Five books I refer to constantly when researching my family history

Jill Ball has suggested writing about five books  especially useful in your family history research.


One of my favourites is the Road to Divorce: England 1530-1987 by Lawrence Stone. Stone's insights on marriage and divorce at different times in history have helped me enormously.

I referred to The Road to Divorce extensively when I was trying to understand the 1849 divorce of my great great great grandmother Charlotte Champion de Crespigny née Dana formerly James. In those days divorces were heard in two courts, the Court of Arches plus a suit for criminal conversation brought before the Queen's Bench,  and also required an Act of Parliament by means of presenting a private bill before the House of Lords. It was extremely expensive to go through the process, and there were only about four divorces a year in England.

In 1987 Fairfax, Some and Weldon published Australians: A Historical Library. While there have been criticisms of the series, for example a 1988 review by Jenny Lee, I have gained a lot from the Historical Statistics volume edited by Wray Vamplew and to lesser extent to of the Events and Places volume. The statistics volume was useful to me when I was trying to understand more about the age at which women marry.

A most encouraging statistical picture of the reduction in the deaths as a result of pregnancy between 1908 and 1980 (click on image to enlarge). 

some statistics on education (click on image to enlarge)

I have often referred to Angus Watson's Lost & Almost Forgotten Towns of Colonial Victoria. I cited it in my post on Carngham. I bought this book direct from the author some years ago. It is now selling on-line for five times what I paid for it.

The page referring to Lamplough - there is a lot of history in the few facts and statistics. (click to enlarge)

I think reading about the context of our ancestor's lives can be most illuminating.  At the moment I am reading London in the 18th century: A Great and Monstrous Thing by Jerry White. I borrowed it first from the library in an attempt to curtail my spending on books - but had to own it, it is so full of information and well written.

My husband Greg is reading Michael Cannon's The Land Boomers which was passed recently to me by my father. He says it is fun. My turn next.

I constantly refer to the family histories written by my relatives. As a way of passing on family history, nothing beats a book!

Some of the family history books written by my relatives

I use LibraryThing to keep track of my books and  the books in my study are organised by the Dewey system.

So many books! So much reading! 

Greg tells me however, that the Chinese say, 书山有路勤为径，学海无涯苦作舟, which means, roughly, 'There is a path through the mountain of books. Work hard to find the way. The ocean of learning has no limit. Work hard to build a boat.'

Related posts

• Divorce of John James and Charlotte Frances née Dana
• N is for Naval husbands
• Carngham
• Family stories

Books

• Stone, Lawrence Road to divorce : England 1530-1987. Oxford University Press, Oxford ; New York, 1990. Work identifier on Trove: http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/18069829
• Australians, a historical library. Fairfax, Syme & Weldon, Broadway, N.S.W, 1987. Work identifier on Trove: http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/13063651
• Watson, Angus B Lost & almost forgotten towns of colonial Victoria : a comprehensive anaysis of census results for Victoria, 1841-1901. Angus B. Watson and Andrew MacMillan Art & Design, [Victoria, Australia], 2003.  Work identifier on Trove: http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/11091065
• White, Jerry London in the eighteenth century : a great and monstrous thing. London Vintage Books, 2013.  Work identifier on Trove: http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/163988431
• Cannon, Michael The land boomers. Melbourne Univ. Pr, Sydney, 1967.  Work identifier on Trove: http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/191686018

References

• Steedman, C. (1990). Vomiting in the marital bed. [Review of the books Road to Divorce, England 1530-1987 and Late Victorian Britain, 1875-1901.] London Review of Books, 12(21), 13-16. Retrieved from https://www.lrb.co.uk/v12/n21/carolyn-steedman/vomiting-in-the-marital-bed.
• Lee, J. (1988). Divers observations on Australians: a historical library. Australian Historical Studies: Making the Bicentenary, 23(91), 141-152. Retrieved from https://minerva-access.unimelb.edu.au/bitstream/handle/11343/34354/66862_00002258_01_Lee008.pdf

Accentuate the Positive 2016 Geneameme

I thought I would take up Jill Ball's challenge again and look back on my 2016 family history researches.

