Newsletter
- 11th August 2014
The
Great War: "What did you do in the war, mummy?"
Red
Cross WW1 Prisoner-of-War records go online
Military
Medals at The Genealogist
WW1
film clips online at the Imperial War Museum
'Mons
Mary' - a war horse comes home
WW1
mystery: Who killed Private John Parr?
Dorset
Quarter Sessions Order Books now at Ancestry
2021
Census to go ahead: government finally agree
Oxford
Dictionary of National Biography
What
do all those symbols mean?
Do
you live in the US? Save 20% with AncestryDNA
DNA project to make UK world leader?
Save 20%
on Genes Reunited subscriptions
The LostCousins newsletter is
usually published fortnightly. To access the previous newsletter (dated 30th
July) click here, for an index to articles
from 2009-10 click here, for
a list of articles from 2011 click here and for a
list of articles from 2012-13 click here.
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there's a new edition of this newsletter available!
The Great War: "What
did you do in the war, mummy?"
Until now most of the events and
broadcasts commemorating the centenary of World War 1 have focused on the men
who risked their lives in combat - but without the efforts of their wives and
mothers, sisters and daughters, the war could never have been won.
During the Great War more than 1.5
million women volunteered their services to fill the gaps left by the men who
had gone off to fight. Hundreds of thousands worked in munitions factories,
over one hundred thousand became nurses, and tens of thousands worked as tram
drivers, ticket collectors, or filled other essential roles.
This evening, at 9pm on BBC2, Kate Adie
presents a one-hour documentary that focuses on the changes in attitudes to
women between 1914-18, and the impact they had on women's lives and
opportunities once that war was over.
Tip:
if you miss the Monday broadcast the programme will be repeated on Wednesday at
11.20pm (and should also be available on BBC iPlayer).
The BBC website also has a guide
entitled What did
World War One really do for women? which I
suspect includes some of the same material - most of the information is in the
PDF files, so be sure to click the links.
Whilst women volunteered to help in the
first war, many of them had little choice in World War 2 - on 18th December
1941 King George VI signed the first Royal Proclamation calling-up women under
the National Service Acts.
Although at that point only single women
and childless widows between the ages of 20 and 30 (inclusive) were called-up,
the second National Service Act provided for women up to the age of 50 to be
conscripted, and this prompted many women to volunteer so that they would have
some degree of choice over the nature of their contribution.
I've recently finished reading an
excellent book which describes the experiences of 31 women during World War 2 -
they were interviewed by Mavis Nicholson over 20 years ago, so sadly many of
them will have passed away since. Some names are well-known - such as the
author Mary Wesley, the actress Molly Weir, and the singer Anne Shelton (who
died just 2 weeks after she was interviewed) - but most are not, however I
found all of the accounts fascinating, and I was intrigued to discover that I
have a connection of sorts to two of them!
What
Did You Do In The War, Mummy? was originally
published in 1995, but was re-released in 2010. I paid just £2.80 on Amazon for
a used copy in very good condition (the price included delivery), but I now
feel guilty at having paid so little - because it really is an excellent read.
If you missed out on the spectacular
half-price subscription offer last month - for whatever reason - you'll be glad
to hear that findmypast.co.uk
are once again offering a one-month Britain subscription for the bargain price
of ONE POUND!
Simply click here
to take advantage of this great opportunity to learn more about your English,
Welsh and Scottish ancestors - whether in the censuses, parish records,
military records, newspaper articles or any of the other millions of records at
findmypast.
There are similar offers at findmypast.ie,
findmypast.com.au,
and findmypast.com
- but of course you won't get access to British records, only local records.
Whichever offer you choose please bear in mind that this special rate is for
the first month only - the subscription will renew automatically at the full
price of 9.95 unless you un-tick the ‘auto-renew my subscription’ box in the My
Account section of the site.
Note:
you may see other similar offers, but only by using the links above will you be
supporting LostCousins!
When the price is so low it surely isn't
a question of whether you can afford it - but of whether you can afford not to.
But if you're new to findmypast.co.uk, or aren't yet familiar with the new
site, make sure you read my tips articles so that you make the most of this
great opportunity:
Masterclass: searching parish registers at findmypast
(July 2014)
How
to get the best from findmypast (April 2014)
Believe me, anybody who says they're
struggling with the new site almost certainly hasn't read those articles!
Red Cross WW1
Prisoner-of-War records go online
It's 3 years since I first reported the plans of the International
Committee of the Red Cross to make available their records in time for the
centenary - so I'm glad to report that they've met their target.
This PDF
document explains the records held - which unfortunately are fairly
limited. You can search the index cards here.
