avins yard, atherstone · 2015-12-01 · cv2 1hl tel: 024 7661 6880 committee member & ray hall, 4...

Avins Yard, Atherstone

NUNEATON AND NORTH WARWICKSHIRE FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Member of the Federation of Family History Societies

http://www.nnwfhs.org.uk

JOURNAL OCTOBER 2002 Price £1.50 (first copy free to members)

Nuneaton & North Warwickshire Family History Society - Journal Page 1

NNWFHS COMMITTEE

CHAIRMAN PETER LEE, P O Box 2282, Nuneaton, Warwicks CV116ZT Tel: (024) 7638 1090 email [email protected]

SECRETARY LEIGH RIDDELL, 14 Amos Avenue, Nuneaton, Warwickshire CV10 7BD Tel: (024) 7634 7754

MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY JOHN PARTON, 6 Windmill Rd, Atherstone, Warwickshire CV9 1HP Tel: (01827) 713938 email [email protected]

TREASURER & CELIA PARTON, 6 Windmill Rd, Atherstone, Warwickshire CV91HP NORTH WARWICKSHIRE CO-ORDINATOR Tel: (01827) 713938 email [email protected]

LIBRARY & PROJECTS CO-ORDINATOR CAROLYN BOSS, Nuneaton Library, Church Street, Nuneaton, & VICE CHAIR Warwickshire CV11 4DR Tel: (024) 7638 4027

JOURNAL & PUBLICATIONS EDITOR PAT BOUCHER, 33 Buttermere Ave, Nuneaton,Warwicks CV11 6ET & MICROFICHE LENDING LIBRARIAN Tel: (024) 7638 3488 email [email protected]

MINUTES SECRETARY & ALVA KING, 26 Thirlmere Avenue, Nuneaton, Warwicks. CV11 6HS BURIALS INDEXING PROJECT Tel: (024) 7638 3499 email: [email protected]

PUBLICATIONS MANAGER CHRISTOPHER COX, 9 Binswood Close, Coventry, W Midlands. CV2 1HL Tel: 024 7661 6880

COMMITTEE MEMBER & RAY HALL, 4 Thornhill Drive, Nuneaton, Warwickshire, CV11 6TD BURIALS INDEXING PROJECT Tel: (024) 76 744647 email [email protected]

COMMITTEE MEMBER STEVE CASEY, 16 Cliveden Walk, Maple Park, Nuneaton, Warwicks CV11 4XJ Tel: (024) 7638 2890 email [email protected]

WEBSITE MANAGER BILL BOSWELL, 21 Randle Road, Stockingford, Nuneaton,Warwicks CV10 8HR Tel: (024) 7634 3596 email [email protected]

NORTH AMERICAN REPRESENTATIVE HARLOW G FARMER, 7427 Venice Street, Falls Church, VA, USA. Telephone 22043 703 560 6776 E-mail [email protected]

CONTENTS PAGE NNWFHS Committee 1 NNWFHS Diary - A Report From The Chairman, Peter Lee. 2 Letters to the Editor 3 Hertford Hill Sanatorium - By Alan Croshaw 4 Cousin Harry - By Jacqui Simkins 7 The Ratherams and Broad St Presbyterian Church, Birmingham - By Andrew J Ratheram 8 Help Wanted and Offered 9 How Can We Be Sure We Always Remember to Respect The Dead - By Alan F Cook 10 A Genealogical A to Z - By Dr Ash Emery 11 In The Name Of The Father, A Personal View - Part 2 - By Tony Davis 15 The Ensor/ Shakespeare Connection - By Peter Lee 16 Nuneaton’s Greatest Author: Where Was He Tried? - By James Sambrook 19 Get Netted 20 Notice board 21 New Members/ New Members’ Interests 22 Publications 23


On Saturday July 20th we organised a visit for members and guests to Mancetter church and Polesworth Abbey. Many of us in North Warwickshire have ancestors doing their church business at Mancetter although the village today is overshadowed by the nearby town of Atherstone. First time researchers are often confused as to why there are no church records for Atherstone when their relatives records are all at Mancetter, and yet they lived in an important coaching town on the Watling Street. I always feel a bit on shaky ground when trying to explain this, as I am not knowledgable enough to talk about the history of Atherstone in much detail. There have been some well researched books on the town over the years and if anyone needs references to them please let me know. In addition there is an excellent ‘Atherstone Online’ web-site. Suffice to say that Atherstone was a chapelry of Mancetter until 1825 when its own church records (baptisms) begin. The Church of St Peter at Mancetter is a lovely old solid stone building with almshouses adjacent and a nearby 13th century Manor House. The interior of the church has been made warm and comfortable. There are monuments to the Saxon Bracebridge family descended from Osbert, son of Churchill de Arden by his second wife Leverunia, heiress of the Saxon kings and earls of Mercia. In the church yard there are many names we are familiar with in our researches. The church yard is kept in very good or-der with neat floral displays. In the afternoon we were entertained by Father Phillip Wells, the vicar of Polesworth Abbey (with Birchmoor) www.Polesworthabbey.co.uk. Of course, the Abbey is no more. It was dissolved in 1539, and the property passed to the Goodere fam-ily. Our visitors to the church were made very welcome by Father Phillip, who is a great character, and we all warmed to him. He is certainly full of lively stories and enthusiastic about his work and the parish. We discovered too that he was a fine musician and a maestro on the church organ. He served us tea in the church rooms which are attached to the vicarage, a nineteenth century structure which looks to have been recycled from various parts of the former Polesworth Hall, which had in turn been reconsti-tuted from the former Abbey monastic buildings. I was fascinated by the great stone fire place in the church hall where tea was served. If I recall correctly this was taken from the old Abbey and re-used in the Hall. Its appearance now was that it was well worn with time and I could imagine, in my minds eye, Michael Drayton - the poet, William Shakespeare, Ben Johnson, John Donne, and the other important Elizabethan literary figures standing in front of it about the year 1600, as the guest of Sir Henry Goodere, taking refreshment after visiting Sir Henry to access his great library. I was pleased to see that Father Phillip had published a leaflet on the possibility of Shakespeare being one of Sir Henry’s literary set, so I sent him my researches on the subject. We were fascinated by the church and the old Abbey precincts which are steeped in history, not least a great mound in the church yard which I suspect is a heap of building materiel left over after the old Hall and Abbey buildings were rebuilt. This rather prompted me to consider writing to the Channel 4 TV and Discovery Channel programme “Time Team” to come along and put a few slot trenches through it. Maybe there is more lurking below the surface there which would shed considerable light on this interesting part of old North Warwickshire! On Saturday, September 14th we were engaged - jointly with the Nuneaton Society and the Chilvers Coton Trust - in opening to the public the 18th century school rooms at the Chilvers Coton Heritage Centre as part of the Civic Trust’s Heritage week-end. Many historic listed buildings were opened but our local and family history event was a big draw. The place was crowded in the morning but the afternoon turn-out was slightly down on last year. We speculated it might have clashed with a soccer match. September is one of those months when there are a large number of outdoor events competing for trade at the tale end of the summer season. Thanks to everyone who came along and supported this event, especially those of you who brought along your research to share with us. Amongst our visitors were Jim and Lilian Enzor from Willow Springs, just outside Chicago. They had centred their UK trip on Nuneaton to take in this event and explore their Ensor ancestor’s roots. I took them to the village of Ednesor on the following Sunday with a tour around Chatsworth, the seat of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire which is adjacent. The original village of Ednesor in Derbyshire was dismantled and re-built as a model village a little further away from the house in the 19th century. Each year we aim to hold jointly with the Nuneaton Society, a learned lecture on an aspect of local or family history in Nunea-ton. This is called the Mike Palladino Memorial Lecture to honour one of our fellow founding members of the Nuneaton Society. Last year our subject was the Stratford family 17th century lords of the manor of Nuneaton. This year it will be given by Stuart McKay on the early history of the De Havilland aircraft company founded by Geoffrey De-Havilland whose father was vicar of the St. Mary’s Abbey Church in Manor Court Road, Nuneaton. Over the years we have forgotten to think of Geoffrey De-Havilland as one of Nuneaton’s Worthies and I hope this will redress the balance. It will be held on Friday October 18th in the Council Chamber at the Town Hall, starting at 7.30pm. Please let me know whether you are able to attend as admittance is by ticket. Please contact me by e.mail: [email protected] or by phone: 024 76 381090. A small entrance charge will be levied to cover the cost of the speaker who will be travelling from St. Albans for the lecture which will be illustrated with slides and possibly cine film.