1.  I found some elusive ancestors, the parents and grandparents of my husband's great grandfather Henry Sullivan: Poor little chap

2.  A precious family photo: a cousin of Greg's showed us her family album. In it was a copy of a photo I had from another branch of the family. The presence of this photograph in her album helped to confirm the identity of the two teenagers. Y is for Young family photographs

3.  An ancestor's grave: I have yet to visit the grave in Geelong of my 4th great uncle William Dana but I have seen some photos. On my to-do list for 2017 Trove Tuesday: death of Captain W. A. P. Dana

4.  An important vital record: the 1863 birth of Ebenezer Henry Sullivan - see Poor little chap.

5.  A newly-found family member shared her DNA. Together through shared matches and by reviewing our family trees and birth, marriage, and death records we added a couple of generations to our family tree on my husband's side. This collaboration showed that you need a tree to start the matching process and that DNA alone is not enough. DNA, of course, helps to verify documents that by themselves would not necessarily have been enough to have taken the family tree back further. I need to write up my genetic genealogy experiences.

6.  A geneasurprise I received was eating a cake from a recipe my grandmother often used to use. It took me back decades: O is for Oma cooking from Dr Oetker's "Backen Macht Freude" [geneacake? geneafood?]

Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte made according to a recipe my grandmother followed

7.   I am pleased with all my 2016 blog posts. In researching each blog entry I learned a little more about my family history and was always inspired to keep researching.

8.   I made a new genimate who ... after some years of correspondence it was terrific to catch up with Greg's cousin Sharon

9.  A new piece of software I mastered was Sun charts from MyHeritage.

10. A social media tool I enjoyed using for genealogy was Facebook. I found the group Using DNA for Genealogy - Australia & NZ full of useful advice

11. In order to get the most out of DNA testing I have spent a lot of time during 2016 viewing webinars about genetic genealogy. I found the advice by Crista Cowan on communicating with cousins particularly useful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qG2CiY_6c9Y .

16. I continue to get much useful material from the State Library of Victoria and the Public Record Office Victoria, both in North Melbourne and in Ballarat. These are enormously important repositories of relevant information. On line of course the National Library of Australia's Trove has made a great difference to family history research and I use it frequently.

17. A new genealogy/history book I enjoyed was The Conversations We Never Had by Jeffrey H. Konis. I need to write up my own review of this book. I also enjoyed High Seas & High Teas: Voyaging to Australia by Roslyn Russell.

lifespans of 2nd great grandparents

This week genealogy blogger Randy Seaver has invited followers to look at the lifespans of their second great grandparents.

The mission:

1)  We each have 16 great-great grandparents.  How did their birth and death years vary?  How long were their lifespans?  

2)  For this week, please list your 16 great-great grandparents, their birth year, their death year, and their lifespan in years.  

I maintain an ancestor table spreadsheet using the Ahnentafel numbering system of my own and my husband's forebears.  Sometimes it is very easy to get distracted by the breadth of the family tree. It is useful to look back at the main trunk.

Mine and my husband's great great grandparents are the 3*great grandparents of my children.  They are numbered 32 to 63 on the table

Name	Ahnentafel number	age at death	lived
George Edward Young	32	64	1826-1890
Caroline Clarke	33	44	1835-1879
John Way	34	76	1835-1911
Sarah Daw	35	58	1837-1895
James Cross	36	54	1828-1882
Ellen Murray	37	64	1837-1901
John Plowright	38	79	1831-1910
Margaret Smyth	39	63	1834-1897
Sullivan	40	I do not know anything about the parents of Henry Sullivan
?	41
John Morley	42	65	1823-1888
Eliza Sinden	43	85	1823-1908
Isaac Dawson	44	42	1831-1872
Eliza Skerrit	45	65	1834-1899
Francis Gilbart Edwards	46	65	1848-1913
Caroline Ralph	47	46	1850-1896
Philip Champion de Crespigny	48	77	1850-1927
Annie Frances Chauncy	49	25	1857-1883
Edward Walter Hughes	50	68	1854-1922
Jeanie Hawkins	51	79	1862-1941
James Francis Cudmore	52	75	1837-1912
Margaret Budge	53	67	1845-1912
Wentworth Cavenagh	54	72	1822-1895
Ellen Jane Mainwaring	55	75	1845-1920
August Bolz	56	76	1840-1916
Wilhelmine Bamberg	57	82	1844-1926
Karl Bertz	58	78	1854-1932
Henrietta Ritter	59	80	1862-1942
Mathias Manogg	60	74	1851-1925
Agathe Maria Lang	61	74	1852-1926
Gustav [Alfons] Waldemar Karl Peters	62	44	1860-1904
Agnes Helene Louise Stern	63	57	1861-1918

