Please remain patient as I continue to deal with no internet/TV/phone service from Bell.

A new independent film about the exploits of Britain’s first ‘ace’ pilot, Maj Lanoe Hawker, will be released on the anniversary of his death, November 23, 2023

The 23-minute film tells the story of a pivotal few days in World War One, when airmen were transformed into fighter pilots for the first time in history.

The 323,144 indexed records, new in this collection, include wills, letters of administration, and probate inventories heard by Norfolk church courts from the 14th century to 1858. There are also marriage licenses.

Searches return name, event type, event or probate date, spouse name and a link to the Norfolk Record Office online catalogue. That will lead to the original document, often available only as a microfilm copy at the Norfolk Record Office.

Two books are scheduled for publication from Pen and Sword in the “Tracing Your …”  family history series.

Here’s the publisher’s blurb for Janet Few’s Tracing Your Marginalized Ancestors.

Often, our most fascinating ancestors are those on society’s margins. They might have been discriminated against due to personal misfortune, or have been a victim of society’s fear of difference. You may have ancestors who were poor, or sick, illegitimate, or lawbreakers. Were your family stigmatised because of their ethnicity? Perhaps they struggled with alcoholism, were prostitutes, or were accused of witchcraft. This book will help you find out more about them and the times in which they lived.

The nature of this book means that it deals with subjects that can make uncomfortable reading but it is important to confront these issues as we try to understand our ancestors and the society that led to them becoming marginalised. In Tracing your Marginalised Ancestors, you will find plenty of suggestions to help you uncover the stories of these, often elusive, groups of people. Will you accept the challenge to seek out your marginalised ancestors and tell their stories?

Tracing your Family History using Irish Newspapers and other Printed Materials by Natalie Bodle, is described as

Tracing your Family History using Irish Newspapers is a great introduction for the family historian into Irish newspapers, journals and periodicals and how these resources can be used to paint a picture of the lives of your ancestors with so much more than what can be found in primary source material.

An informative guide with hints and tips throughout, as well as case studies and excerpts that show you the type of material you can find on your ancestors, their lives and where they lived. Natalie Bodle explores how to find information in biographies, genealogies and name books, as well as how to find your ancestors in the official record, The Gazette, and how to track them down in street directories, including a range of physical and online libraries, portals and book publishers who have a focus on Irish genealogy material.

Both are scheduled for publication next February, available for pre-order at a discount.

New to Findmypast this last week (I missed posting) are parish BMBs from Cumberland, the most northwesterly of the old English counties.

Cumberland Baptisms
Sixty-five thousand two hundred fifty-two new transcriptions from across the county for a total of 192,404 records.

Cumberland Marriages
Covering from 1547 to 1975, there are 68,211 new records  for a new total of 125,020,

Cumberland Burials
Between 1566 and 1992, 62,746 new burial records for a total of 133,333.

The new entries have yet to be added to the parish list so which additional parishes for which year are now included is a mystery. Many of the entries are from FamilySearch and the old IGI. There are various other sources, including printed marriage listings.

10 am: “We Will Remember Them” (Family stories from times of war), by Susan Davis, Sue Lambeth, Linda Reid, Mary-Lou Simac and Barbara Tose.
https://www.bifhsgo.ca/events

OGS Ottawa Branch

Online and at the City of Ottawa Archives, 100 Tallwood.

1 pm: Rural Diary Archive, by Catharine A. Wilson.
https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/events/rural-diary-archive-ottawa/

BIGWILL

In casse neither of those appeal, an additional Saturday morning opportunity, online at 11 am EST, is Ye Olde Genealogie: Medieval English Research

The British Interest Group of Wisconsin and Illinois invites you to attend our November meeting with guest speaker, Dr. Daniel Hubbard, with the topic being “Ye Olde Genealogie: Medieval English Research.” In this presentation Dr. Hubbard will look at the transition from “modern” genealogy to researching in the middle ages, what you can do to research your ancestors among the “common folk” when there are no more parish registers to follow back in time. Then, browse through some of the vast amount of documentation for the gentry and nobility. Some of those documents, like wills, should feel familiar. Others will bear little resemblance to what we normally think of when we think of genealogy-heraldic visitations, inquisitions post-mortem, pipe rolls, etc., and we will know that we have entered the genealogical mists of time.

Via Zoom, please register in advance: us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZYucO-srD0jHtafxgl_64C0T0nmbCKWkx7t

 After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about linking to the meeting.

Kingston and District Branch, United Empire Loyalists’ Association of Canada will meet on Saturday, 25 November at 1:00 p.m. at St. Paul’s Anglican Church Hall, 137 Queen Street or, if you prefer, on Zoom. Award-winning author Jean Rae Baxter UE will discuss her 2023 book, Battle on the Ice. Most Canadians have never heard of the Battle of Point Pelee in 1838. Why did the grandchildren of Loyalists, who had fought hard and had given up land and lifestyle to support the British Crown, rebel against the government in 1837? For the Zoom link for the meeting, visit the website www.uelac.org/Kingston-Branch. All with an interest in Canadian history are welcome. Copies of Jean’s book will be available for purchase.