NnwFHs Diary A Report From The Chairman, Peter Lee


Letters to THE EDITOR It is all in the genes

I had to smile at Tony Davis’s article in the most-readable July 2002 Journal! It reminded me of a phrase I was told many years ago when I first got hooked on genealogy and was encouraged to research female lines rather than male ones - “The mother is the mother, the father is who the mother says he is.” I have to admit that I am partially reassured to have descended from an early child of my 5xgt grandfather, who was still siring children at the ripe old age of 70 when his second wife was 46. The doubt comes in latter years, as there was an assistant miller – who was the same age as the wife!! Of course we now have DNA testing, should anyone wish to check the possibilities. Whilst it is, to a degree, amusing to cogitate on what might have been, there can be a down side to inherited genes: there are current research projects for genetic illness. My mother’s family has a dominant and seri-ous trait to hypertension with sudden death from heart attack. Grandmother was 47, her four adult daugh-ters were aged 47-65, when they died and we cousins are now being “picked off”: two down (one male and one female who just managed to see her 61st year), four to go, three of whom are known to be hypertensive. It is not a particularly pleasant state of affairs as the same health problem runs in the descendants of grand-mother’s sister and possibly in other lines that I am not in family contact with. My own GP was sceptical when I suggested my hypertension was genetic: however, when the tests proved nothing else was wrong, and a particularly stressful period at work saw a decrease (albeit miniscule one) in blood pressure, it was acknowledged that my genes were likely to blame. Some of us therefore would like to find the odd gene eliminated - be it by indiscretion, as in Tony’s article, or medical science. In the meantime we keep taking the pills and hope for science to find a cure. Anon.

Griff Hollows In the very early years of WWII (I would be about 3 or 4) a nice Sunday after tea walk was from Heath End Rd along the Coventry Rd towards Bedworth and into Griff Hollows. The massive grassy bank to the left had a rabbit hole every yard apart in all directions and sitting at almost every burrow was a beautiful big rabbit. My parents taught me a little poem:- The furry little rabbits keep very, very, still, and peep at me across the grass as I go up the hill, For if I venture near them or even stop to play, the furry little rabbits run right away! I now live in Dobcross in the Pennine Hills and don't visit Nuneaton very often, when I do I always try to drive along Hill Top and down the Griff Hollows, 60+ years later - guess what I think about? There was another occasion when I was about 20 and courting my wife-to-be from Bedworth. I had been to see her on my bicycle ( as we all did in those days) and was cycling back home on a week night at about 11.30pm and very tired ( I had started work at 7.00am at Griff No 4 Colliery). You could get a good speed up no matter which way you approached the hollows. My mind floated back to the furry little rabbit days. Being very tired in those few yards down the hill I fell asleep and did not wake up until the bike fell on top of me. Imagine the following morning trying to explain to my workmates why I was walking with a limp and had a badly grazed leg. I am glad they are leaving Griff Hollows alone. Clive A A Ball


Hospitals inevitably feature in our lives; in Nuneaton in the thirties that meant the Manor Hospital and later the “Emergency Hospital” but every Sunday morning a group of people would gather in Bond Gate to await the arrival of the Midland Red bus that would take them to either Hatton or Hertford Hill. Most of them were regular visitors to see long stay pa-tients and there was a communal bond between them. Hatton was the Warwickshire hospital for mentally ill patients and adjoining it was the Hertford Hill sanatorium for the treatment of tuberculosis. At that time both of these illnesses carried a degree of social stigma and perhaps for that reason these hospitals were isolated, but isolated in beautiful coun-tryside with a commanding view of Warwick town dominated by the mag-nificent church and spire of St Mary’s. I never did set foot in Hatton but its Victorian buildings looked rather for-bidding at a distance although it seems that many patients at that time proba-bly should not have been there and were able enough to be employed in farming and other work so that in ac-cordance with the Victorian work ethic the place was run at compara-tively little cost. Rest, however and not work was the theme at Hertford Hill Sanatorium, or to give it its correct title “The King Edward VIIth Memorial Hospital. It was opened in 1924 and closed in the 1980’s and having spent nearly two years there as a patient I thought that it would be useful to give a first hand ac-count of life there for the record. I was first diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis in the spring of 1947 when I was 19. At that time it was virtually a death sentence although with the optimism of youth, that was not something that I took too seri-ously. Such was the demand for treat-ment that the waiting time for a bed was then eight months and so I had to wait at home and rest. A few years later the NHS tackled the backlog by sending patients to the famed moun-tain clinics in Switzerland, and some

went from Nuneaton. I myself did not lack visitors, since none of my many friends were deterred from visiting me, for which I was grateful, but the time did drag and I was relieved to fi-nally catch the train and alight at Milverton station from where a few others and I were collected by van. The basic treatment was to imbibe lots of fresh air, and the buildings reflected this. Pavilions four and five were brick built but at the top of the hill was a long wooden building with a verandah along its length - this was Pavilion six and my home for the next eight months. It comprised 24 cubicles: twelve single, twelve double, each with but three walls and a mere three foot wall to the verandah so that when it was snowing and the wind was in the wrong direction you got snow on the bottom of your bed! Fortunately it was spring and I was able to acclima-tise. I was in a double bunked cubicle with an extrovert Irish lad and since nearly all the nurses, mostly male, were Irish too I felt like a second class citizen as they chatted animatedly to John Patrick with their backs to me. I had not the political nouse of my wife who, arriving at St Joseph’s at the age of seven, told her fellow pupils that she was “from Hanley - near Ireland!”

In fact the first person to speak to me was the Bookies Runner who inquired “any bets?” for the treatment was gen-erally quite leisurely and the challenge was to find ways of combating bore-dom and this included occupational therapy, chess, solo whist for ambu-lant patients and getting up to mischief in various ways such as I quickly dis-covered when I received unsolicited mail advising me on “Ventilation”! Routine was the overriding factor and yet I struggle to remember some of the details? One difference to other hospi-tals was that we numbered plates and mugs and metal “spittoons” with lids that were all boiled up each day. The meals were cooked centrally and brought out to the pavilions by porters on trolleys but despite their best ef-forts it was never hot. Breakfast was porridge although many patients had cereal brought in by their visitors and this was followed by fried bread with sausage or bacon and egg but served lukewarm it was not a good start to the day. Then the ward would be tidied up ready for the doctor’s round. For pa-tients solely on bed rest the burning question was would they get “an hour” because if your temperature stayed down you were allowed to dress and get up, initially for one hour each day for a week, after which it would be in-creased to two hours and on attaining three hours this meant that you could walk down to the dining room for the midday meal where the female pa-tients also dined, but at the opposite end of the room. When my friend George got to this stage, as did his wife who was also a patient, it was only after strong representations that they were allowed to sit together - in isolation - at a little table at the front and right under the nose of Sister! In continental fashion we had a com-pulsory siesta called “Rest Hour” when even ambulant patients had to lie on top of their beds from twelve until one, mainly I suspect to allow the staff time for lunch, after which the patients were aroused for their meal. I was a patient there on the very day that the National Health Service was inaugu-rated when we were told that in future

(Continued on page 5)

HERTFORD HILL SANATORIUM By Alan Croshaw

Pavillion 6, which was my home for 8 months.


(Continued from page 4) if we broke our personal thermometer we would not have to pay the one shil-ling towards its replacement. However on the next day the spirit of years of prudent spending prevailed and the or-der rescinded but after a few weeks we saw the first sign of the revolution, a sprung interior mattress appeared on the ward which was naturally allo-cated to a patient confined to bed. The rest of us had straw filled pailliasses with not a lot of straw which were very uncomfortable so that when a week later dozens of the new mat-tresses appeared, one for each patient, there was a carnival atmosphere and we all thought that the NHS was in-deed wonderful.

One lasting memory that I have on combating boredom was the experi-ment with the News of the World crossword. Four of us decided to sub-mit a combined permutated entry, per-mutating the six most ambiguous clues and sending in the maximum number of entries each. Since we were in two adjoining double bunks we had to shout to one another in our delibera-tions and since it was three weeks be-fore our first entries were published, some of the other patients gave us a hard time, but when at last the papers were delivered - to our glee we read that we had won three first prizes and eight second prizes and although this only amounted to twelve pounds each as it was a low dividend - this was Week 1!! The rest of the sanatorium - patients and staff - all thought that we had found a way to print money and clamored to join our syndicate but we calculated that to add just one more clue to our perm would need nearly a hundred more entries and said no, but

we never won again, and with cash prizes of thousands of pounds, being just one clue off a winning entry was frustrating - but we did savour our mo-ment of glory. Apart from rest the treatment in vogue was pneumothorax, whereby air was introduced into the chest wall to par-tially collapse the lung and allow it to heal. This involved fortnightly refills with x-ray screening over a long pe-riod with discharged patients returning as outpatients for many months as I did. I was discharged in 1949, catching a bus outside the main gate and recall that the bus conductor had a machine that printed your ticket when he turned a handle instead of a pre-printed col-oured one. The aforementioned stigma raised its head when I reported back to work at the Coventry Colliery laboratories with a medical note to the effect that I was “fit for work” I was sent home and my P45 followed in the post the next day! Unbeknown to the manage-ment however, although it was a staff appointment, I was a member of the Transport & General Workers Union, having been advised to join a trade un-ion at the time of nationalisation and after a quiet word by the T&GW Area Secretary to the NCB Area General Manager I was quickly reinstated. After just over a year of resuming my normal lifestyle my fortnightly visit for screening revealed that the disease had returned and infected the top of my other lung and I was quickly read-mitted (to pavilion 5) but this time with some apprehension although I soon realised that the atmosphere had changed; patients were not dying regu-larly and there was a new optimism about the place. Streptomycin and P.A.S. had arrived, prescribed in liquid form to save money, but it was the most foul tasting medicine imaginable. Peppermints were the common anti-dote although it took nearly an hour for the taste buds to recover. My treatment was then a brand new one, called postural retention and in-volved raising the bottom of my bed by two feet and lying on one side against a board and never raising my head above horizontal. It took some

