert Dr. Nick Barratt (personally, I felt a little too much cross-over between content of the latter two that I visited).

Gill Blanchard’s talk on Norfolk ancestors was welcome, since I may have to trace there (as confirmed by a visit to the Norfolk FHS stall).

The talk on the 1910 Valuation Survey (‘Lloyd George’s Domesday’) given by Peter Park was ‘different’ but useful, amongst other things highlighting how the occupier of property is not necessarily the owner, and that occupation could change a lot within a short few years.

All-in-all, another worthwhile visit, and the extra CDs I bought from KFHS have already this weekend yielded tree expansion and clarification around Birchington, Chartham and Challock!

Ancestry Intermediate

I was searching today through the British Army WWI Service Records, 1914-1920, on Ancestry in an effort to find information of my 2nd cousin 3 times removed, William FAGG, born 1882 in Kingston, near Canterbury. The index indicated that I would find 3 images for him. I thought I’d tried my luck and click forward one more page …

To my surprise, I found a further seventeen images, indicating that he enlisted in the Royal Garrison Artillery Reserves for the duration of WWI (having already served the R.G.A between 1899 and 1907), but later re-enlisted in 1919, for one year at the age of 37, into the Royal Engineers (Inland Waterways & Docks) within weeks of being demobbed.

William’s military records also suggested that his brother George served in the Royal Army Medical Corps, and his brother James served in the Navy. He was also living with his (as yet undetermined) sister Miss ‘A’ FAGG in Ramsgate during the period around the First World War. I now have two more brothers’ records to locate, and a sister (at least) to find!

Seek and ye shall find … !

Found a great little site today: World War One Photos. Photographs & Pictures of The First World War

As well as photos (including things such as obituaries), it is also a source for poetry, art, postcards, music & songs and propaganda posters.

Soldiers are searchable by regiment, and some items can be purchased.

Give it a look!