Your ideas, comments and advice
I had never done it before, bought someone else’s album. I was at a Western Front Association event browsing at the secondhand book stall. I was attracted by the postcards in the album, being a collector of old postcards in a small way. Inside the album were three First World War photos; four postcards showing a soldier with an inspiring, sentimental verse underneath, but no writing; and five postcards that had been written on.
I naturally became curious. Who sent the cards, and who was in the photos? The majority of the cards were stamped “Received From H. M. Ship”. Apart from the birthday card they were written by someone called Joe and all but one of Joe’s cards were sent to 28 St Mary’s Road in Peckham, and addressed to three different members of the Barrett family: two to Ivy, whom he calls sister, and one each to Mich (addressed “AH Barrett”) and Gwen.
The 1911 census failed to give a Barrett family at St Mary’s Road. However, Joe had described Ivy as his sister, and the 1911 census did reveal a Barrett family living at 11 Culmore Road, Peckham, with an Ivy aged 16 and Joseph aged 15. As there were no other close matches in the area, I felt sure I had found the right family. Gwen was Joe’s younger sister Ada Gwendoline and AH Barrett (Mich) was younger brother Arthur Haycock.
I then turned to naval records, which confirmed I had found the right Joe. From his date of joining to 18 October 1916 he was stationed on HMS President II (a shore establishment, primarily the accounting base for the Royal Naval Air Service or RNAS). He then moved to Northern France as an air mechanic. In February 1918 he was posted to HMS Daedalus, one of the shore airfields of the RNAS used as a naval seaplane training school.
On 1 April 1918 he was transferred to the newly formed Royal Air Force.
His RAF record said he was stationed back in Northern
France. On 14
December 1918 he was admitted to the 5th Casualty
Clearing Station with bronchopneumonia.
By 17 December there was no change in his condition, and he died the following day. He was buried at
Maubeuge (Sous-le
Bois) cemetery.
I am sure that the young man in front of the plane must be Joe himself. I have a feeling he loved the work he was doing, and was very proud of it. I think the album probably belonged to Ivy. I would imagine Joe was one of the ratings in the group photo. Could the soldier have been Ivy’s husband William Davy?
I have not been able to identify his cap badge.
But was it Joe in the photos? His younger brother, Mich, followed in his footsteps and joined the RNAS on 16 February 1918, and like him was transferred to the RAF in 1918. He too worked as an air mechanic. Unlike Joe his service was just in England, at Tregantle in Cornwall and Crystal Palace.
Poignantly, on the 1918 card to Ivy he wrote: “What do you think about the British advances. It’s Fine. This is what’s going to end the war as we will soon be home now.” For Joe there was no coming home.
Would any of the descendants of Joe’s brothers and sisters like the album? I would love to find it a proper home. His siblings were: Ivy Marion Florence Barrett (1894–1983); Alfred Haylock Barrett (1898–1957); Arthur Bridge Barrett (born 1900); Montague Valiant Thomas Barrett (1903–1973); Ada Gwendoline Violet Barrett (born 1906); and Sydney James Fuller Barrett (1908–1982).
Susan Martin, by email
EDITOR REPLIES: What a fascinating discovery Susan. I’m sure we can find a family home for this treasure. If readers would like to help track down descendants, then please drop us an email. Susan has carried out further research into Joe’s siblings that we could not print because of a lack of space, but are happy to share.
Channel Islands Find
Every so often I pump the name of an ancestor into Google and see what comes up. Since there are unusual family names on my mother’s side, this has been fruitful on a number of occasions and recently led me to a website that I thought was worth sharing, the Frank Falla Archive ( frankfallaarchive.org).
The Frank Falla Archive contains fascinating information about the men and women who were deported from the Channel Islands during the Second World War. It’s definitely worth a look if you have Channel Islands ancestry or are interested in this dark period of the islands’ history. The website has copies of documents revealing the story of each person documented. This is very useful, because a good deal of Channel Islands’ material is not yet online.
Christine Brennan, by email
EDITOR REPLIES: Thank you for sharing this website Christine. What a great find!
Transcription Tuesday Testament
I just had to write and tell you of my experience of Transcription Tuesday and beyond. I have been a family historian for many years, but decided to take part this year for the first time. I chose to transcribe Cumbria parish records for familysearch.org. I have found it so interesting, and am still transcribing a month on. Looking at records over 100 or more years, the same family names recur over and over again. In the early 1700s the letter e is written backwards, and of course the s’s look more like f’s! On one page there was the baptism of a baby boy and further down the page the burial of the mother and the next day the burial of the baby – so sad. In another set of registers I found “late” written by the mother’s name on a birth record, another added under a burial “a poor sea faring man”. It shows the importance of looking at original parish records, and not just relying on transcriptions. To anyone who hasn’t participated in Transcription Tuesday I would thoroughly recommend it. Not only is it interesting and enjoyable – I have learned a lot.
