The DAW(E) twigs will eventually be updated on both the main DAW(E) descendant chart, and my basic all BDM database LornaHenderson on WorldConnect, thanks to Arthur from Ipplepen who found the latter and realised I was connected to a family member whose funeral he had just attended.
I quickly forwarded the email to a much closer relation, just in case she didn't know, and found that a) her email address was no longer valid, and b) (once contact had been restored courtesy of skype) that she had been at the same funeral and was way ahead of me with the news.
As a result of looking at the family concerned, there are of course other updates that will follow in due course as more i-s get dotted and t-s crossed, and Val is back in contact.
Saturday, 27 November 2010
Thursday, 25 November 2010
Power of co-operation
One of the mysteries in my extended RICHARDSON tree has just been solved (not that I'd spent much time on it of late).
The death of William McCulloch son of James Russell RICHARDSON and Bessie McCULLOCH had eluded my initial searches.
Not surprising really, as my assumption was that he had died in Oamaru, or at least NZ.
A fellow researcher recently spent some time tracking me down (didn't take her long, although our mutual contact had forgotten my name, she remembered enough about me for it to only take one phone call to someone likely to be able to place me).
The first gem from our conversation was the she had found the death of the above William mentioned in an index of deaths (held at the North Otago Museum) reported in Oamaru papers - at age 17 of a bus accident in Sydney 14 Apr 1889, s/o James.
And so it proved. Having pointed her to Trove (the National Library of Australia's newspapers can be found there) I received an excited phone call this morning telling me that she had beaten me to some information (it's not a contest really you know).
There, reported in The Mercury (Hobart) of 18th April was this report (I've corrected the OCR):
"An accident, resulting in the death of a youth named William Richardson, aged 16 years, happened on Saturday. Deceased was riding on the outside of an omnibus, when the harness on one of the horses became disarranged, and while the driver was in the act of adjusting it the animal becoming frightened backed the vehicle under a verandah, with the result that Richardson was crushed between it and one of the posts. He was removed to the Prince Alfred Hospital, where he lingered until shortly after noon to-day."
The link to this being our William is aided by the NSW death index showing a death registration Newtown, NSW to William with parents James and Bessie.
Wonder why he was in Sydney at age 17?
This is shortly after when his aunt was mentioning his father in her will as being in Australia (written Sep 1888), but he had been in NZ for a considerable time before that, and the Oamaru papers certainly thought so.
(James died in Oamaru in 1902 in tragic circumstance - perhaps the early death of his son contributed to that).
Cannot, yet, find any mention in our own NZ PapersPast, but did get sidetracked into what else was news of the time and found this accident reported in The Grey River Argus, of SATURDAY, MAY 18, 1889:
An extraordinary accident happened to a man who was driving along the Bayswater road, in the suburbs of Brisbane. He was in a spring cart with a number of hives of bees, when by some means he upset one of the hives. The bees attacked the horse, causing it to bolt. After galloping some distance the horse fell and fractured its for a leg. The bees swarmed upon the animal and soon stung it to death. So dense and vicious were the bees that traffic on the road was suspended for a considerable time.
Along with reports for "Arrangements for hoisting people to the top of Eiffel's Tower"
.. which will be raised to its thousand feet by March 31st"
they "are to consist of two lifts to carry fifty to one hundred persons each to the first platform. Two others will ascend from the ground floor to the second platform, 112 metres high in a minute. They will stop at the first platform, to take up or leave passengers. The complete ascent will take four minutes, and it will be possible to take to the top 750 visitors an hour. "
Wonder if the stats still hold?
The death of William McCulloch son of James Russell RICHARDSON and Bessie McCULLOCH had eluded my initial searches.
Not surprising really, as my assumption was that he had died in Oamaru, or at least NZ.
A fellow researcher recently spent some time tracking me down (didn't take her long, although our mutual contact had forgotten my name, she remembered enough about me for it to only take one phone call to someone likely to be able to place me).
The first gem from our conversation was the she had found the death of the above William mentioned in an index of deaths (held at the North Otago Museum) reported in Oamaru papers - at age 17 of a bus accident in Sydney 14 Apr 1889, s/o James.
