Miscellaneous items I found of interest during the week.

Ottawa Genealogists to Gather on May Day
Internationally known speaker Daniel Horowitz, and leading Ottawa genealogists, Mags Gaulden and Glenn Wright, will be presenting at OPL Genealogy Day, a free event in the Chamber, Ben Franklin Place at Nepean Centrepointe, on Monday 1 May. Daniel will highlight MyHeritage Library Edition, which is now free online to Ottawa Public Library cardholders, and give a tour of all MyHeritage’s new photo features. In Jumping the Pond, Mags will illustrate combining DNA and archival records, Glenn will dig into books and newspapers online. There is no preregistration, just turn up. All welcome. The event is sponsored by the Ottawa Public Library, BIFHSGO and Ottawa Branch OGS are co-sponsors.

Sunday Sundaes
A little bit of ice cream does no harm.

Scanning
Some practical advice for those starting out scanning family photos and other material. Also, many public libraries offer equipment for DIY scanning.

Kinbank
A database of 1229 languages and a set of 100 core kin types between Grandparents and Grandchildren, and between Parent’s siblings, and Parent’s siblings’ children.

The Fionn Folklore Database

The Coronation of James II

Science in the Making, from the Royal Society
Thirty thousand manuscripts now included in Science in the Making relate to the long history of scientific publishing at the UK Royal Society. This blog post is a glimpse of the work that has gone on behind the scenes to make the launch possible.

Google Updates Satellite Imagery of Ukraine

Thanks to this week’s contributors: Ann Burns, Anonymous, Brenda Maitland, Brenda Turner, Chad, gail benjafield, Glenn Wright, Jackie Corrigan, Jo Stanbridge, Ken McKinlay, Sunday Thompson, Susan Courage, Teresa, Terry Mulcahy, Unknown.

 

A further 814 historical photographs taken by Daily Mirror photographer Bela Zola between 1947 and 1955 have been added to the Findmypast Photo Collection.
That brings the total to 12,645 photos, including this one of children being processed in England before proceeding to Canada in 1940 under the CORB evacuation program.

According to this IWM post 1.7 million men served in Britain’s WW2 Home Guard. This latest Home Guard post from Ancestry has 92,037 records for Surrey suggesting it only covers part of the county.

Some registers, linked to the index, have a double page spread with regimental number, name, address, date of enlistment, date of birth, next of kin, religion, national ID number, addedda (notes), and date pt II (a mystery).

Others are much less informative; the search may not find the person. Out of a sample of 500 only 177 transcriptions indicated the location, including 47 for Thornton Heath and 25 for Croydon. More often than not initials  rather than first name(s) are given. 

If an ancestor owned over 1 acre of land in the UK, including Ireland, in the 1870s they will likely appear in the Return of Owners of Land records.

England & Wales, Return of Owners of Land 1873

Scotland, Return of Owners of Land 1873

Ireland, Return of Owners of Land 1876

According to Wikipedia, the returns, for England and Wales it excludes London, list holdings by size (in acres, roods and poles) and estimated yearly rental of all holdings over one acre. It is laid out by county and landowner, with an identifying address for each landowner.

Wikipedia also mentions that the 1873 Return had inaccuracies (some significant), and a revised edition—The Great Landowners of Great Britain and Ireland—was published in 1883. It’s available through the Internet Archives at https://archive.org/details/greatlandownerso00bateuoft/mode/2up/.

 

Canadian Pacific afloat 1883-1968 : a short history and fleet list, by George Musk will be of possible interest if your family history includes someone who voyaged on one of the company ships; I was on two of them. Find out about a ship’s history. Beware as names were recycled.

It contains a table of the company ships that saw WW2 service

I was surprised to see the large role played by the Empress of Scotland.

The book is online as part of the Chung Collection at The University of British Columbia.

It’s unusual for Ancestry to post a new collection with only 466 records. But this Hampshire parish marriage record collection only appears to be indexed for the parish of Winchester St Peter Chesil.