I’d barely posted on the November issue when the December issue came out on 7 November.

Feature articles are by two of my favourite British genealogist/writers.

Debbie Kennett explains how to solve your family mysteries using the latest online tools and patient building out of DNA matches trees.

In Documenting Disaster, Chris Paton reveals how records of misfortune and crisis can tell us a great deal about our ancestors’ lives.  In a second article Chris examines the causes and effects of the tragic Highland Clearances in 18th- and 19th-century Scotland.

In the Research Advice section Simon Fowler shares his advice on the records available to research any publicans in your tree, and their pubs. Jonathan Scott rounds up the essential online resources for tracing your musical forebears, and Nicola Morris explains how to use digitised Valuation Office Revision Books to locate Northern Irish kin.

New to me was the free software Ancestris reviewed by Nick Peers. The majority of its user base is in France. It looks interesting with some unique features, but one does get concerned about the longevity of free software.

The issue also includes a five-page guide to Staffordshire.

Let’s qualify that!

It’s for those of us researching people who died in England and Wales from the start of civil registration of deaths in 1837 until 1957.

On Wednesday, 70 years of the later death registrations became available as jpg digital image scans of the original GRO death registers. That extends the period previously available.

First, find the GRO reference coordinates from https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/indexes_search.asp. You will need a free registration.

Then, for the cost of £2.50, you can order and should receive a jpg image of the original almost instantaneously.

Need more Scotland? Then mark 25 November on your calendar for the next online conference from Scottish Indexes.

We will be most interested in the Eastern Time Zone Second Session in North America.

10:00 am Introduction
10:15 am ‘Edinburgh City Archives’ by Ashleigh Thompson
11:15 am ‘Medical Matters: discover the wealth of information that hospital and asylum records hold’ by Caroline Brown
12:15 pm ‘Discover Scottish Civil Registration Records’ by Chris Paton
1:30 pm ‘Getting the best from the NLS maps website for family history research’ by Chris Fleet
2:30 pm ‘Placenames’ by Lorna Steele-McGinn
3:30 pm Genealogy Q & A hosted by Graham and Emma Maxwell
4:30 pm ‘The ‘peculiar position’ of housing the farm worker (1900-25)’ by Kay Williams
5:40 pm ‘What’s New at Scottish Indexes’ by Graham & Emma Maxwell

Find out more at https://www.scottishindexes.com/default.aspx

A sunny Sunday morning tempted me to downtown Ottawa to pay my respects at the National War Memorial. Skirting fleets of fire and police vehicles to the west, the tomb of the unknown soldier was laden with poppies. People approached in a trickle, respectfully,  to add their tribute.

A few steps down Elgin Street the National Aboriginal Veterans Memorial retained four wreaths, many at the National War Memorial had been removed, and a few poppies.

I was reminded of the group exercizes where everyone is given a few sticky coloured paper dots and you are asked to add yours to various action item options. I visited other nearby memorials.

In Confederation park no poppies had been left on the South African War Memorial. Nearby, three poppies and two carnations graced the plaque to Canadian airmen who lost their lives over Poland in WW2.

Tucked away where it’s easy to overlook, the memorial to the over five hundred Canadians killed between 1950 and 1953 in Korea attracted eight poppies.

Last, not least, I wandered over to the Cartier Square Drill Hall and the nearby statue to John Rogers and William Osgood(e) of the Ottawa Company of Sharpshooters, who died in 1885 as part of the Northwest Field Force. It attracted 16 poppies.

Location, location, location.

The Library and Archives Canada annual Departmental Results Report, tabled in the Commons, is available here.

Included were four mentions of genealog*, eight for census, and one for newspaper.

Good things are happening at LAC, like new physical facilities and much-renewed efforts to catch up on the ATIP backlog.

Five performance indicators were exceeded for the core responsibility of acquiring and preserving documentary heritage; one was met, and two were missed.

For the core responsibility of providing access to documentary heritage, all seven performance targets were met; three were exceeded. That’s a welcome improvement over four of six in the previous year.

LAC reported digitizing  a total of 3,480,613 images in 2022–23, including the digitization of the 1931 Census. That’s more then in the previous two years, still far short of the times when ten million images were digitized for titles like First World War personnel files, and passenger lists.

The digitization included 234,678 images (187 microfilm reels) from the 1931 census of Canada. Digitization from microfilm is much simpler than from hardcopy, and was performed by FamilySearch under an MOU. 

A further 284,101 Indigenous-related images in LAC collections were digitized as part of the We Are Here: Sharing Stories initiative. More are planned with earmarked funding of $25 million in the 2022 federal budget to support the identification, description and digitization of six million pages of records related to the federal Indian day school system.

What about the other 2,961,834 images digitized? Were they for public release, digitized in reponse to ATIP or other individual information requests, or something else? I’ve asked LAC Communications.

But more important, why is LAC’s baseline “digitization” goal so lacking in ambition when it’s the only affordable way to access LAC records for many of us across our enormous country?