The average lifespan is 65.8. The median, middle of the range,  is 67 to 68. The average lifespan for men was 67.3 (median 68)  and for women was 64.3 (median 64).

My great great grandmother Annie Frances Champion de Crespigny née Chauncy (1857-1883) died at the age of 25 of pelvic cellulitis after a 3week illness.

Greg's great great grandmother Eliza Morley née Sinden (1823-1908) was 85 when she died of asthenia (weakness) and cancer of the pharynx after an illness of 10 week.

This generation was born between 1822 and 1862. The most recent death of this generation of our family was 1942: my great great grandmother Henrietta Bertz née  Ritter (1862-1942).

My mother with her great grandmother Henrietta Bertz née  Ritter Easter 1941

My grandmother's cousins

My grandmother, Kathleen Cudmore (1908-2013), had many cousins. Her sister Rosemary claimed they had ninety.

Their father, Arthur Murray Cudmore, was one of thirteen children and their mother, Kathleen Mary Cavenagh-Mainwaring, was one of ten.

Two of the bridesmaids at my grandmother's 1933 wedding, Mary and Dymphna Toll, were her cousins. SOCIAL NOTES. (1933, June 12). The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1931 - 1954), p. 5. Retrieved May 12, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article46980229

The children of James Francis Cudmore (1837-1912) and Margaret née Budge (1845-1912):

• James Kenneth Cudmore (1867-1948) had four children
• Margaret Jane Cudmore (1869-died young)
• (Arthur Murray Cudmore, Kathleen's father, had two children)
• Violet Mary Cudmore (1872-1947) had three children
• Kenneth de Lacy Cudmore (1874-1940) had two sons
• Dorothea Nevill Cudmore (1876-1925) had one son
• Thomas Cecil Cudmore (1877-1926) had no children
• Rosa Florence Cudmore (1879-1954) had five children
• Daniel Cashel Cudmore (1881-1966) had one child
• Alexandrina Budge Cudmore (1882-1953) had three children
• Mary Jane Cudmore (1883-1884) died as an infant
• Mary Paringa Cudmore (1887-1952) had two children
• Robert Milo Cudmore (1889-1969) had four children

There were 25 Cudmore cousins for the two daughters of Arthur Murray Cudmore.

The children of Wentworth Cavenagh (1822-1895) and Ellen Jane née Mainwaring (1845-1920):

• James Gordon Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1865 – 1938) had four children
• Eva Mainwaring Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1867 – 1941) had two children
• Mabel Alice Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1868 – 1944) had two children
• Wentworth Rowland Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1869 – 1933) died without issue
• Orfeur Charles Cavenagh (1872 – 1890) died without issue
• (Kathleen Mary Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1874 – 1951), Kathleen's mother, had two children)
• Hugh Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1875 – 1953) had three children
• Helen Maud Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1877 – 1918) had three children
• Alice Mainwaring Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1879 – 1952) had two children
• Gertrude Lucy Cavenagh-Mainwaring (1882 – 1968 ) had one child

There were seventeen Cavenagh-Mainwaring cousins for the two daughters of Kathleen Mary Cavenagh-Mainwaring.

In total my grandmother Kathleen had 42 first cousins.