days to get used to but the other pa-tients were supportive and my chess improved no end. This treatment proved to be very effective and within eight weeks the cavity had completely closed when I was visited by Mr Leigh-Collis, the surgeon, who told me that they would shortly remove a few of my ribs to ensure that it stayed closed. This created strong feeling on the pavilion since the waiting time for this operation (thoracoplasty) was eight months and as others had already been waiting for months I was accused of “having friends in high places!!” But the nurses and the more level headed patients used sweet reason to good effect and peace was restored. Much later I learned that just at that time they had discovered that by al-lowing postural retention patients to get up to await surgery the healing was undone and irreversible and I was the very first male patient at Hertford Hill to benefit. After Christmas I was transferred from my fresh air environment to a sub-tropical surgical ward in Lakin Road general hospital in Warwick It was a four bedded annexe and the other men on the ward thought that we were pri-vate patients since we were segregated and were prescribed a bottle of stout each evening. The surgery went well and I was at last able to return to a ver-tical stance and start to convalesce considerably aided by attractive young lady sadists who were called physio-therapists. However, to my surprise, and way ahead of schedule, in order to free my bed I was whisked from my hot house environment back to pavil-ion six. The contrast could hardly have been greater; the roads were covered with snow and ice in a prolonged bit-terly cold spell. It was too slippery to push a wheelchair up the steep hill to Pavilion 6 and so I had to walk, very gingerly, with a nurse on each arm - one of whom, Kathleen, shrieked with amazement to find that I was tall, hav-ing only ever seen me with my feet in the air. I was put in a single bunk between two old inhabitants who were hibernating under the bedclothes which I was un-able to do as I could not lie down but the nurses took up the challenge with enthusiasm and I was clad with two vests, thick pyjamas, polo neck pull-


Me in 1952 at Hertford Hill Sana-torium, Warwick.


(Continued from page 5) over, bed-jacket, woolly hat and muf-fler plus six hot water bottles changed two at a time day and night. However, what kept my spirits up was the radio (via earphones, which also kept my ears warm) that is until King George VI with a deplorable sense of timing was inconsiderate enough to die. For a long long week the BBC broadcast ab-solutely nothing but funereal music. It was too cold on the hands to read for very long and my spirits sank lower than the mercury in the thermometer and time seemed to stand still. At long last Family Favourites reap-peared, the sun came out and I was transferred to a double bunk with a kindred spirit. It was like awakening from a bad dream. Ted, my new bunk-mate was good at leatherwork and so I took it up and designed and made a pigskin camera case. Occupational therapy was a thriving concern; partly because it was something to do and for some married men a source of income. One chap made a quality, hand sewn leather handbag each weekday and on Sunday his wife collected them to sell. I had previously made silk dressing ta-ble sets and embroidered a linen table-cloth, even stitching it to my pyjama leg! Most of the Irish nurses had moved on and had been replaced by young Ger-man girls most of whom were called Hildegarde. Their alleged lack of hu-mour was tested to the full as we re-wrote German history arguing amongst ourselves as to the date that The Reichstag burned down. The girl within hearing would of course correct us and with very straight faces we would assure her that she could not possibly be right and she would get would get very worked up about it un-til eventually the penny would drop and we would all have a good laugh. For all ambulant patients there was a weekly weighing ceremony but unlike

“weight watchers” we were all anxious to gain weight since tuberculosis or “consumption” as it was once called was a wasting disease and at that stage I was actually gaining one pound every week to the envy of many. After the trauma of January and Feb-ruary these were the best weeks of my sojourn there. Our pavilion Sister was a dragon but on Saturday, her day off, both patients and staff relaxed. She-lagh’s father kept pigs and so she used to bring me in home cured bacon. Ted, my bunkmate, had asked his wife to bring in a frying pan and so on Satur-days he would sneak into the kitchen to fry bacon and eggs, fresh and hot and for us - “Cordon Bleu” and since there was enough for four my popular-ity soared but this came to an end when it was decided that I was now ready for more surgery and taken back to Lakin road to have the original dis-eased lobe of my right lung removed, a fairly new operation but for me un-complicated and this time the weather was more amenable. Shortly after my return to Pavilion 5 to convalesce the Medical Superintendent, Dr Budge, a martinet, caught me out of bed one evening making tea for four patients confined to bed. The German nurse on duty however assured him that I had asked her permission to go into the kitchen, which I had, and said that I was a very well behaved patient. She was reprimanded and I narrowly es-caped expulsion. Dental care was by a Coventry dentist who volunteered his services once a month for no fee and on the occasion that he varied his date and only Pavil-ion 6 got the message I was his sole patient and since he did not want to waste his time I had two extractions and four fillings and took to my bed. When a patient was “up all day” he was encouraged to exercise by walk-ing and the only place to walk any dis-tance was down the long entrance

drive but only as far as a large sign warning “Patients are not allowed be-yond this point without permission” It was about 20 yards from the gate and main road and a red public telephone booth and a temptation to many! An old stager observed that Saturday af-ternoons were very quiet and follow-ing his advice one sunny day I crossed the road and walked over to the nearby canal and along the wondrous flight of locks. It was another world. We were also allotted minor tasks and I brushed and ironed the only snooker table - Pavilion 5 had a recreation room. Unusually I also managed, with the help of my surgeon, to be allowed to work for one hour five days a week in the carpenters shop. Duke, the car-penter, who had made the board and chocks for my postural retention was surprised when I told him that I wanted to build a photographic enlarger. I described the theory of it all and Duke quickly came up with a clever design quite unlike the com-mercial enlargers as it had a wooden base, column and slide with a large tin as lampholder. I had telephoned from the end of the drive to Len Bott in Nuneaton Camera shop opposite the Council House and he had kindly sent in condenser lenses with Shelagh. With my discharge date looming and my working hours limited Duke did a bit of overtime and it was ready. I even had transport for it as Canon Herbert’s wife from St Nicolas very kindly drove over to pick me up and take me home. Gradually tuberculosis became just an-other treatable illness and at subse-quent annual check ups I was fre-quently told that my surgery would not have been necessary “nowadays” and whilst it was true that sanatoria were happily no longer needed I knew that they had played their part in the battle to overcome the scourge of tuberculo-sis and for me and many others they had literally been life savers.

If you have a photograph or an article which you would like to be published in the next journal please contact Pat Boucher either at the monthly meetings, telephone 024 7638 3488, email [email protected] or by post at 33 Buttermere Ave, Nuneaton, Warwicks, CV11 6ET. I am happy to accept word processed articles or scanned photographs etc on computer disk.

Deadline for all copy to be included in January issue of the Journal is December 7th


Thanks to Peter Lee and Pat Boucher I went along to the Chilvers Coton Heri-tage Centre on 14th September. Both Pat and I have Bates of Mancetter an-cestry and we displayed some of our research: in Pat’s case all beautifully laid out and laminated, with pictures in the right places! Sadly, mine was a patchwork of people, arrows and a rogues’ gallery of unidentified photo-graphs.

Above: My great grandmother, Maggie Bates, born 1875. She was married to Francis Reuben Henry Stevenson and widowed for over 40 years after he died of tetanus in 1916. She died in 1959. Below: Frank Stevenson, born 1900, son of Maggie, pictured in 1949 at his son’s wed-ding.

The unnamed photographs were in a box that recently came back to my fa-ther – it had belonged to my great aunt and great grandmother. Some were annotated “ten months of age”, or “Aunt Jane Bates with fondest love…[in a hand much like Maggie’s] Cousin Harry”. (Maggie’s mother was known as Jane). Most say nothing and, being in Nuneaton I hoped beyond hope that

someone would recognise one as being in their collection also. My father re-calls childhood visits to Bates relatives in Nuneaton, I therefore felt that some of the photographs had to be members of the Bates family – but which ones and who were they? Sadly nobody claimed a relative, but one person commented, “isn’t that the same chap as on Pat’s?” which prompted much comparing of photo-graphs. There are similarities - not least in both being “cousin Harry”, though my photograph was from what appears to be a Melbourne Australia photographer, whilst Pat’s “Cousin Harry” was in America. A third and slightly later Harry, brother of Maggie, was renowned for working in shirt-sleeves, in all weathers.

