Month: April 2022

Choose from free online events in the next five days. All times are ET except as noted. Those in red are Canadian, bolded if local to Ottawa or recommended

Assume registration in advance is required; check so you’re not disappointed.T

Tuesday 19 Apr. 2 pm: Virtual Genealogy Drop-In, from Ottawa Branch of OGS and The Ottawa Public Library.
https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/events/

Tuesday 18 Apr. 2:30 pm: Genealogy Begins with Questions, by Cynthia Theusch for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/6421746

Tuesday 19 Apr. 7 pm: Dr. Joy – Tillsonburg’s Man with Eclectic Interests, by Laurel Beechey for Oxford County Branch OGS.
https://oxford.ogs.on.ca/events/branch-meeting-3/

Tuesday 19 Apr. 8 pm: Proving Parentage Two Centuries Later Using DNA Evidence, by David S. Ouimette for BCG and Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/proving-parentage-two-centuries-later-using-dna-evidence/

Wednesday 20 Apr. 12 noon: Using the FamilySearch Wiki, presented by FamilySearch Family History Library.
https://churchofjesuschrist.zoom.us/webinar/register/2816426145814/WN_27IzwZ98SYeeFgiA6oSP

Wednesday 20 Apr. 2 pm: Unlocking Stories of Our Female Ancestors through Effective Research Methodology, by Denyce Porter Peyton for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/unlocking-stories-of-our-female-ancestors-through-effective-research-methodology/

Wednesday 20 Apr. 7 pm: The DNA of Cornwall, by Joe Flood for the British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa.
https://www.bifhsgo.ca/events

Wednesday 20 Apr. 7 pm: The Prisoners of Gravenhurst, by Judy Humphries for Orillia Museum of Art & History.
https://www.orilliamuseum.org/project/the-prisoners-of-gravenhurst/

Thursday 21 Apr. 6:30 pm: Origin: How Ancient DNA Informs Modern Genealogy, by Jennifer Raff for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/6300521

Friday 22 Apr. 9 am: Harlots, Whores & Hackabouts: A History of Sex for Sale, by Kate Lister for The (UK) National Archives.
https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/about/visit-us/whats-on/events/
(scroll down).

Saturday 23 Apr. 1 pm: The Early History of Cumberland Township, 1798 to 1840 (Ottawa), by Gérard Boyer for Ottawa Branch OGS. 
https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/events/ottawa-branch-presentation-2022-04-23/

Have you been known to tear up, perhaps with joy, perhaps with sadness, at something you’ve experienced while exploring your family history? Have you run into the bizarre, baffling or hilarious? If so Toronto genealogist Paul Jones,  “Roots” columnist for Canada’s History magazine, would love to hear from you.

Here Paul gives the details.

I’m inviting members of various genealogical groups to share their experiences for an upcoming “Roots” column in Canada’s History magazine. John Reid and his Canada’s Anglo-Celtic Connections blog are supporting the project.

The goal is to explore the extremes of emotions triggered during genealogical research, whether by unexpected findings, out-of-the ordinary interactions with others, the unintended consequences of your actions, whatever… To that end, I welcome your stories of “The Good, the Bad and the Ridiculous of Family History”

The Good: The most pleasant, satisfying or exciting moment that you’ve experienced as a result of doing family history.

The Bad: The most annoying, humiliating or upsetting.

The Ridiculous: The most bizarre, baffling or hilarious.

In the magazine column, which will appear during the summer, I will select and describe one exemplar in each category. I also plan to find another platform, perhaps online, for a lengthier analysis of the submissions.

If you have one or more experiences you’d be happy to share, drop me a line at pauljones@rogers.com indicating for each story whether good, bad or ridiculous. And, yes, a single-story could conceivably fall into a couple of categories.

Should your anecdote be chosen for commentary, please advise whether you’d prefer to be identified by your full name, your initials or Anonymous. (If you’d like to submit anonymously, feel free to do so, e.g., via a non-identifying Hotmail or Gmail account.)

You don’t need to provide more than 100 words per story. Point form will do if your feelings and the reasons for them are clear. I’ll get back to you if there’s something I don’t understand.