Browsable marriage records are available for many more Hampshire parishes, sourced from Hampshire Archives and Local Studies, but not advertised. How long will it be before these others are indexed?

In the meantime, Findmypast has over 348,565 transcript marriage records, with a few images, from the Hampshire Genealogical Society. In addition, FamilySearch has over 2 million parish register entries and Bishop’s transcripts for BMBs of all types, with transcriptions for registered readers and images viewable at FSCs and affiliate libraries.

Here’s the complete table of contents for the May issue, with my comments.

FAMILY HISTORY NEWS
Rachel Bellerby reports on the latest from the genealogy scene.
(Includes mention of the Living with Machines project, and that 3 million UK Ministry of Defense Service Records post WW1 into WW2 will be made available only on Ancestry between 2024-2029. )

ILLUSTRATING YOUR FAMILY’S HISTORY
Dr Simon Wills shows you where to find fabulous images to illustrate the past.

MANY NAMES, ONE MAN
Ciaire Bradiey demonsirates the value of digging deeper.

DNA WORKSHOP
DNA advisor Karen Evens steps up to help a reader whose DNA confirms that his relations are not relaed to him…as
he suspected.

FAIRY TALE INSIGHTS
Wayne Shepheard takes a look at fairy tale characters & examines what they reveal about our ancestors’ times.
(Was the LIttle Ice Age really that significant for Fairy Tales?)

BOOKS & CO
Helen Tovey, Paul Chiddicks & Jackie Tench reflect on some recent releases.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
Read on to discover how you can get your hands on a copy of the Famiy History Workbook.

UNRELIABLE SURNAMES
Famiy Tree Academy tutor David Annal shows the steps he took to trace a family that liked to choose from a selection of sumames.

YOUR PULL-OUT CHART: A CORONATION KEEPSAKE
A familytree chart to  pull out, fill in, and file away for the future (or pin it up!)

NEXT ISSUE
Discover what’s on the menu in the June issue of Family Tree

TWIGLETS
Gill Shaw’s makes some unexpected discoveries, in the way of two Canadian Home Children.
(The story of the origins of two boys who came to Canada via Fegan’s. The text included “I know many Home Children had
horrific experiences, but I think John and Christian may have been among the luckier ones.” Or could it be that their story was typical and the “horrific experiences” are the exception?)

MEDIEVAL MASTERCLASS
Leam how to look at the past with new eyes: Dr Nick Barratt gives insights to the worid of our ancestors from many
centuries past, with advice on 17 useful records to power your research,
(Recommended if your interests go back that far.)

DNA: HISTORY, MILESTONES & HOW YOU CAN JOIN IN
A look at the past 70 years of DNA discoverios, and a mini beginner guide on how to get started with DNA today

MAPPING YOUR FAMILY HISTORY WITH FLOURISH
Follow Dr Sophie Kay’s inspiring instructions and discover how to make an interactive timeline of your family history with genealogy gadget, Flourish.

SPOTLIGHT ON
Take a look at the Braund One-Name Study, and its impressively muitigenerational membership.

PHOTO CORNER
Jayne Shimpton analyses a selection of pictures from the past.

YOUR QUESTIONS
Our experts pit their wits to help.

DIARY DATES
Events to look forward to in May
(Don’t miss Maurice Gleeson on Using multiple WATO analyses to break through a brick wall on 3 May from Family Tree Webinars.)

YOUR LETTERS
Readers have their say

JOIN THE SUBS CLUB
Make sure you’re getting all the benefits

THOUGHTS ON…
Diane Lindsay’s reflects on the uncomfortable past beds of her forebears

On Monday, I spent time following up on the resources mentioned in my 19 April post Ancestry adds Canada, Royal Canadian Air Force Crash Cards, 1939-1945 for a Canadian airman buried at Beechwood Cemetery.

None of the crash investigation information is in the person’s service file, his Commonwealth War Graves Commission file, or his Canadian Virtual War Memorial file, including newspaper clippings predating the court of enquiry.

The crash investigation reveals much detail about the incident, including the state of the body when found and that pilot error was the primary cause of the crash.