Above: Harry Bates “cousin” on Pat Boucher’s side, born 1863, who emigrated to America. Right top : “Cousin Harry” photographed in Melbourne and sent with the greeting “Aunt Jane Bates with fondest love”. Right bottom: Harry Bates, born 1880, of Browns Farm, Arley, brother of Maggie ———————————————– It is amazing how lateral thinking kicks in when two individuals with probable links into the same family discuss possibilities together. There is a facial boldness in both families, re-called by Pat as “the Bates’ nose”. Some of Pat’s “cousins” from the past have a likeness to some of my contem-poraries who also descend from the

Bates line. We have not unravelled the puzzle, but went away with ideas for further research! As I doubt DNA testing will become the norm in the foreseeable future, others tracing par-allel lines are recommended to meet, compare information and family leg-ends in addition to their “hard facts”: it may enable you to climb one of those unassailable brick walls. Tele-phone calls and emails would not have spotted the likenesses amongst our photographs: it took an onlooker! Peter Lee suggested a “gathering” of descendants and others with a Bates interest from Nuneaton & North War-wickshire. Maybe something should be organised…anyone interested? If so contact me or Pat Boucher and we will see what we can arrange.

“Cousin Harry” By Jacqui Simkins


Upon reading the article in the last is-sue “Some possibilities from the re-cords of non-conformity” by Jacqui Simkins I thought that my experiences in this field may be of some interest to other readers, as it turned up some in-teresting facts that were previously un-known to me. When my parents first met, my mater-nal grandad, Fred Vizor, (I always called him Pop) upon hearing that my dad’s name was John Ratheram, said that as a child in the 1920s he was a Sunday scholar at Broad St Presbyte-rian Church Sunday School where he could remember there being an old man in charge known as Daddy Ratheram, who sat at the back with a long cane. Unfortunately, dad had never followed up this fact and, as he and both my mother’s parents had died by the time I became interested in ge-nealogy, it became a matter of interest to me. Fred Vizor had attended Broad St all his life, becoming a full member in 1930, and an Elder in 1950. The church was originally situated in Broad St Birmingham but this build-ing was sold due to internal prob-lems – too complicated to go into now but never the less fascinating - and the church moved into the old Sunday School building in Ozzells St North, just behind Broad St. As a child the place had fascinated me, my parents were members for a short time and my brother was christened there. As Nan was also a prominent member we spent many hours there at jumble sales, beetle drives and various family parties. I can never smell coal gas now without being instantly trans-ported back to the downstairs room where everybody used to meet (the church proper being on the first floor). The Church was closed, due to com-pulsory purchase in 1969, but not knocked down for several years. I used to still see it on the number 3 bus going down Broad St. The site is now the Sea life centre. Sunday night on Broad St, waiting for a bus after the service in the late 1960s was a bit like a ghost town –it is a bit different to Broad St now with all the clubs and pubs, etc.!

Anyway back to the point of this somewhat rambling article. When the church did close down, no one was really interested in all the records that had been kept over the years (Mom said there were cupboards full of old books) so Pop kept one of the old Sun-day School Minute books and gave it to me. It was dated February 3rd 1883 - October 14th 1895 and many of the entries were signed by James Ratheram, Sunday School Superinten-dent. Pop also gave me a “Potted His-tory Of Broad St Presbyterian Church” by R.W. McKenzie, just three pages of notes culled from the records that no longer seemed to exist. In them was mentioned “16 November 1923, the resignation of Mr Ratheram after 70 years service” but even more interest-ing was the entry “Mr Rotherham was appointed caretaker of the church from Christmas Day 1834”. The spelling of the surname was different but was that due to a typing error or could the two both be Ratherams and related to each other? A further entry was “January 1883, J Rotheram appointed Elder”. Three different spellings on three pages certainly made it worth another look. I checked the name in the Min-ute Book and that was definitely Ratheram. I started to try to find out what hap-pened to the original records. The problem was that the Presbyterian Church no longer existed, having be-come part of the United Reform Church in the 1970s. I could find no mention in Birmingham Library. I asked Mom and she thought they had all gone to Carrs Lane Church but they had no knowledge of any items from Broad St. I checked central Presbytery records at Oxford and they had noth-ing either. I Phoned Birmingham Li-brary again and spoke to a different department who got back to me later to say they had some original docu-ments that had recently come to light and would I like to see them? Would I!! I took a day off work to see what I could discover. On arrival and after checking in I asked to see what information they had. I was surprised at how much was available but also how much was

missing. There were no Sunday School minute books so mine must be the only survivor. I decided to consult the Communion Roll first. This ap-peared to be a continuation book, as it started in 1854, but it provided my first bit of good luck as listed in 1854 were Charles and Martha Ratheram who were my great, great, great grand-parents. Their address, given as Oozells St North, was also correct. I continued on through the book. James appeared in 1874 - I knew he was the son of the Charles above and was my great, great grandfather’s elder brother. James’ wife Eliza was listed in 1875, then an Emma in 1883 (I don’t know who she is yet). John James, son of James and Eliza appears in 1888 and is listed as leaving in 1901/2. In 1883 James is mentioned as a member of Session and listed as an Elder of the church in 1886. I contin-ued on through the book to the end, Fred Vizor appearing in 1930 and Rose Vizor, my Nan, appearing in 1941. There were no other Ratherams listed, so was the caretaker appointed in 1834 my Charles? I found another docu-ment, a list of members from 1853, and number 168 was Charles Ratheram who was admitted by ex-amination November 1st 1833. This was good enough proof for me, the caretaking must have been a part time job as he always described himself as a Japanner, the occupation given in the member list along with an address of Mill St. Martha’s date of joining was February 2nd 1850. The interesting thing is that they were having their children christened in St Phillips, the Cathedral Church in Birmingham, be-tween 1829 and 1837. I know that Martha was christened in a Baptist Chapel, so perhaps they had to agree on a compromise for the christenings! I still haven’t found Charles’ christen-ing, so I think he may have come from nonconformist stock too. I spent more time calling up various documents and items from the store, one of which was a minute book of the meetings of the Elders. As I was now running out of time I started to flick


The Ratherams And Broad St Presbyterian Church, Birmingham By Andrew J Ratheram


(Continued from page 8) through the book from the back, look-ing for any Ratherams. I started to find references to “Mr Ratherams problem” and on 6th September 1844 entry number 192 read “Resolved that the Treasurer be authorised to pay Mr Ratheram the salary due to him of £7-3-6, deducting there from the sum of £2-14-0, the deficiency not yet made up to replace the loss” This was intriguing to say the least, what had happened? Why weren’t the Elders paying out? What had hap-pened to the money? How much was involved? There were more references on the pages until I came to entry 124 on 12th May 1843 which read “The Treasurer explained that Mr Ratheram had been robbed of a very consider-able portion of the amount collected from seat rents for the current quarter and that he was in attendance to ex-plain what had happened. Mr Ratheram was introduced and in very great detail explained the whole cir-cumstances connected with the rob-bery and the measures taken to en-deavour to find out the parties, the substance of which was as under: - Mr Ratheram had let part of his house to

lodgers of respectable appearance and in the afternoon of Monday 24th April, his room had been entered and a box broken open from which the money £24-18-0 belonging to the funds of the Church (besides some money of his own) £2 1-5-0 of which belonged to the seat rent and the £3-13-0 to the fund for the increase of Ministry Sti-pend - at the same time his lodgers disappeared and have not since been heard of . Mr Ratheram was ques-tioned by the committee as to all the circumstances and requested to retire” The Committee resolved to express their sympathy with Charles, but ex-pected him to repay the money, which must have been a huge sum for him to find in those days. They allowed him to approach the occupants of the rented seats to see if they would pay again and resolved that each member of the committee of Elders would give what they could to help, a sum of £9-1-0 being raised by the committee. The problem rumbled on until late 1844, but by 20th August 1847 it was “resolved that Mr Ratheram’s salary be raised from £6-10-0 to £10-0-0 per annum” so he must have been back in favour by then.

In the 1841 census there are seven members of the Ratheram family liv-ing in Swallow St in the centre of Bir-mingham. With lodgers as well it must have been quite crowded but it gives some idea of the way families lived in those days. They also moved around a lot, living at five different addresses between 1829 and 1861 by which time they had moved to the back of number 4 Oozzels St North, where Charles’ son John - my great, great granddad - was still living as late as 1914 accord-ing to the rate returns for the district. So there you have it, a church connec-tion between my paternal and maternal families dating back from nearly 170 years ago. It was strange to think that I had been in the very same rooms that Charles must have known so well and where his son James had been in charge of the Sunday School for so long, retiring in 1923 and dying in 1924 aged 88. What would Pop have thought as a small child had he known that his daughter would marry a rela-tive of the old man at the back of the class! It’s good to know that a family legend has been proved right.

Mr Michael Cooke, Member 136, 3 Berkshire Court, 205 St. Mary Church Rd, Torquay, Devon, TQ1 3JT. Tel: 01803 323242 John COOKE, station master at Kingsbury, is listed in a directory of 1864. Does anyone know anything about him please? Was he one of the Cookes of Baddesley Ensor and Hurley or was he ‘imported’ by the railway company?