Some of my grandmother's first cousins once removed. Members of the Cudmore family who owned "Adare" at Victor Harbor. Back Row, l-r: Roland, Henry, Mary (Minnie), Paul. Front Row, l-r: Collier, Martha, Daniel H;, Danny (on footstool), Milo DATE ca.1900 From the State Library of South Australia image B 48077. Daniel Henry Cashel Cudmore (1844-1913) was the brother of my grandmother's grandfather.

As their grandparents were all from large families, Kathleen and her sister Rosemary had many second cousins. Their great grandparents on the Cudmore side had 52 grandchildren, including the 13 children of James Francis Cudmore. 39 of those grandchildren were the first cousins of Kathleen's father Arthur Murray Cudmore and thus my grandmother's first cousins once removed. The children of the 39 cousins were Kathleen's second cousins.

On the Budge side, Kathleen's grandmother, Margaret Budge, had two brothers and two sisters but only one of the brothers and one of the sisters had children and there were only five grandchildren other than the thirteen Cudmore grandchildren.

Kathleen's grandfather Wentworth Cavenagh had six brothers and sisters. Only one brother had two sons who survived. 

On the Mainwaring side, although Kathleen's great grandparents had seven children, only one, Kathleen's grandmother Ellen Jane Mainwaring had children. Thus Kathleen had no second cousins from this side of the family.

In total my grandmother Kathleen had 46 first cousins once removed. This calculation does not include the younger generation, the children of her first cousins.

My own cousins

I have only two first cousins, the daughters of my mother's sister. My father was an only child and my mother had one sister. These cousins do not have children so there are no first cousins once removed downwards.

My mother had no first cousins. Her father was an only child and her mother's sister had no children. She is, however, close to a cousin of my grandmother's, and also to her children, my mother's second cousins.

My father had one cousin on his mother's side of the family, the Cudmore side, with whom he remains close. There was another boy who died as an infant. On his father's side, the de Crespigny side, my father has four first cousins from his father's sisters and five cousins from his father's half-sister. In total I have eleven first cousins once removed on my father's side of the family.

As for my second cousins, my great aunt Nancy had five grand children. My great aunt Margaret had six grandchildren. I am not sure of the number of grandchildren my great aunt Charlotte has (I must follow this up with her). On the Cudmore side, my great aunt Rosemary had three grand children. I have fourteen second cousins in addition to the grand children of my great aunt Charlotte.

Geneablogging

This post was inspired by Randy Seaver's post some weeks ago asking How many cousins do you know you have?

I enjoyed Alex Daw's and Caitlin Gow's responses and thought I would have a go myself.

I wanted to calculate my great aunt Rosemary's statement about the number of cousins she had. 42 first cousins and 46 first cousins once removed is certainly a lot. Calculating the number of second cousins is a large task that remains for another day.

I found it very interesting that both my grandmother Kathleen's parents came from large families but their children, my great grandparents and my various great great aunts and uncles on my grandmother's side, all had small families. There was a very rapid shift in the size of families within a generation.

I am more interested in tracing my family tree backwards than keeping track of the present generation but I am always delighted to hear from them and would be thrilled to share what I have learned of our family history.

The challenge was:

1) Take both sets of your grandparents and figure out how many first cousins you have, and how many first cousins removed (a child or grandchild of a first cousin) you have.

2) Extra Credit: Take all four sets of your great-grandparents and figure out how many second cousins you have, and how many second cousins removed you have.

HINT: Make a Descendants Chart with your genealogy software program!

3) Tell us the grandparents and great-grandparents names, but don't give the name of living cousins unless you want to.

4) Are there any of those lines that you don't know all of the cousins names? Do you care? 

5) Tell us about them in your own blog post, in a comment to this blog post, or in a Facebook or Google+ post of your own. Be sure to drop a comment to this post to link to your work.

52 Weeks of Genealogical Records in 2014 – Week 4 Memorial Cards

Four weeks ago, the archivist and historian Shauna Hicks (http://www.shaunahicks.com.au) started a series of blog posts about genealogical records. There's to be one post each week this year.  I am a bit late to the party, but now I'm joining in.

This week Shauna wrote about Memorial Cards (http://www.shaunahicks.com.au/52-weeks-of-genealogical-records-in-2014-week-4-memorial-cards/).