And so it proved. Having pointed her to Trove (the National Library of Australia's newspapers can be found there) I received an excited phone call this morning telling me that she had beaten me to some information (it's not a contest really you know
There, reported in The Mercury (Hobart) of 18th April was this report (I've corrected the OCR):
"An accident, resulting in the death of a youth named William Richardson, aged 16 years, happened on Saturday. Deceased was riding on the outside of an omnibus, when the harness on one of the horses became disarranged, and while the driver was in the act of adjusting it the animal becoming frightened backed the vehicle under a verandah, with the result that Richardson was crushed between it and one of the posts. He was removed to the Prince Alfred Hospital, where he lingered until shortly after noon to-day."
The link to this being our William is aided by the NSW death index showing a death registration Newtown, NSW to William with parents James and Bessie.
Wonder why he was in Sydney at age 17?
This is shortly after when his aunt was mentioning his father in her will as being in Australia (written Sep 1888), but he had been in NZ for a considerable time before that, and the Oamaru papers certainly thought so.
(James died in Oamaru in 1902 in tragic circumstance - perhaps the early death of his son contributed to that).
Cannot, yet, find any mention in our own NZ PapersPast, but did get sidetracked into what else was news of the time and found this accident reported in The Grey River Argus, of SATURDAY, MAY 18, 1889:
An extraordinary accident happened to a man who was driving along the Bayswater road, in the suburbs of Brisbane. He was in a spring cart with a number of hives of bees, when by some means he upset one of the hives. The bees attacked the horse, causing it to bolt. After galloping some distance the horse fell and fractured its for a leg. The bees swarmed upon the animal and soon stung it to death. So dense and vicious were the bees that traffic on the road was suspended for a considerable time.
Along with reports for "Arrangements for hoisting people to the top of Eiffel's Tower"
.. which will be raised to its thousand feet by March 31st"
they "are to consist of two lifts to carry fifty to one hundred persons each to the first platform. Two others will ascend from the ground floor to the second platform, 112 metres high in a minute. They will stop at the first platform, to take up or leave passengers. The complete ascent will take four minutes, and it will be possible to take to the top 750 visitors an hour. "
Wonder if the stats still hold?
Saturday, 20 November 2010
19th: Web updates/ interesting sites
Must be surfacing from the non genie stuff that has been swamping me most of this year.
Think I've brought most of my web pages up to date, fixing several broken links etc (but probably not all).
Have rationalised the FAIRBAIRN and RUNCIMAN project diaries into one each per surname instead of one each for their respective DNA and One Name Study projects - see FairbairnsAll and RuncimansAll for the current versions - all history has been migrated, but the older DNA and One Name Study blogs remain in place given there may be links to existing posts.
Harry has provided a couple of interesting web sites:
The War Graves Photographic Project
and
Addressing History, this latter being particularly interesting if your people of interest are likely to have made it into a Directory in Edinburgh.
As their blurb states, it "combines data from digitised historical Scottish Post Office Directories (PODs) with contemporaneous historical maps"
Think I've brought most of my web pages up to date, fixing several broken links etc (but probably not all).
Have rationalised the FAIRBAIRN and RUNCIMAN project diaries into one each per surname instead of one each for their respective DNA and One Name Study projects - see FairbairnsAll and RuncimansAll for the current versions - all history has been migrated, but the older DNA and One Name Study blogs remain in place given there may be links to existing posts.
Harry has provided a couple of interesting web sites:
The War Graves Photographic Project
and
Addressing History, this latter being particularly interesting if your people of interest are likely to have made it into a Directory in Edinburgh.
As their blurb states, it "combines data from digitised historical Scottish Post Office Directories (PODs) with contemporaneous historical maps"
Monday, 15 November 2010
15th: Minor updates to web
Reloaded my main family tree pages.
You'll have to search fairly hard for the changes, none are the published people with pages of their own, so the recent changes index doesn't have any new entries.
However several charts will now have new twigs on them and one or two added names as partners have been identified etc.
eg William Fairside HAMLEY's wife has been confirmed as Florence Mabel THYNNE, and will show up on the ROWE chart;
a couple of present day COMBELLACKs now appear in their rightful place at the end of the DAWE chart etc etc.