Brenda Adams, Member 258, 17 Lawford Grove, Shirley, Solihull, West Midlands B90 1EX A book that has been in the possession of my family for years has the fol-lowing names handwritten on the inside cover: Joseph L ADAMS, Coton Road Nuneaton. Edward PALMER, Bedworth, Nune 1818. M BALL Bulkington 1827. Are the names familiar to anyone? They may be mem-bers of my family but I am not sure. Tony Davis, email [email protected] A framed Certificate has come into my hands. It was presented by Coven-try Archediaconal Church Extension Society to Hannah PICKARD in 1886. It was for The Lent Examination at Bedworth Central School. I have never heard of this Coventry etc Society. From some casual research I believe Hannah Pickard was born at Bedworth, 14.5.1854, the daughter of William and Hannah Pickard. Later, there are two marriages for a Han-nah Pickard: the first o William BIRCH 24.12.1872, and the second to Joe JONES 19.5.1875. It would be nice to find an ancestor of this young lady to pass it on to. I have also sent a Copy to Bedworth Echo.

HELP WANTED AND OFFERED

NNWFHS HELPLINE

Peter Lee (024) 7638 1090

6.30 - 8.00pm Mon to Sat

Or email: [email protected]


What do 1852, metal polish, Birming-ham Middle Ring Road and recent church extensions have to do with each other? (I hear you ask!) If you have hobbies and a profession like mine - an awful lot. I remember when they landscaped the churchyard at St Nicolas many years ago, the headstones were lifted and moved, turf was laid after some ‘rotovation’. Over the next few weeks I was amazed at how many human teeth and small bones were revealed. They were be-yond identification, but probably came from areas of the cemetery that were used before 1852. I wonder if some were from Joseph Scrivener? When Coton Road was widened in 1974, the difficult decision was made to take some of the Catholic Church graveyard. This involved the emo-tional task of exhuming many graves, some not that old. I was a witness to that process and must say I found it harrowing. Most of these were post 1852 and details were well known from burial records and ‘plot’ maps. I had visited the Catacombs in Rome and worked on Roman skeletal re-mains from Smockington Hollows when it was first widened in the 1960’s. With those experiences and others, I thought that I was equipped to deal with our ‘mortal residues’ (to quote Dr John Watson in: Hound of the Baskervilles). What I next encountered I was not prepared for. During the building of the last segment of the Birmingham Ring Road (mid 1980’s) a churchyard had been carefully searched and many bodies found and re-buried with dig-nity. However, I had a phone call at my office, I was on call-out, and had to go. When I arrived at the church-yard the bulldozers had been cutting down through the soft brown sand-stones and they had broken into a cata-comb “Birmingham style”. I had to go into the catacomb, which I found very upsetting and chilling and it took a long time to get over it. There were 6 or 7 lead-wrapped slate coffins on brackets fixed into the sandstone walls. The bodies were almost mum-

mified. Needless to say we started the search to find out whom they were. That process took a long time and there were no obvious clues to their identity (and no church records). Eventually a family was tentatively found and the bodies buried with names. Why is 1852 so important? The Burial Act of that year forced all burial to be at the new depth of 6 foot. This was a reaction to increasing outbreaks of ill-ness (cholera, gastro-enteritis etc.), growing awareness of germs and bac-teria, groundwater contamination from nearby rivers and cemeteries etc. Prior to that, burials were literally as shal-low as 18” to 24” (450mm to 600mm). To end my account, a mystery grave was encountered during the construc-tion of a parish room at a local church. The site had been excavated by ar-chaeologists in accordance with Plan-ning Policy Guidance Note 16 Archae-ology and Planning (2001). The trou-ble was that did not go deep enough and the cemetery burial plans did not record the grave. So who were they and when were they buried? But more to the point how do you begin to find out? Well that process is still going on – it can take a long time. The depth was exactly 6 Feet – so it was after 1852. The bones that I saw were defi-nitely from a male skeleton. The skull sutures fully closed – at least 28 yrs old, teeth quite worn with caries – per-haps early 50’s? Adjacent burials were in the late 19thC. There were handles, very dirty, but when I polished them they were good quality brass, with no true corrosion – just tarnish. The cof-fin looked good quality with some slate, lead traces in its lid and floor. How did this person ‘fall through the net’ of bureaucratic administration? He may have been the last person on the last page of the register. That page got ‘dog-eared’ or even ripped so the entry was lost? In 1856 there were changes in who held the Manor, Sam-uel Bracebridge Hall died, it then passed to Bracebridge Heming Hall; Rev. G Sanford remained as the Vicar. The castle, Manor, estate and lands were being split up and there are

pieces of archival evidence missing for this period. The parish never really regained its former stability after that. The railways came, land was agricul-turally altered, the castle fell into growing disrepair and then came the houses. So who is the mystery guest beneath the floor – he will be identified one day when all the evidence has been sifted through. Hopefully there may be a plaque made to mark his final resting place. But it would be even better if we did not have to take peoples’ final resting places. It would be better if we took the excavation and search more seriously, diligently and earnestly. If it had been a pot of gold, would things have been different? A maxim of these troubled times with all their financial dabblings: If you do not want to find something, you won’t!

How can we be sure we always remember to respect the dead? By Alan F Cook

The Spelling Chequer By Linda Percival

I have a spelling chequer It came with my pea see,

It plane lee Marx for my revue Miss steaks I cannot sea,

Each thyme when aye have struck the quays,

I weight four it too say If watt I rote is wrong or rite, It shows me strait a weigh.

As soon as a mist ache is maid, It nose bee four two late,

And eye can put the err or write As this rime demon straights. I’ve run this poem threw it,

And I’m sure your policed too no Its’ letter perfect in it’s weigh –

My chequer told me sew!

Note from the editor: I have seen many and various versions of this poem often attributed to different authors, so I hope I have given credit to the correct one and, if not, I apologise. It made me smile, especially as I’m probably guilty of some of these errors in the journal!!


This A to Z has been taken from the pages at Genuki and is reproduced in this journal with the kind permission of the author. A few amendments and ad-ditions have been made by the editor. Please note that some addresses and telephone numbers may have changed since this information was written so please ensure that you check the dtails before either visiting or writing - Pat Boucher AGRA - Association of Genealogists & Record Agents ASGRA - Association of Scottish Genealo-gists & Record Agents AUGRA - Association of Ulster Genealo-gists & Record Agents BigR - British Isles Genealogical Register BL - British Library BMD – Birth Marriage and Death BTs - Bishops' Transcripts CHI – Catherine House Index CLRO - County of London Record Office CRO - County Record Office FFHS - Federation of Family History So-cieties FHC - Family History Centre (of LDS), also known as FHL (FH Library) FHLC - Family History Library Catalogue FHS - Family History Society FRC - Family Records Centre FTM - Family Tree Magazine GEDCOM - Genealogical Data Communi-cation GOONS - Guild of One-Name Studies GRD - Genealogical Research Directory GRO - General Register Office IGI - International Genealogical Index IHGS - Institute of Heraldic & Genealogi-cal Studies IRCs - International Reply Coupons LDS - Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints LMA - London Metropolitan Archives MIs - Monumental Inscriptions NBI – National Burial Index NNWFHS - Nuneaton and North Warwick-shire Family History Society ONS - Office of National Statistics PAF - Personal Ancestral File PR – Parish Register PRO - Public Record Office RO – Register Office SH - Somerset House SoG - Society of Genealogists —————————————————- ADOPTIONS: Adoptions have been legal in England and Wales since 1927. Previously children were "fostered" and tracing natural parents of a fostered child is close to impossible. The GRO maintains an Adopted Children Regis-ter and indexes thereto may be exam-ined at FRC. The indexes give the adopted name of the child and date of adoption but not the names of the natu-ral parents. Two forms of certificate can be issued but only the full should be ordered. The full certificate includes the adoptive name and surname, sex, date of birth and (where known) coun-try or district of birth, details of the or-der (date and court) and particulars of the adoptive parents. The Children's Acts of 1975 and 1989 enable an adopted person over the age of 18 years to exercise his/her right to obtain a copy of the original birth certificate af-ter counselling. A pamphlet, Access to Birth Records, is available from the Registrar General, local Social Services Departments or adoption societies. The