Best wishes. I look forward to hearing your stories.

Find out about a new initiative here tomorrow!

Is there someone in your family tree associated with the military who crossed the Atlantic during the Second World War? Maybe they were Canadian military going to serve in the war and returning, R.A.F. coming to Canada to train and return, or war brides and their children coming to Canada. If so there may be information available on little-known microfilms about his or her passage. That’s especially useful as most of the government information for the period is still embargoed.

Originating from records of Canada’s Department of National Defence, Directorate of Movements, files for individual voyages, including passenger manifests and miscellaneous documents, may be identified through Library and Archives Canada’s Collection Search.

Canadiana Héritage has digital copies of some of those microfilms online. Currently available are 189 reels from C-5547 to C-5769. No math prize for recognizing there are 33 missing reels between them. They’re free to view and, it must be said, it’s a bugger to locate information for an individual. 

To make a search practicable you need more information than the person’s name. Were they coming or going, eastbound or westbound? Do you know the name of the ship? People often remember that even if they’re vague about the date. You may find that, or other information, to help pin down a date range in a military service file, that’s if they were military. Sometimes newspaper reports on events, like the arrival of a group of war brides, will name the ship.

You can find out about those voyages starting at LAC’s Collection Search by entering “Directorate of Movements”,”Personnel” and Eastbound or Westbound.  Add other information like the port (often Halifax), the name of the ship if you have it and the year, even better, the year and month of departure in format (yyyy/mm). Best not to add too much initially so you can filter down.

If you find something promising note the information. The next step is to find out if there’s a digitized microfilm for that voyage at Canadiana Héritage. Search the microfilm number, for microfilm C-5547 the first hit is Directorate of Movements: C-5547, 5488 images. So all you have to do is read through 5488 images, clicking through one at a time! The voyages are not always in date order on the microfilm. Every so often you come across a file cover including the name of the ship followed by 100 or more images of documents in the file. It would be helpful if Canadiana would show an array of thumbnails of the images on the microfilm so you can pick out the distinctive cover image. I suggested it but Canadiana’s reply wasn’t encouraging.

If the microfilm hasn’t been digitized it means a trip to Library and Archives Canada to view it.

You can save a bit of time by determining the total number, the number of the voyage of interest and the order of voyages on the microfilm. A simple way of finding what files are on a particular microfilm eludes me at present. My workaround is to go back to LAC’s Collection Search and repeat the search for “Directorate of Movements” “Personnel” and Eastbound or Westbound and the port. Download all the hits to a spreadsheet and sort the sheet by Item Number. All the voyages on a film will be together. Note how far into the film you might expect to find your voyage of interest. Then start viewing the individual pages as far into the film as you estimate that voyage’s information might begin.

You’ll likely eventually find a passenger manifest. There’s a good chance, no guarantee, it will be legible! Don’t overlook those other documents that may help build a more complete picture of the experience.

Miscellaneous items I found of interest during the week.

Boogie Woogie in Church

The following three items are from The Conversation.

Easter laughter: the hilarious and controversial medieval history of religious jokes

Jesus the faithful Jew: How misreadings of the Christian Gospels miss this and fuel anti-Judaism

No space for a heat pump? Here’s how your whole street could get off gas heating

The book that sank on the Titanic and burned in the Blitz

Russell C Johnston RIP
Vice-President of the Gloucester Historical Society, who regularly represented the society at Ottawa family history and a variety of public events, passed on 29 January.  He was active in the Ottawa theatre community.

LOOK FOR A NEW INITIATIVE EXPECTED ON TUESDAY

New and Forthcoming from Pen and Sword

Thanks to this week’s contributors. Anonymous, Brenda Turner, Gail B., jon ackroyd, Teresa, Toni, Unknown.

On Sunday 26 June, just 10 weeks away, Wayne Shepheard will present “Natural Phenomena and The Effects on the Lives of Our Ancestors”. A few days ago I had the opportunity to speak with Wayne about the topic and his presentation.