Military Medals at The Genealogist
The
Genealogist have recently added records of the
117,000 Military Medals awarded for acts of gallantry during the Great War. The
equivalent of the Military Cross (which prior to 1993 was only given to commissioned
officers) it was awarded to non-commissioned officers and ordinary soldiers -
and to men and women alike.
You can search the records here
- the search itself is free.
WW1 film clips online at
the Imperial War Museum
There are over 1000 film clips from the
Great War online now at the Imperial War Museum's main website, but it's a
little difficult to navigate so I'd suggest following this link.
There's also a new dedicated WW1 search
page at findmypast.co.uk which you'll find here.
'Mons Mary' - a war
horse comes home
Over a million horses and mules were
deployed by the British Army in the Great War, but only horses owned by
officers were certain to return when the war was over - and many of the oldest
and weariest horses, the ones who had seen the most action, were destined for
the knacker's yard.
Gaye sent me this wonderful story about
one horse that eventually made it back - I hope you enjoy it as much as I did:
After the war ended the Government
said it could not afford to bring all the surviving war horses back to England.
Many of them were to be sold to France and Germany and some were simply shot. My
great uncle who managed the Maypole store in Portsmouth held some lovely
parties for the returning troops, and he got to know about a horse called Mons
Mary that its rider, Sergeant-Major Budden,
desperately wanted to bring back to England and so he decided to launch an
appeal to raise some money.
He wrote to the editor of the
Portsmouth “Evening News” asking for help: The horse had been in nearly every
action of war from start to finish and both horse and rider had come through
unscathed. Sgt Major Budden had had to leave his
“dumb friend” behind and had received information that his horse had been
classified for sale in either France of Belgium. He appealed for a lover of
horses to give this “dumb hero” a better home. A further letter from him said
he had received a visit from an RSPCA Inspector who had taken this up with the
Society’s Chief Secretary and been informed that the Society would do their
utmost to get the horse back to England.
The next letter reported some
very good news. The Duchess of Portland had taken a great interest in the horse
and contributed the remainder of the balance required to purchase the horse for
the sum of £37 4s 3d and the safe return of the horse.
The final letter came from the
Chief Secretary of the RSPCA saying how pleased he was, and the news would be
of great interest to the children of the infants department of Cottage Grove
School who contributed their halfpennies and pennies and sent £2 to the Mons
Mary fund; to Mr Vernon Lovatt, "the genial
manager of the Maypole Company, a staunch friend of dumb animals", and to
the RSPCA Inspector who first took up the case and of course Sgt Major Budden.
Subsequently Sgt-Major Budden sent a photo of himself mounted on Mons Mary to my
Great Uncle, with the following inscription on the reverse:
"Mons Mary went through the
Great War without being wounded. I worked hard to get her back to England,
& am happy to say that I succeeded, & she is now living a life of ease
at Welbeck Abbey.
The Duchess of Portland bought her. Just lately the Duchess of Portland
has offered me Mons Mary as a Gift."
What a wonderful end to the story.
I have the original newspaper cuttings and the original photograph which is
printed on a postcard.
I never met my great-uncle but I
inherited his love of horses.
You can read more about the role of
horses during WW1 in this BBC article.
WW1 mystery: Who
killed Private John Parr?
I was intrigued by this article on the BBC website - I
wonder if the mystery will ever be solved?
Dorset Quarter Sessions
Order Books from 1625-1905 now at Ancestry
Parish registers and Poor Law records
for Dorset have been online at Ancestry for a while, but the latest addition
appeared just after my last newsletter was published.
As you'll see, the Quarter Sessions
Order Books document the decisions in a wide range of matters - your ancestors
need not have been criminals to be mentioned! You can search the records here.
2021 Census to go ahead:
government finally agree
It may have seen like a formality, but
there have been some frayed nerves while we've been waiting to find out whether
the government would accept the recommendation of the National Statistician
that the 2021 Census should proceed. You can read the
government's response here
(it's a PDF file so you may see a security warning).
However, as you'll see from the letter,
this decision only relates to 2021 - the government are still looking for an
alternative solution after that date.
Oxford Dictionary of
National Biography
There are now nearly 60,000 entries in
the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, which aims to feature everyone who
has shaped British history and culture from the Romans onwards. A full set of
60 printed volumes would cost you over £1000, but fortunately many people
reading this will, like me, have free online access using their library card.
Tip:
make sure you know what online resources are available through your local
library - for example, many offer access to newspaper archives (I used The
Times archive when researching my article about the conscription of women), and
if I went down to the library in my village I could also get free access to
Ancestry.