National Organisation for Counselling and Adoptees and their Parents (NORCAP) exists to help adoptees and (presumably) both types of parents. It is located at 3 New High Street, Heading-ton, Oxfordshire, England, OX3 7AJ. There is also an organisation named Adopt-A-Link who advertise regularly as "specialists in tracing birth families for adopted children." Adopt-A-Link is run by P G Peacock, 3 Mulberry Court, Meadow Way, Petworth, West Sussex, England, GU28 0EP. AGRA: The Association of Genealo-gists and Record Agents was founded in 1968. Sooner or later you will need professional help in your research, par-ticularly if you are researching your British ancestry from abroad. AGRA has a code of practice so there is pro-tection for clients located outside the UK. A list of members can be obtained for a small fee from the Secretary, AGRA, 29 Badgers Close, Horsham, West Sussex, England, RH12 5RU. ANCESTRY: Webster's defines ances-try as a line of descent or persons initi-ating or comprising a line of descent. Before you begin tracing your own an-cestry, write on paper what you want to accomplish. Talk to relatives. Seek out old papers. Look for entries in family bibles. Know what it is you want to do before you spend real money. Access the ever increasing riches of the Inter-net's World Wide Web. Check whether someone has previously researched your area(s) of interest. Check what names are registered with the GOONS. Visit your local reference library. See if there is a FHS dedicated to your area of research. Visit your local LDS FHC. View the IGI and refer to the library's books and materials. Order appropriate fiches and/or microfilms. If you live outside the UK, complete your prelimi-nary research before you contact or-ganisations in the UK. APPRENTICESHIP RECORDS: Many records exist for children and men learning a trade. Guilds, some dat-ing from the Middle Ages, evolved to protect members of a particular trade (first) and the public (second). The Statute of Apprentices of 1563 required an individual to qualify in his trade by serving an apprenticeship. The appren-tice would typically serve a period of seven years' training before being ad-mitted to the guild. The apprenticeship indentures were signed by the guild master and the apprentice's father or guardian. Many of these indentures sur-vive and not just for the famous Lon-don livery companies. Check records held at SoG, the CROs (including the LMA) and see what exist on microfiche or film in the FHLC at your nearest FHC. ARCHIVES: There are many record repositories and libraries in the UK that are of value to the researcher such as the various components of the British Library. Among hundreds of others are the PRO, the Guildhall Library, the Na-tional Libraries of Scotland and Wales

and the Library of the Society of Gene-alogists (SoG). Most initial research is likely to be undertaken at the FRC (perusing the Civil Registration indexes or winding through microfilms of the Victorian censuses). Every County has a CRO and there are LDS FHCs situ-ated in major centres throughout the world. The FFHS issues a free leaflet called You and Your Record Office. Various books and many useful guides to archives are obtainable fromFFHS, SoG and other specialist genealogical book services. ARMY, NAVY & AIR FORCE: War deaths are accessible at FRC in separate registers to civil deaths. Most of the re-cords relating to military service are held at the PRO. Various archives are held covering the Home Office, For-eign Office, War Office, Army, Royal Navy, merchant navy, Royal Air Force, etc. The Imperial War Museum has a department of documents that include British private papers and captured German documents. The War Museum is at Lambeth Road, London, England, SE1 6HZ. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission was set up to iden-tify and maintain the graves of Com-monwealth forces killed in World Wars I and II. Records are also kept of those who have no known graves. In late 1998 the Commission put its records online on the Internet. This is a phe-nomenal, and free, fully searchable ar-chive for those researchers fortunate enough to own a PC with access to the World Wide Web. For those many re-searchers not online, information in-cluding photographs of known graves can be obtained from the Commission at 2 Marlow Road, Maidenhead, Berk-shire, England, SL6 7DX. Two special-ists in military research are Sunset Militaria, Dinedor Cross, Hereford-shire, England, HR2 6PF who have an index to over 5.5 million soldiers enti-tled to medals from the First World War and Dennis James of 18 Mill Lane, Toft, Cambridgeshire, England, CB3 7RW who undertakes RAF research. ASGRA: This is the Scottish equiva-lent of AGRA. Write for a list of mem-bers and specialised services to the Sec-retary, ASGRA, 51/53 Mortonhall Road, Edinburgh, Scotland, EH9 2HN. AUGRA: The Association of Ulster Genealogists and Record Agents is based at Glen Cottage, Glenmachan Road, Belfast, Northern Ireland, BT4 2NP. BANKRUPTCY: Falling into debt was a crime until relatively recent times and was not an occasional misdemean-our. Over 30,000 debtors were arrested in England in 1837 alone. An individ-ual not engaged in business but de-clared insolvent prior to 1861 could not be made a bankrupt but could be sent to prison until his debts were settled. A commercial trader heavily in debt often escaped imprisonment but was declared a bankrupt. After 1861 an insolvent person and a bankrupt were treated


A Genealogical A to Z By Dr Ash Emery ©

Nuneaton & North Warwickshire Family History Society - Journal Page 12 (Continued from page 11)

similarly. The London Gazette, first published in 1665, regularly and re-morselessly printed notices of bank-ruptcies. Complete copies of the Ga-zette are held at PRO, SoG and the British Library, and various indexes ex-ist. Other journals publishing similar notices were the Scottish Gazette, the Times, Gentleman's Magazine and Perry's Bankrupt & Insolvent Gazette. The PRO also holds records of the Court of Bankruptcy and registers of bankruptcy actions as well as records of certain debtors' prisons including Mar-shalsea where John Dickens, father of Charles, was imprisoned. CROs and the Newspaper Library are useful if one is researching a known insolvent or bank-rupt in a particular time frame. BANNS: A marriage by banns necessi-tated the banns (announcement of mar-riage) being called in the parishes of both of the intended at three weekly in-tervals before the marriage. Wealthier people frequently married by licence to avoid the unnecessary publicity. Many old banns books and copies of licences are still available. It is worth checking the FHLC at an FHC or the archives at the appropriate CRO. Be aware that an entry in a banns book or the existence of a licence does not prove a couple was married BAPTISMS: Records of British baptisms have been maintained by law since 1538. The early baptism records were usually jumbled together with the marriages and burials and some of them were written in Latin but by 1732 all regis-ters were required to be written in Eng-lish. During 18th century the baptisms, marriages and burials were maintained in separately. For the first 200 years it was normal to record only the father's full name and that of his child in baptis-mal entries, so proving ancestry for a popular surname is often difficult. Re-member, the date in a baptism entry is not the birth date. Typically, a child was baptised a few days or weeks after birth but this is not always the case. The obvious starting place to search for baptisms is the IGI. When searching for baptisms don’t forget that your ances-tors may have been non-conformists. BERNAU's INDEX: A card index of about 4 million slips mainly relating to individuals involved in court cases, re-cords of which are held at the PRO. The index relates chiefly to 18th cen-tury Chancery Proceedings and was compiled by the late C A Bernau. Mi-crofilmed copies of the index may be viewed at SoG or ordered at any FHC. BIBLE: Old bibles often contain re-cords of a particular family's births, baptisms, marriages, deaths and burials. Check with your parents, grandparents and cousins to see if your family has the basis of a history. BigR: The British Isles Genealogical Register (BigR) is a directory of re-searchers' interests. The BigR was ini-tially published in 1994 with similar aims to those of the GRD but limited to Britain and with surnames sorted into county order. A further edition was published in 1997. The BigR is obtain-

able on fiche from FFHS Publications, 2/4 Killer Street, Ramsbottom, Lanca-shire, England, BL0 9BZ. Individual fiche by county may be obtained from the appropriate . BIRTHS: (See Civil Registration and Certificates.) BISHOPS' TRANSCRIPTS: These are copies of the parish registers com-pleted on an annual basis by the clergy and forwarded to the local bishop. The practice commenced in 1598 but those transcripts that still exist must be checked where possible with the origi-nal registers as not all copies are accu-rate. BRITISH LIBRARY: Most collec-tions of The British Library, the na-tional library of the United Kingdom, are housed in a huge custom built premise facing St Pancras Station in London. The Department of Manu-scripts has huge collections from the Magna Carta through copies of most books published in Britain and the old Empire to Captain Scott's diary com-piled on his last South Pole expedition. This department also contains cata-logued collections of family archives including pedigrees, title deeds and cor-respondence. The BL was formed in 1973 from four previously separate na-tional libraries and is at Euston Road, London, England, NW1 2DB. There are two further archives of particular interest to researchers: the India Office at 197 Blackfriars Road, London, Eng-land, SE1 8NG and the Newspaper Li-brary at Colindale Avenue, London, England, NW9 5HE. The India Office has archives of the East India Com-pany, the India Office and Burma Of-fice and is an invaluable source if your ancestor served on the sub-continent.. The Newspaper Library has a large col-lection of 18th, 19th and 20th century publications. This is a useful repository if your ancestor "made news" and you are aware of the date(s). Obituaries were not so common in 19th century but newspapers carried news stories and advertisements, which could be useful if your ancestor was a local poli-tician, land owner, tradesman or crimi-nal. The newspapers are both national and local, and most are originals al-though some are on microfilm. BOYD's MARRIAGE INDEX: 533 typewritten volumes of English mar-riages between 1538 and 1837 com-piled by the late Percival Boyd. The in-dex contains about 7 million entries or about 12% of all marriages before 1837 and is located at SoG. Like the IGI, Boyd's should be treated as an index with all extractions subsequently checked against the appropriate parish registers. CALENDAR: Current arguments on whether the second Millennium ended on the last day of 1999 or 2000 fade into insignificance compared to previ-ous radical changes in the calendar. Un-til 1751 England and Wales followed the Julian calendar whereby the year commenced on Ladyday, 25 March and ended the following year on 24 March. Lord Chesterfield's Act of 1751-52 stated that the year 1752 would begin