You may also be interested in his blogs https://mothernaturestests.blogspot.com/
https://discovergenealogy.blogspot.com/

and his book

Surviving Mother Nature’s Tests

Before you read the listing of the contents of the new issue, Family Tree invites you to record a story.

What’s in the issue:

Family History News
Tracing Scottish House History
Ten Steps to Finding John Armstrong
Another Brick in Your Wall (full of good advice)
Postcards from the Front (I enjoyed this one)
Murder or Misadventure?
Law and the Family Historian
Old Handwriting Mastered
Twiglets
A Summer to Remember
DNA Workshop
Reclaimed Janes.

Plus there’s a good helping of regular columns.

Over 4,000 Catholic parish baptisms are added to the collection this week, bringing the total number of exclusive records up to 1.2 million. There are both transcripts and images of the original with additional information. Here’s full information about all the records available for the 37 parishes with additions.

Information for 40 Catholic parish marriages is also augmented with nearly 10,000 new records, and also with transcripts and images of the original.

This latest release from TheGenealogist adds the following searchable book records:

Armorial Families, Arms Authorized by The Laws of Heraldry 1863
Boyle’s court guide 1888
Burke’s Handbook to the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire 1921
Burke’s Landed Gentry Volume 1886
Debretts House of Commons and the Judicial Bench 1887
Encyclopedia of Heraldry or General Armory of England Scotland and Ireland 1844
Genealogica Bedfordienses Landed Gentry of Bedfordshire 1538-1700
Grantees of Arms to The End of The XVII Century
Herefordshire Visitation Of 1569
His Majesty the King 1910-1935
Imperial British Calendar 1823
Index Nominum to the Royalist Composition Papers
Kelly’s Handbook To The Titled Landed and Official Classes 1909
Landed Gentry of Bedfordshire 1538-1700
Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica – Third Series Vol IIIV
Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica – Third Series Vol IV
Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica Fourth Series Vol II 1908
Nottingham Visitation 1569 and 1614
Short View of the Peerage of Ireland 1759
Standing Council of the Baronetage Official Roll of the Baronets 1929
Suffolk Visitations of 1561 1577 1612
Sussex Visitations 1530 and 1633-4
The Pedigree Register for London 1907-1915
The Peerage of Ireland 1754
The Royal Kalendar 1786
The Royal Kalendar 1788
The Royal Kalendar 1796
The Royal Kalendar 1804
The Royal Kalendar 1820
Webster’s Royal Red Book Court and Fashionable Register January 1915
Worcestershire Visitation 1569

If you’re interested in this type of resource have a look at Guide to Selected Genealogical Reference Works.

I’m impressed. Using a trademarked technique, SideView™,  Ancestry is estimating the percentages of each ethnicity you inherited from each parent. It’s done based on segment analysis and comparison with your DNA matches; it does not identify which parent is associated with which estimate.

I was pleased to see that my Jewish ancestry was associated with only one parent, that’s something 23andMe got confused with when it originally assessed my father’s ethnic makeup from mine and my mother’s.

Ignoring small amounts of ethnicity where the error bar includes zero, my ethnic makeup is similar for England & Northwestern Europe, and for Scotland for both parents. For my father, Irish ethnicity accounts for about the same percent as my mother’s Jewish ethnicity. The SideView™ estimates for my mother (as I identify) from my DNA are reasonably consistent with the estimates from her DNA results at 23andMe.

The British Newspaper Archives has passed a major milepost, the 50 million page mark.

That came with 76,705 pages added in the past 7 days. What pushed it past the mark? It could have been the Ormskirk Advertiser, Dover Express, Taunton Courier and Western Advertiser, Winsford Chronicle, or Uttoxeter Newsletter.

Do any of those have content relevant to your family history?  You can access all the newspapers as a Findmypast subscriber. I sometimes find the free superior search capability at www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk reveals content I can subsequently read on Findmypast.

As of mid-day on Tuesday MyHeritage is slightly in the lead in the count of US states and territories 1950 census records indexed.

Both Ancestry and MyHeritage have tackled the same ones first. Ancestry is indexing more fields, notably occupation.