Canada’s Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act permit disclosure without knowledge or consent if made after the earlier of:

(i) one hundred years after the record containing the information was created, and

(ii) twenty years after the death of the individual whom the information is about.

Even though the crash was over 80 years ago, I remain uneasy about blogging details, making them simple to discover as they could be upsetting to elderly relatives. How far back do you have to go before that ceases to be an issue?

On 22 April, MyHeritage added a free database with 1,243,400 records for BC Deaths “from the year 1872 onwards.” That means to 2001. Until 1946 these are transcriptions. Then images of the Registration of Death or Medical Certification of Death form are shown.

The MyHeritage database is from the latest BC Vital Statistics Agency release which has 1,243,696 records.

If you rely on Ancestry or FamilySearch be aware their records  have not been updated recently.

Ancestry’s equivalent database is from 1872 to 1990 and does not include images.

FamilySearch has a database British Columbia Death Registrations, 1872-1986; 1992-1993.

Choose from selected 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. Additional mainly US events are listed at https://conferencekeeper.org/virtual.

Tuesday 25 April

11 am – 6 pm:  2023 DNA Day at the FamilySearch Library.
https://churchofjesuschrist.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_BKXVYwaIStapRDiwRCywKg#/registration

7 pm: Squiggly Lines and Spit: How DNA is Changing Family History Research, by Dave Obee for OGS Wellington County Branch.
https://wellington.ogs.on.ca/events/wellington-county-branch-squiggly-lines-and-spit-how-dna-is-changing-family-history-research/

Wednesday, 26 April

2 pm: Hidden in Plain Site: English and Welsh websites, by Mia Bennett for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/hidden-in-plain-site-english-and-welsh-websites/

7 pm: Alexandra Bridge: a bright future of a programmed death? by Claude Royer for Heritage Ottawa.
https://heritageottawa.org/events/alexandra-bridge-outlook-bright-future-or-programmed-death

7 p.m: The Role of Art and Artists in Ottawa’s History, by Jim Burant for the Historical Society of Ottawa.
https://www.historicalsocietyottawa.ca/activities/events/eventdetail/93/16,17,19,21/the-role-of-art-artists-in-ottawa-s-history

Thursday 27 April

7 pm: Using Newspapers to Fill in the Gaps in a Family Story, by Maureen Brady for BYU Family History Library.
No pre-registration required. Click on this link at the time of the webinar byu.zoom.us/j/97185943513?pwd=TkUyRkhucTJPMDVmRUROSm1RbWdlZz09
Password to Join the Meeting: byufhl

7:30 pm: If This Barn Could Talk: An Oral History of the Garden City Arena, by Elizabeth Vlossak and Paige Groot for The Historical Society of St. Catharines.
Registration not require: us02web.zoom.us/j/82274108094

Friday 28 April

Saturday 29 April

9:15 am: What Happened to Lucy, by Ian Waller for Hertfordshire Family History Society.
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/what-happened-to-lucy-speaker-ian-waller-tickets-503347715567

Monday 1 May (not online)
Ottawa Public Library Genealogy Day
https://biblioottawalibrary.ca/en/event/ottawa-public-library-genealogy-day

 

The Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs have a free online website, AgMaps, which makes it easy to find the lot, concession and township for any place just by zooming in on a map.

1. Browse to https://www.ontario.ca/page/how-use-agmaps

2. Read the information, and hit the Launch AgMaps button.

3. Wait for the licensing logo to turn to the disclaimer page.

4. Scroll down and hit the I accept button.

5. On the map that appears, zoom in on the place of interest. When you’ve scrolled in sufficiently, the outine of the lot will appear with the lot, concession, and township indicated. Make a note of it.

What can you do with that fantastic knowledge aside from assuage your curiosity? Maybe you’d like the history of the property. Check Ken McKinlay’s blog post Ontario Land Records: Where Are They Online? https://familytreeknots.blogspot.com/p/ontario-land-records-where-are-they.html and skip Part I.