on 1 January and end on 31 December. In addition, and in 1752 only, the calen-dar was adjusted to omit eleven days - 2 September 1752 being followed by 14 September. The "new" calendar, known as the Gregorian calendar, had been adopted by Scotland and the coun-tries of continental Europe over 150 years earlier. Dates between 1 January and 25 March and prior to 1752 are typically dated for both calendars by researchers and historians. Thus, a bap-tism on 3 February 1712/13 means the event occurred in 1712 under the pre-vailing Julian calendar but by today's (Gregorian) calendar would be recog-nised as occurring in 1713. (Note: It is not unusual to find errors in transcrip-tion due to the confusion of the calen-dar before 1752. One source book pub-lished in the 1930s by an eminent re-searcher contained many errors in dat-ing events.) CATHOLICS: Only marriages in the Anglican church were legal after the in-troduction of Hardwicke's Marriage Act of 1754. Catholics were allowed to worship in their own churches from 1791 but they still had to marry in An-glican churches. Most surviving Catho-lic registers date from the late 1700s and most are from the north of Eng-land. Many have been published by the Catholic Record Society, 114 Mount Street, London, England, W1X 6AX. The Catholic Family History Society is based at 2 Winscombe Crescent, Eal-ing, London, England, W5 1AZ. Marie McQuade of 8 Ecclesall Avenue, Litherland, Merseyside, England, L21 5HQ has an index to over 200,000 Catholic baptisms, marriages and buri-als that took place in Liverpool. CEMETERIES: Many cemeteries, parish churchyards and burial grounds have been mapped and/or indexed for those interred therein. Each modern cemetery has a register which can be consulted for relatives but sometimes at a fee. Many a FHS has indexed ceme-teries within its particular area. Both the SoG and the Guildhall Library have cemetery register holdings. The Com-monwealth War Graves Commission's online Web site gives precise instruc-tions on finding cemeteries (abroad and within the UK) where gravestones or memorials commemorate men and women who fell in the two world wars. CENSUS: The first official census of England and Wales took place on 10 March 1801. Censuses have been taken every 10 years since with the exception of 1941. Details of individuals only ap-peared on a compulsory basis for the first time in the 1841 Census but a Sus-sex researcher was able to provide me with names and ages of individuals from the 1821 Census so do not assume the early years are not worthy of inves-tigation. Because of the so-called 'One Hundred Year Rule', the census returns available for the genealogist are only those up to and including 1901. The 1841 census was undertaken on 7 June, 1851 (30 March), 1861 (7 April), 1871 (2 April), 1881 (3 April), 1891 (5 April) and 1901 (31 March.) The cen-sus returns were for all the population



as at midnight on those dates. The cen-suses of 1841 to 1901 are wonderful pools of research. 1851 to 1901 give more information than the 1841 census but all enable the historian to identify a family at a particular point in time. The addresses pinpoint a family to a par-ticular location although the relation-ships, ages and occupations may not be precise. (An in-law in the 19th century meant something different to what it means today. A son-in-law could mean stepson of the householder, ie son of the householder's wife and therefore a son in the eye of the law.) The 1851 to 1901 censuses provide pointers to an ancestor's parish of birth since there is a 'Where Born' column. The Industrial Revolution resulted in the migration of many people from the countryside to the major cities during the first half of the 19th century. By the time of the 1881 Census the population of London was 3.8 million and living within its bounds were more Scots than in Edin-burgh, more Irish than in Dublin and more Roman Catholics than in Rome. The censuses of 1841 through 1891 are available on microfilm at the FRC. The 1901 has been available at the PRO at Kew and also on line as a pay to view searchable site on the PRO website. Despite early problems it does now seem to be working well. The 1881 census for England, Scotland, Wales, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, and the 1851 census for War-wickshire, Norfolk and Devon are available on computer CD from LDS Distribution centre in Birmingham. They are fully searchable and an in-valuable research tool. Certain copies of the census 1841—1901 are also available at CROs, FHCs, FHSs and at other archives. Many of the streets have been indexed by various bodies includ-ing FHSs. There are various finding aids at the FRC including surname in-dexes for some areas for particular years. The census returns at the FRC are available to the public free of charge. Publications about using the Census include Gibson's Census Re-turns on Microfilm and McLaughlin's Censuses 1841-1891 both available from FTM. CERTIFICATES: (Also see Civil Registration). The GRO registers can-not be examined by the public so a cer-tified copy of an entry of a birth, mar-riage or death will be issued against a reference obtained from the indexes held in huge volumes at FRC or on mi-crofiche at SoG, FHSs and FHCs. Cer-tificates can be obtained in several ways. You can personally visit the GRO at FRC, write to or telephone the GRO at Southport, use the services of a record agent or certificate service, or contact the appropriate Register Office if you know the district where an indi-vidual was born, married or died. The price of a certificate obtained by per-sonal application at FRC or the relevant Register Office is £6.50. Applications direct to the GRO will cost minimum £8 if you have the exact reference they require. ( I have found applying direct to the GRO at Southport to be most useful when applying for marriage cer-tificates as, even when the exact quarter and district is known, some local Regis-

ter offices will not search the registers unless you also provide the name of the church where the ceremony took place). While certificates are not cheap, they are often essential in proving an-cestry. If you are uncertain of the dis-trict where an event occurred and/or you cannot visit FRC, use a reputable record agent or certificate service. The price of a certificate through an agent/service is about £8 if you supply the full reference (ie Name, Year, Quarter, Place and, preferably, Volume and Page Number.) The cost of a five year search and certificate is about £10. CHANCERY PROCEEDINGS: Chancery was the high court of equity in England and Wales. The PRO holds Calendars of Chancery Proceedings containing records of disputes heard by the Court of Chancery from 14th to 19th centuries. (See Bernau's Index.) CHRISTENINGS: (See Baptisms.) CHRISTIAN NAMES: ONS now publishes annual statistics relating to the most popular first names registered in England and Wales. The lists reflects current British preferences for names made famous by Hollywood stars, models, TV actors and presenters. An-cestral research can be helped by nam-ing patterns established centuries ago. A first born son often took his father's name and a first born daughter would be named after her mother. In Scotland and the northernmost part of England a more sophisticated pattern was often used. With male offspring, the firstborn was named after the father's father, the second son after the mother's father and the third boy was given his father's Christian name. The pattern for daugh-ters was a variation on the theme. The eldest was given the name of her mother's mother, the second daughter bore her father's mother's name and the third girl was given her mother's name. Researching Welsh names 300 or more years ago may be difficult because a child was given his father's Christian name as his surname. Even in relatively modern times Welsh research is diffi-cult because of the popularity of sur-names developed from forenames. An-other popular naming pattern in Eng-land was the adoption as a second given name of the mother's surname. This was often given to daughters as well as sons so this helps research in extracting names from registers and indexes. Sta-tistics vary regarding the number of il-legitimate children born in any particu-lar period but 5% is a reasonable esti-mate for the 1800s. The given name(s) may assist in tracking a line of descent. A "baseborn" child of (say) Sarah Brown may be named Thomas Woods Brown or Thomas Taylor Brown with the second name being the surname of the father. We all "lose" ancestors in the Victorian Census or in Civil Regis-tration but they are often there but un-der another name. It is not uncommon to find a child born Anthony John to go through life as John and be buried as such or John A if one is lucky. An an-cestor of mine registered at birth as Madeline Annie was Annie M when she died. Perhaps bigger problems are the diminutive forms of given names. Aunt Polly may have been born Mary.

Other diminutives include Ann (Hannah), Nelly (Ellen or Helen) and Peggy (Margaret). I have also found Ann as a diminutive of Agnes. Jack, currently the a popular name for newly born males in England, was once only found as a diminutive of John. CIVIL REGISTRATION: Lord Mel-bourne's government of 1836 intro-duced two major pieces of legislation: the Marriage Act and the Registration Act. The acts necessitated the creation of a new office, the General Register Office (GRO) in 1837. Under the new legislation, all births, marriages and deaths were to be recorded and appro-priate certificates issued. Copies of the records were kept locally at a parish register office and centrally at the GRO and copies of the entries may still be obtained from either the local (district) Register Offices or the GRO - (see Cer-tificates). Most, but not all, births, mar-riages and deaths were recorded until 1875 when it became an offence not to register an event. The GRO merged with the Government Social Survey in 1970 to form what is now known as the ONS. The Public Search Room was housed at Somerset House from 1837 until 1973 when it moved to St Cath-erine's House (hence still being some-times referred to as the ‘Catherine’s House Index’ or CHI) before relocating to the FRC in 1997. Today there are more than 8,500 leather bound volumes available on shelves for the public to examine. Births are in red covers, mar-riages in green and deaths, appropri-ately, in black. The volumes contain in-dexes with references not original en-tries. A researcher may consult the in-dexes without charge and obtain there-from a reference to a particular event. Then, a form has to be completed for a certificate to be issued at a cost - see Certificates. No certificates are issued on demand, there is a delay of several days if a certificate is collected. There can be a delay of several weeks if a cer-tificate is requested to be mailed. If you are researching at a distance and cannot personally visit FRC, DO NOT write to the GRO but engage the services of a record agent or certificate service. They are much cheaper and much faster since they make both the initial search/ordering visit and the collection visit on your behalf, and will furnish you with the same result - an official certificate of a birth, death or marriage. The Pub-lic Search Room of the GRO is located at FRC, 1 Myddelton Street, Finsbury, London, England, EC1R 1UW. Scot-tish civil registration commenced in 1855. Although there may be an online link to Edinburgh, Scottish records are not maintained at FRC. Irish civil regis-tration commenced in 1864. There are no Irish records at FRC. C O M M O N W E A L T H W A R GRAVES COMMISSION: (See Army, Navy & Air Force.) COMPUTERS: The world of family history research has been changed for-ever by the growth in home use of PCs (personal computers) and the explosion of the World Wide Web of the Internet online service. One cannot totally ig-