I have only one Memorial Card, purchased from Lenore Frost's 'Photo Rescue!', a service intended to 're-unite orphaned photos [and cards] with their lost families'. (http://members.optushome.com.au/lenorefrost/prnews.html)

n 1854 Margaret Smyth, who became Margaret Plowright, arrived in Melbourne from Southampton on the Persian. She was twenty years old from County Cavan. During the passage to Australia, she gave birth to a boy, and when she arrived she first stayed with a cousin called John Hente. At least the surname looks like 'Hente' on the Assisted Migrant record; but the writing is hard to read and I have no other information about him. I would be grateful for any suggestions.

Microfiche copy of Register of Assisted Immigrants from United Kingdom 1839 – 1871 - See more at: http://prov.vic.gov.au/provguide-50#sthash.Bo7PJjpY.dpuf

Microfiche copy of Register of Assisted Immigrants from United Kingdom 1839 – 1871 - See more at: http://prov.vic.gov.au/provguide-50#sthash.Bo7PJjpY.dpuf

From Public Record Office of Victoria VPRS 3502 Register of Assisted Migrants from the U.K. 1839 - 1871: 1854 list for the Persian Book 9 page 437

In November 1855 Margaret married John Plowright, a goldminer, at Magpie near Ballarat.  Their  marriage certificate describes her as a 22 year old dressmaker from County Cavan, whose parents were William Smyth, a farmer, and Mary Cox.


Margaret and John had seven children including one adopted child.  I can find no mention of the boy who was born on the Persian.


I have written previously on the marriage and children of Margaret and John.

On 5 March 1872 Margaret was admitted to the Maryborough Hospital.  According to the index of the hospital admission record, she was 37 years old, married, from Homebush, a Wesleyan, and she had arrived in the colony seventeen years previously on the Persian.

In 1897 at the age of 63 Margaret died at Homebush near Avoca. The death certificate has the cause of death as Brights Disease [kidney failure], dropsy [fluid retention] and exhaustion.  She was buried in Avoca cemetery.

Australia Day: Climbing our family's gum tree

CLIMBING OUR FAMILY’S GUM TREE, a blogging challenge from Pauline Cass for Australia Day 2014

My children have fifty-one direct ancestors who were immigrants to Australia. It has been quite a job to gather and arrange this information about them.

My first ancestor to arrive in Australia was my fifth great grandfather George Taylor (1758 - 1828). He came to Tasmania in 1822 with wife Mary née  Low (1765 -1850) and his family. His descendants still run Valleyfield near Longford, the property he and his sons farmed.

"Valleyfield" Epping Tas. The "Taylors" have lived here for over 100 years. , about 1914 - about 1941 Photograph in the collection of the State Library of Victoria. Accession number H22546. A.C. Dreier postcard collection. Retrieved from
https://www.slv.vic.gov.au/pictoria/gid/slv-pic-aab47005

Were there any convicts? There are no convicts on my side. On my husband Greg's side we know that Caroline Clarke, his great great grandmother who married George Young, was born in New South Wales about 1835. We haven't been able to trace her parents, so perhaps they were convicts.

Where did our ancestors come from? Twenty-six from England, seven from Scotland, two from Wales, eight from Ireland, and four from Germany.  One of our English forebears was born in India. There are at least four immigrants in the list of fifty-one that I know nothing about.

Did any of our ancestors arrive under their own financial steam? Many paid their own passage, and there were some assisted immigrants.  Only one seems to have worked his way to Australia. This was John Plowright, who stated when admitted to Maryborough Hospital in 1873 that he had arrived in the colony on the Speculation from London about 1853 and his occupation was mariner.  He wasn't listed as a deserter but perhaps he signed off to go to the goldfields.

How many ancestors came as singles? couples? families? Thirty-two of the fifty-one immigrants, or sixty percent, came as families. Thirteen came as single immigrants and there was only one couple without children: John and Sarah Way.

Did one person lead the way and others follow? There are quite a few instances of this. 