Made time to get more of my recent updates up to date on OneGreatFamily
as well.
Everything to end of July is now there, my own families, and the FAIRBAIRN and RUNCIMAN investigations which result in at least 3 generations of family trees.
But, as is usual these days, most of my current investigations will be reported under the dna blogs, or the one name study pages - see links at top left.
It's quite interesting seeing which family lines pop up unexpectedly on the other side of the world.
Have now placed an Agnes FAIRBAIRN (married a John CRIGHTON) that I came across recently marrying in Balmain, Sydney in 1876.
My initial thought was that she may have been one of the sisters of Robert FAIRBAIRN, the Resident Magistrate of Freemantle, grdson of the Robert and Janet (AINSLIE) FAIRBAIRN I've been investigating (and have now popped a summary on the dna Patriarch's page - as reported in the Fairbairn dna blog).
Don't yet know if any others of the family emigrated, but her marriage notice in the paper shows her to be the second daughter of the late Thomas FAIRBAIRN, M.D. of Edinburgh.
You'll have to search fairly hard for the changes, none are the published people with pages of their own, so the recent changes index doesn't have any new entries.
However several charts will now have new twigs on them and one or two added names as partners have been identified etc.
eg William Fairside HAMLEY's wife has been confirmed as Florence Mabel THYNNE, and will show up on the ROWE chart;
a couple of present day COMBELLACKs now appear in their rightful place at the end of the DAWE chart etc etc.
Made time to get more of my recent updates up to date on OneGreatFamily
Everything to end of July is now there, my own families, and the FAIRBAIRN and RUNCIMAN investigations which result in at least 3 generations of family trees.
But, as is usual these days, most of my current investigations will be reported under the dna blogs, or the one name study pages - see links at top left.
It's quite interesting seeing which family lines pop up unexpectedly on the other side of the world.
Have now placed an Agnes FAIRBAIRN (married a John CRIGHTON) that I came across recently marrying in Balmain, Sydney in 1876.
My initial thought was that she may have been one of the sisters of Robert FAIRBAIRN, the Resident Magistrate of Freemantle, grdson of the Robert and Janet (AINSLIE) FAIRBAIRN I've been investigating (and have now popped a summary on the dna Patriarch's page - as reported in the Fairbairn dna blog).
Don't yet know if any others of the family emigrated, but her marriage notice in the paper shows her to be the second daughter of the late Thomas FAIRBAIRN, M.D. of Edinburgh.
Sunday, 14 November 2010
14th: OCR
Don't you just love spell checkers and OCR text?
I'm working my way through the National Library of Australia's newspapers piecing together the family of the aforementioned Robert and Janet (AINSLIE) FAIRBAIRN, (and distentangling their grandson George from the George A of the Marrickville baker FAIRBAIRNs that several people seem to have confused the family with) and came across this death notice which says in part:
... my wife Vera Fairbairn who derailed this life ...
I've corrected it to the rather more prosaic "departed this life" that it actually reads.
I'm working my way through the National Library of Australia's newspapers piecing together the family of the aforementioned Robert and Janet (AINSLIE) FAIRBAIRN, (and distentangling their grandson George from the George A of the Marrickville baker FAIRBAIRNs that several people seem to have confused the family with) and came across this death notice which says in part:
... my wife Vera Fairbairn who derailed this life ...
I've corrected it to the rather more prosaic "departed this life" that it actually reads.
Wednesday, 10 November 2010
10th: Fantastic news from NAS
Chris Patton's blog pointed me to the News section of the National Archives of Scotland - announcing that digital images of the Kirk Sessions, and other Church court records, are planned to go online next year sometime.
In the meantime, if you just happen to be in the Aberdeen or Orkney archives you can get a sneak preview.
In the meantime, if you just happen to be in the Aberdeen or Orkney archives you can get a sneak preview.
Monday, 8 November 2010
8th: What happens when you run an audit?
Thought it time to run an audit against my database, primarily to figure out if I had any pictures and sources not where they were meant to be.
One that proved to be misplaced was a headstone photograph for Daniel and Mary Ann (LIPSON) SKEWES at Bere Ferrers.