nore computers because they are in-creasingly being made available for re-searchers at FHCs, local libraries and many archives so, even if you never own a PC, you may have to become at least partially computer literate. The LDS is moving more of its records on to CD-ROM ) and is selling database indexes to the public at very competi-tive prices. Family History is one of the world's fastest growing hobbies and the personal computer has spawned numer-ous specialised genealogy packages that will maintain a database of your family and generate family trees, ances-try charts and so on. Packages come and go and others change name fairly regularly. Some of the most popular of-ferings at the time of writing are Ances-tral Quest, Brother's Keeper, Cumber-land Family Tree, Family Origins, Family Tree Maker, Generations (Reunion), Kith & Kin, ROOTSWin, the Master Genealogist (TMG) and Ul-timate Family Tree. They all have their strong points and a weakness or two. Before purchasing a package you must ask the question: has it got GEDCOM facilities? (and you MUST have GED-COM for transferring data between the different packages and for sending and receiving family research by disk or e-mail). The original genealogy package sold to patrons by the LDS through FHCs was PAF (Personal Ancestral File), a Microsoft DOS based system still widely used. Other than regular up-grades, I still use what I did five years ago: Windows based Family Tree Maker and PAF. I also use Ancestral Quest, a 100% PAF compatible pack-age, that enables me to manipulate the PAF database in a Windows environ-ment. Researchers downloading IGI ex-tractions from the CD-ROM versions held at FHCs will require additional software such as IGIREAD, GIPSI or IGI255. These utilities convert CD-ROM downloads into a database format for easy processing on you home PC. There are utilities and peripheral pro-grams today for virtually everything: IGI Search is a Windows shareware program that performs searches on IGI data previously downloaded at a FHC; Will Reader is a suite of four programs that enables you to read and interpret old wills and inventories; Birdie and GenMap will display surname distribu-tions geographically; TreeDraw and Family Publisher will make your family tree look that bit different; and there are hundreds more. Some are available as shareware, enabling you to try the prod-uct at a nominal cost before registering as a user. CRO: If you know where your ances-tors were born or once you find out af-ter initial searches at FRC and the PRO, you may want to target CROs. Each old county in Britain had its CRO as a cen-tral repository for its records. CROs typically hold parish registers, probate records, rate books and local census re-turns. Every CRO will have a brochure or guide about its facilities which typi-cally include fiche and microfilm read-ers that must be booked in advance. CURRER-BRIGGS INDEX: The Currer-Briggs Genealogical Index is actually a number of indexes containing

several hundred thousand names taken from wills, PRs, Chancery and other court proceedings, and a large selection of Virginia records covering the period 1550 to 1700. To enquire about the in-dex and for current prices contact Noel Currer-Briggs, 3 High Street, Sutton-in-the-Isle, Ely, Cambs, England, CB6 2RB. DEATHS: (See Civil Registration and Certificates.) DEED POLL: This is a legal process to effect a name change for an individ-ual. This can be confusing to a re-searcher of a 20th century ancestor as anyone can change his or her name un-der English law. (For example, you may search at the GRO for the marriage of a previously married male Jones to a female Smith and not find a matching reference being unaware that Smith changed her name to Jones by deed poll years before the marriage at a time when Jones still had a legal wife.) DIRECTORIES: Before the advent of the telephone and yellow/white pages, a company or individual may have been listed in a directory. Kelly's was the biggest publisher of directories in Eng-land. Kelly's retained a copy of virtu-ally every directory issued and the en-tire collection was deposited at the Guildhall Library but, until recently, was not available for public scrutiny. Nevertheless, the Guildhall Library has an extensive collection of its own which is available for visitors. Most di-rectories were focused on counties (or parts of counties) and towns. Directo-ries will be found in most CROs. SoG has an unusual collection of Dublin di-rectories. DISSENTERS:(This will be covered under Non-Conformists.) DIVORCES: Very few divorces oc-curred before the 1857 Matrimonial Causes Act. Indexes to divorces since 1858 are held at the Family Division, SH, Strand, London, England, WC2R 1LP. Although a 75 Year Rule applies to files and a 30 year rule to the in-dexes, the Divorce Registry will con-sider a search in the records of decrees absolute for researchers. The initial fee is around £5 for searching a specified 10 year period. This could be an expen-sive exercise if the researcher does not know the date of divorce. An alternate route to locating divorces in one's an-cestry is at the PRO, which holds di-vorce indexes (in J78) that refer you to the divorce files containing the most detailed (and often lurid) information in series J77. The indexes are annual so it may take a while to find the reference you seek. Copies of documents from J77 can then be made at a nominal cost. EDUCATION: The registers of vari-ous universities and colleges from the Middle Ages to the 19th century are at SoG. There are also registers of public (in English terminology - private or in-dependent) schools. The SoG publishes a guide of its holdings: School, Univer-sity and College Registers and Histories in the Library of the SoG. You will find that many schools and universities maintain their own archives of registers and photographs, and records may also be found in libraries and CROs.

ELECTORAL REGISTERS: Elec-toral registers or poll books are histori-cal lists of those entitled to vote in par-liamentary elections. These are useful aids if you are seeking an ancestor in a particular parish or town. The Reform Act of 1832 increased the electorate by 50% but most Englishmen and all Eng-lish women still had no vote. The Re-form Act of 1884 extended the fran-chise to two-thirds of the adult male population but women only received the vote after the First World War. Electoral registers and poll books may be examined at many Local Studies and reference libraries, at CROs and SoG. EMIGRANTS: Hundreds of thousands of British citizens left for the old colo-nies in 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. There have been giant strides made in 20th century to identify them. The Famine Immigrants by Ira A. Glazier is a seven volume schedule of Irish immi-grants who arrived at the Port of New York between 1846 and 1851 (and Sus-sex born ancestors of mine with no Irish connection have been found therein). The SoG's library has Ameri-can shelves containing such publica-tions as Filby's Passenger & Immigra-tion Lists Bibliography 1538-1900 and Meyer's Passenger & Immigration Lists Index. The latter comprises 3 original volumes and numerous supplements and contains records of over 2 million passengers who arrived in the USA and Canada. There is excellent archive ma-terial for emigrants to the West Indies and India but less extensive collections for Australia and New Zealand. Immi-grants to these countries should use the superb facilities in the Antipodes. The Society of Australian Genealogists is located at 120 Kent Street, Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia and has over 20,000 books plus extensive records on fiche and computer. There is also an Australian Association of Genealogists & Record Agents. A list of members can be obtained from the Secretary, PO Box 268, Oakleigh, Victoria, 3168, Australia. Please send two IRCs or a large stamped, self addressed envelope. The Archives Authority of New South Wales was extremely helpful to me. The office is at 2 Globe Street, Sydney, New South Wales 2000, Australia. There are also special groups for de-scendants of convicts and first fleeters. The New Zealand Family History Soci-ety is located at PO Box 8795, Sy-monds Street, Auckland, 1035, New Zealand. Moving on to the 20th cen-tury, over 17 million immigrant Ameri-cans passed through Ellis Island be-tween 1892 and 1952. It is believed that at least 40 % of living US nationals can trace their ancestry back to these stal-warts. The Immigrant Arrival Records, held on microfilm at the US National Archives and Records Administration, are being digitised and entered into an electronic database that will be made available at the American Family Im-migration Centre to be located on Ellis Island. For a nominal fee, visitors will be able to obtain a printout of their an-cestors' data and a scanned reproduc-tion of the original ship's manifest. The Genealogical A to Z will continue in the next journal or you can see the complete A to Z through links at www.GENUKI.org.uk


May I emphasise that this follow up is not judgmental or meant to be critical of modern practices in any way, but purely what I perceive may be some difficulties for later genealogists. Part one covered the pitfalls that may be found from ancient records. I em-phasise that, when tracing a family tree, it is so important to make sure that you are researching the correct line, whether it be paternal or maternal branches. Maternal lines from the past are reasonably straightforward to fol-low. Then the mother was the mother but a grey area may have arisen re-garding the father. My suggestion that the majority of ge-nealogists are ‘barking up the wrong tree’ by following a paternal line that is false has increased during the last fifty years. The single mother with her baby are now accepted as the norm in society but is the father named on the birth certificate? Sadly, that same mother may have other children from different partners. Similarly, one of the fathers may have sired children with a number of partners. What details are on their birth registrations. What confusion will arise in future years if those chil-dren research their family tree! Now we face the genetic pitfalls to a family history, created in the latter 20th and early 21st centuries to blow some parts of genealogical study into turmoil. Future researchers could be in ‘Never, Never Land’ as they will have different scenarios to deal with. What of the child who experiences adoption resulting in the trauma of try-ing to trace both genetic parents at a much later date, after having had a se-cure and happy childhood with those he always regarded as mum and dad. Rightly, they will be in a turmoil to trace their

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