• The de Crespignys probably came because Charlotte's brothers had been given jobs by Governor Latrobe. 
• The Edwards probably came because Mary's sister Sarah and her husband Francis Tuckfield were already in Australia. 
• Philip Chauncy followed his sisters, who had arrived in Adelaide two years previously. 
• The Plaisteds followed Ann's sister and brother, who had arrived twelve years earlier in Adelaide. 
• Isabella Hutcheson née Taylor followed her parents and brothers to Tasmania in about 1833 after the death of her husband.  She came with five young children.
• My grandfather came first after the war and his wife and daughter joined him ten months later. My grandfather was the only immigrant to arrive by air.

Which state(s)/colony did our ancestors arrive? Eight arrived in Tasmania, eighteen in Victoria, fifteen in South Australia, two in Western Australia and four migrated to the Australian Capital Territory.

Forty-two, or ninety percent, of our forty-seven immigrant ancestors arrived before 1855, one arrived in 1888, and the remaining four arrived in the middle of the twentieth century after World War 2.

Number of arrivals by year of arrival:

1822	1833	1835	1836	1838	1839	1840	1849	1850	1852	1853	1854	1888	1949	1950	1960
2	2	3	1	2	2	3	6	3	3	6	9	1	1	2	1

Did they settle and remain in one state/colony? No, for example

• the Ways moved from South Australia to Victoria and then to New South Wales
• the Ralphs moved from Victoria to South Australia
• the Plaisteds and the Hughes moved from South Australia to Victoria
• the Cudmores and Nihills moved from Tasmania to South Australia
• the Hutchesons moved from Tasmania to Victoria
• Philip Chauncy moved from South Australia to Western Australia to Victoria

Did any of our ancestors leave Australia and go “home”? William Snell Chauncy visited his children in South Australia for only twelve months before returning to England. Gordon Mainwaring and his wife Mary née Hickey both died in England as did their son-in-law, Wentworth Cavenagh-Mainwaring. My grandparents and mother visited Germany.

generated by https://www.tagxedo.com inspired by the image by Sharon at https://shazlex.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/australia-day-challenge-2014.html who also responded to the challenge

Accentuate the Positive 2013 Geneameme

We are already into 2014 but I thought I would take up Jill Ball's challenge to look back on my family history researches in 2013. 

1.  An elusive ancestor I found was
- after nearly 20 years of searching I found the death of my great great great grandfather, Kenneth Budge. He died from cholera while at sea.

2.  A precious family photo I found was
- I was interested to find photos from 1915 of my great grand father who served during World War 1 as a doctor

3.  An ancestor's grave I found was
- I found an image of the grave of my great great great grandfather, Samuel Proudfoot Hawkins

4.  An important vital record I found was
- I found a probate calendar record which led me to the death record of the mother of my step grandfather - a date I had been searching for for many years. The probate calendar records are useful for sorting out if the person who died is really part of your family or otherwise.

5.  A newly found family member who shared
- there were quite a few who contacted me because of my blog.  I would not have discovered about the death of kenneth Budge if it wasn't for contact from Laurena.  In the past week I have been contacted by two people who have followed up on my blog entries to do with Charlotte Kemmis and Philip Crespigny and his wife Emilia Wade.

6.  A geneasurprise I received was
- each time I sit down and do some research there are new surprises :)

7.   My 2013 blog post that I was particularly proud of was
- none in particular but I was pleased to uncover a little more information on my husband's great great grandfather, James Cross

8.   My 2013 blog post that received a large number of hits or comments was
- the largest number of hits was received by A toxophilite - Mary de Crespigny née Clarke (1749 - 1812)

9.  A new piece of software I mastered was
- mapalist.com which I played with at Mapping the birthplaces of the children of John Way and Sarah née Daw

10. A social media tool I enjoyed using for genealogy was
- ... blogging!  In 2013 I completed 52 posts - it wasn't weekly but I managed to post at least once a month.  Each time I post I learn a lot by revisiting my research and writing it up beyond merely having collected a few dates and facts.  I have enjoyed being contacted by fellow researchers. I find geneamemes including the Sepia Saturday prompts very useful for giving me ideas.