Which made me realise I had him in my database twice, and hadn't fully confirmed whether or not there was a third wife shortly before he died, nor when he and Mary Ann had married (no LIPSON/SKEWES marriage obvious).
The latter was easily solved - findmypast.com now has a heap of Devon records indexed, and there was Daniel's marriage to Mary Ann in the right timeframe, but she was a JOHNS instead of LIPSON. She had married an Andrew JOHNS back in 1818. Couldn't easily spot his death.
Jury still out on the 3rd marriage though.
One that proved to be misplaced was a headstone photograph for Daniel and Mary Ann (LIPSON) SKEWES at Bere Ferrers.
Which made me realise I had him in my database twice, and hadn't fully confirmed whether or not there was a third wife shortly before he died, nor when he and Mary Ann had married (no LIPSON/SKEWES marriage obvious).
The latter was easily solved - findmypast.com now has a heap of Devon records indexed, and there was Daniel's marriage to Mary Ann in the right timeframe, but she was a JOHNS instead of LIPSON. She had married an Andrew JOHNS back in 1818. Couldn't easily spot his death.
Jury still out on the 3rd marriage though.
Wednesday, 3 November 2010
3rd: Coincidence time again
Last week - investigating a Greenlaw Headstone featuring Isabella FAIRBAIRN as second wife of a George SUTHERLAND, merchant of Greenlaw - finding that her parents were a Robert FAIRBAIRN and Janet AINSLIE.
Nothing much else available to be readily found on Robert and Janet.
Today - using the introductory 24 hour free access offer to findmypast.com.au, finding a Robert FAIRBAIRN, resident magistrate in Freemantle, Western Australia, son of a John FAIRBAIRN of Berwickshire, who emigrated in 1839 as part of the Australind Colonisation Company who settled, or it seems, tried to settle, Bunbury, Western Australia. John and family moved from there to the Murray, and thence, with 2 of their sons and 3 daughters, on to New South Wales, where I eventually found his death notice - died 1872 in his 72nd year, youngest son of a Robert FAIRBAIRN, Esq. of East Gordon, Berwickshire.
The daughter left behind in Western Australia just happened to be a Jane Ainslie FAIRBAIRN, and the only other fact I'd gleaned last week was that Robert and Janet (AINSLIE) had a son John baptised in Gordon in 1800.
Youngest son does rather imply that there are more to be found somewhere, and I've not identified the sons that went to NSW with the family as yet, nor confirmed that an Agnes FAIRBAIRN I found married to a John CRIGHTON is one of the daughters who went to Sydney (I can find his death, their son Philip's birth, and marriage (to Florence THYNNE), and some information on Philip and Florence's son John Fairbairn CRIGHTON, but there my search ended - can anyone place Agnes in the FAIRBAIRN families?).
Nothing much else available to be readily found on Robert and Janet.
Today - using the introductory 24 hour free access offer to findmypast.com.au, finding a Robert FAIRBAIRN, resident magistrate in Freemantle, Western Australia, son of a John FAIRBAIRN of Berwickshire, who emigrated in 1839 as part of the Australind Colonisation Company who settled, or it seems, tried to settle, Bunbury, Western Australia. John and family moved from there to the Murray, and thence, with 2 of their sons and 3 daughters, on to New South Wales, where I eventually found his death notice - died 1872 in his 72nd year, youngest son of a Robert FAIRBAIRN, Esq. of East Gordon, Berwickshire.
The daughter left behind in Western Australia just happened to be a Jane Ainslie FAIRBAIRN, and the only other fact I'd gleaned last week was that Robert and Janet (AINSLIE) had a son John baptised in Gordon in 1800.
Youngest son does rather imply that there are more to be found somewhere, and I've not identified the sons that went to NSW with the family as yet, nor confirmed that an Agnes FAIRBAIRN I found married to a John CRIGHTON is one of the daughters who went to Sydney (I can find his death, their son Philip's birth, and marriage (to Florence THYNNE), and some information on Philip and Florence's son John Fairbairn CRIGHTON, but there my search ended - can anyone place Agnes in the FAIRBAIRN families?).
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