Lynne Barber, Otley, Yorkshire
EDITOR REPLIES: Glad you enjoyed it Lynne. Transcription Tuesday just keeps growing!
Rachael Jenkins welcomed our announcement that a new series of A House Through Time is coming I love this series. It has inspired me to research my own house and the families that have lived there since 1830.
The Police Gazette Goes Online
I enjoyed the article on the best websites for tracing prisoners in your February 2019 issue. I just want to let your readers know that I believe I have the largest private collection of the Police Gazette in the UK, which is gradually going online when I get the chance.
It’s a superb source for crime, criminals and victims of crime. I’m currently working through the 1860s and 1870s, which I aim to have uploaded later this year.
Readers can search all of the newspapers I have digitised via lastchancetoread.com (free to search with a fee to download), or look at some examples at pinterest.co.uk/richardheaton. Richard Heaton, by email
EDITOR REPLIES: Thanks for sharing your site with us Richard. I’ve even included it in our feature about newspapers on page 15.
Illegitimate Concerns
In researching my Freakley ancestors of Staffordshire, I have trawled through the baptism records of that county for the
years 1740 to 1840, with some surprising results.
I have found a total of 122 christenings of children with that surname (or close variant) in the period. Of these, 21 were noted as being illegitimate in the parish registers and a further seven had only the mother’s name recorded. This seems a very high level of illegitimacy, potentially as high as over one in five of all births.
Two sisters, Alice and Ann Freakley, who lived in the village of Standon, contributed eight of the illegitimate births between them, between 1786 and 1812! Richard Hornbrook, by email
EDITOR REPLIES: As you can see from our Reader Story this month (page 30), illegitimate children seem to have been a fairly accepted fact of life before the Victorian era.
Welsh Migrants
While doing some research, I came across a little-known anniversary that might be of interest to readers investigating Welsh ancestry.
On 11 June 1819 the brig Albion arrived at Saint John, New Brunswick, with a cargo of slate – and some 160 people from Teifi, in Cardigan, West Wales, seeking a new life in British North America. They’d braved danger and death during the 60-day sea voyage in a bid to escape the economic depression and unemployment that was rife in their home area.
The young people among them quickly found employment, but it was a different story for families who knew nothing but farming. With little or no money to buy land, they were reliant on help from the settlers already there, who were bemused by
@kathryn68james responded to #NamesakeDay I was named after my grandmother Kathryn Mason. She was adopted and we don’t know her history but I named my adopted son Mason too.
the strange language (most spoke Welsh) and the women’s tall hats and shawls. Their first winter was very hard; the cold and malnutrition claimed several lives. But they persevered, and were eventually granted land near Fredericton. By the 1830s the settlement they founded, a second Cardigan, was a thriving farming community, and descendants still live in the area. Through the Central New Brunswick Welsh Society, they’ll be celebrating their achievement in August 2019. They have a Facebook page at bit.ly/fb-cnbws. Sandra Westbrooke, by email
EDITOR REPLIES: What a great story. I wonder if any of our readers have got family who did this migration?
What’s In A Name?
In response to the February 2019 letter sent in by William Crook, I have had a similar experience with an ancestor’s forename.
My great grandfather, Samuel Buckley Bradbury, was born around 1828 in Saddleworth. I received the record of his third marriage from the General Register Office, which showed that his father’s forename was originally written as “Tim” but had been altered to “Jim”.
I applied for a copy of Samuel’s first marriage from the Oldham Register Office, hoping to settle the problem, and was surprised to see his father’s name shown as “Wm”! I wrote back and asked them to check the name again, as Wm
(short for William) was a new contender. I then received a copy of the original entry, and we both agreed that the forename was “Sim” (Simeon).
Over the years, his father’s name has been written as “Tim”, “Jim” or “Sim”. In the 19th century handwriting had lots of swirls and curls, so it’s easy to make a mistake.
Pam Slater, Bishop’s Stortford
EDITOR REPLIES: I think those who took part in Transcription Tuesday would agree with you Pam!
A Happy Reader!
You and the team have put together another superb edition for the 150th issue (April 2019). I would like to class myself as being there at the start, watching the shelves in the shop as issues arrived, then you persuaded me to take out a subscription at Who Do You Think You Are? Live.
I am no expert, but I felt I knew my way around most datasets. However, as usual you showed me there is always something new to learn, as in the case of Laura Berry’s article on parish registers.
The article about the countdown to the 1921 census was also enlightening – it’s a shame that the Government did not suspend the 100-year rule, since the 1931 census returns were destroyed and there was no 1941 census.
The article about the best websites for orphanages and children’s homes by Jonathan Scott has given me some new leads on a couple of sticking points I have, as has Simon Wills’ piece on passenger lists.
The ‘Ancestors at Work’ article was also very interesting, as I have several miners in my family tree.
And finally, your devoting an area of the magazine to highlight free resources is a good idea.
Bob Shaw, Oldbury,
West Midlands
EDITOR REPLIES: High praise indeed Bob, we’re blushing!