The first thing I did was to check
whether there were any famous people who bear my surname - I thought that perhaps
the famous telescope maker George Calver (no
relation) might be listed, but he wasn't. However, I did learn that there was
an Edward Calver (also no relation, so far as I know)
who was writing poetry around the time of the Civil War.
Eventually I realised that I could
search the full text of the articles, and in so doing discovered that the
overlooked George Calver had in fact been mentioned as
the supplier of telescopes to two gentlemen deemed more worthy of inclusion.
The individuals chosen are an eclectic
bunch as this entry
for Henry Croft, the original "Pearly King", demonstrates. I was also
interested to read this blog article
which describes how that particular entry was researched - many thanks to Jo at
the ODNB who sent me the link after her father forwarded a copy of my
newsletter. This quote from the article has a special resonance for family
historians, who often have to cut away a thicket of misinformation in order to
get at the truth:
"Online
there is no shortage of references to Croft and his 'pearlies',
but it soon becomes clear that much of this material is partial, anecdotal, and
derivative."
I did eventually find an indirect
mention of one of my relatives - she isn't mentioned, but the department at the
Industrial Society named after her is. But that in itself was interesting
because until then I didn't realise that such a department had existed (it
doesn't now). I also found Richard de Montfichet, who
was one of the 25 barons appointed to enforce the observance of the Magna
Carta, and whose ancestor lent his name to the village where LostCousins is
based.
Does anyone from your tree feature?
What do all those
symbols mean?
On your My Ancestors page at the LostCousins site you're likely to see some
or all of the following symbols:
indicates a very recent match
identifies a relative you share with one or more
cousins
means that you share the relative with someone
who is not a cousin (typically they're related by marriage)
To find out who else has entered the relative simply click on the tick. If instead of a name it shows 'new contact' refer to the New Contacts section on your My Cousins page.
indicates that your
entry almost, but not quite, matches another entry
Check your entry carefully against the census to make sure that there
isn't some small difference (remember that you should use the transcription for
the 1880 and 1881 censuses, but the handwritten image for other censuses).
Click the symbol
then either amend the entry, or confirm it as correct.
Note that if you already have matches for other people in the household
it’s likely that the 'near match' is with the same member - so having confirmed
that your own entry is correct it makes sense to contact them so that they can
correct their entry.
shows that you have
attached a note to the record
To view the note either place the cursor over the symbol, or click your
relative's name.
appears after every entry and is there to save you
time
Click the symbol to enter another person who was in the
same household on the census - most of the Add
Ancestor form will be filled in automatically, saving you lots of time and
effort (as well as reducing the chance of a typing error).
For a reminder of how the My Ancestors page works click 'How to
use this page' at the top right.
Do you live in the
US? Save 20% with AncestryDNA
Until 27th August AncestryDNA
are offering 20% off their autosomal DNA test, which can give a guide to your
ethnic origins as well as providing links to possible cousins - this brings the
price down to just $79.
Alternatively, take out a new 6 month US
subscription to Ancestry.com
and get a free DNA test!
Note:
these tests are only available to US residents; if you live elsewhere I recommend
Family
Tree DNA, the company I use myself.
DNA project to make UK world leader?
The government plans to sequence the DNA
of 100,000 people who have cancer or rare diseases in the hope that targeted
therapies will prove more effective than blunt instruments like chemotherapy.
You can read more about the plans here.
Save 20% on Genes Reunited
subscriptions
During August you can save 20% on any
subscription at Genes
Reunited when you click this link
and enter the code SUMMER20 on the payment page.
Tip:
the 12 month subscriptions are by far the best value, but please bear in mind
that the records available with a Platinum subscription are only a subset of
what's available at findmypast.
When I was in Norfolk recently I visited
the parish church of St Helen's in Ranworth, and
noticed the war memorial in the church was unusual in showing the names of all
those who fought in the Great War, whether or not they survived:
The men who gave their lives are
indicated by the letters R.I.P.
In the graveyard at Happisburgh
I found this memorial on top of a small mound - as you'll see it was recently
placed there to commemorate a sad event that took place over two centuries ago:
It's not only at time of war that mariners are buried far from home -
there were merchant seaman from far away who were buried in the churchyard and,
of course, I only saw the ones whose gravestones had survived - many wouldn't
have had gravestones.
This is where I'll post any last minute
additions.
Thanks for taking the time to read my
newsletter - I hope you find it useful.
Peter Calver
Founder, LostCousins
© Copyright 2014 Peter Calver
You
MAY link to this newsletter or email a link to your friends and relatives
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