Anglo-Celtic Connections

Dave Annal / Mia Bennett / Gill Blanchard / Derek Blount / Beryl Evans / Dr. Janet Few / Caroline Gurney / Andrea Hetherington / Paul Milner / Alan Ruston / Gill Thomas / Ian Waller.

That’s the impressive list of speakers on England and Wales for the 28 September – 2 October British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa 2022 conference.

So impressive I’ve already registered!

Here’s the announcement.

Ottawa: 20 April 2022—England and Wales: at home and on the move is the focus of the 27th and second virtual family history conference presented by the British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa (BIFHSGO), to be held virtually from 28 September to 2 October 2022.
Twelve expert speakers will discuss topics ranging from finding elusive ancestors in London, through using maps in your research, to domestic or international migration in and out of Wales.
There will be stories of the plucky women who made new lives overseas after their husbands died in the Great War and life as a ship’s steward travelling the globe.
The conference will also feature a virtual Expo Hall, where you may make contact with organizations offering products or ideas to help your research.
A bonus feature of the event is three Connect Sessions, where speakers, vendors or societies will be available for two hours to answer registrants’ questions or discuss their offerings.
Both novice genealogists and seasoned family historians will find tips on furthering their research skills and the motivation to expand their family history story. Whether you attend the live sessions or watch the recorded sessions later at your convenience, you can enjoy our virtual conference.
“Our first virtual conference was a great success, and we expect attendees to find this year’s event just as interesting and helpful,” said BIFHSGO President Duncan Monkhouse.
The C$40 conference registration fee includes the 12 presentations, the Connect Sessions, and access to the presentation videos and handouts until 31 October. Visit our website for the full speaker and program details and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

DNA Day, Monday, 25 Apri, 2022, from 11:00 AM to 6:00 PM EDT. 

This seminar includes the following:

11:00 AM – DNA Basics: An Introduction to DNA and Genealogy

12:15 PM – Grouping DNA Matches

1:00 PM – Using DNA to Determine Relationships

1:45 PM – Quick and Dirty Trees: Crowdsourcing Your DNA Connections

3:00 PM – DNA Visual Phasing 2:30 PM – Immigration Research and DNA: A Case Study
5:15 PM – Using DNA to Find an Unknown Grandparent: A Case Study

Link to register
https://churchofjesuschrist.zoom.us/webinar/register/4616426157731/WN_dWXajX7yRmKu9ZIB7ls2CQ?fbclid=IwAR3Yi2lyr5XCi1mE15tr_JjWi7sQKcSR8tHQ7h4hYZ8-bWqMM7-ZezmCdIk

via a notice from Susan Courage and Shirley Monkhouse.

Of Library and Archives Canada’s Co-Lab Challenges progress is reported on two, including one new since last month.

Travel posters in the Marc Choko collection is 41% complete in French, 0% in English. New.

Women in the War remains 0% complete.

First World War Posters, with 140 images, remains 99% complete,

Arthur Lismer’s Children’s Art Classes remains 0% complete.

John Freemont Smith remains 93% complete.

Canadian National Land Settlement Association remains 98% complete.

Molly Lamb Bobak with 226 images, is 91% complete, 89% last month.

Diary of François-Hyacinthe Séguin remains 99% complete.

George Mully: moments in Indigenous communities remains 0% complete.

Correspondence regarding First Nations veterans returning after the First World War remains 99% complete.

Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 remains 96% complete.

Legendary Train Robber and Prison Escapee Bill Miner remains 99% complete.

Japanese-Canadians: Second World War, is 0% remains 3% last month.

The Call to Duty: Canada’s Nursing Sisters remains 92% complete.

Projects that remain 100% complete are no longer reported here.

Other unidentified Co-Lab activities not part of the Challenges may have happened.

This is one of the hundreds, probably thousands if you count old issues, of magazines available free online through the Ottawa Public Library, and likely many other libraries’, subscriptions to PressReader.

Given the mention by Wayne Shepheard in my recent interview of a Scottish ancestor’s livelihood being disrupted owing to the silting up of a river, I was interested to see another example of the impact of natural environmental processes, this augmented by climate change. That’s right at the bottom of the list of contents below in the Final Word column.

NEWS
5 News
Latest history and heritage news.
6 Plockton’s sporting dilemma
A quoiting or a shinty club?

ARCHAEOLOGY
8 Urban standing stones
Dr Kenneth Brophy takes us on a tour of these monuments.
10 Air raid archaeology
Report on the discovery and excavation of a unique domestic WW II air-raid shelter.

FEATURES
14 Plague returns to Glasgow
20 The annals of the Goodsir-Taylor brooch
A brooch that tells the story of three Scottish families across the centuries.
23 Three centuries of performance
Allan Ramsay’s Gentle Shepherd.
30 The police and the RAF in wartime Berwickshire.
38 How to take a town
The logistical and administrative directives of Jacobite army officials in the early weeks of the 1745 rising.
40 The First Scottish Enlightenment
Enlightenment and Jacobitism
46 Audobon’s Birds of America
Curator’s exhibition preview.
50 A lifelong passion for history
Interview with James Thomson OBE.
52 The end of Scottish witch-hunting
The group of skeptics whose endeavours helped bring the age of witch-hunting to an end.
55 NEW Climate Change Heritage Action.
The launch of a new series on the challenges facing our built heritage.

REGULARS… IN EVERY ISSUE
28 Events Online and on-site events
36 National Records Scotland
Archive evidence of the establishment of the midwifery profession
56 Book reviews
Anna of Denmark, by Jemma Field.
Women and Scottish Society: 1700-2000, by W W J Know.
The Case for Scottish Independence, by Ben Jackson.
59 Ten minutes on…
The Albany Stewarts.
60 Family history
Legacies of the slave trade In JamaIca.
61 Scottish History Society
The scholarship of Dr John Durkan,
62 Final Word
Dr Martin Kirkbride on a new extreme weather project, assessing changing patterns across the decades.

Subscriber Rob Bennie sent an email:

I was horrified and disgusted by the proposal to build seaside condos on Juno Beach in Normandy, France. This decision reflects a total lack of respect and disregard for those brave Canadians who fought and died to liberate France. Some places should be sacrosanct.

He asks you, if that’s your sentiment, to write your MP, the PM and the French President to try to get this decision reversed so that Juno Beach remains a fitting memorial to Canada’s role in the D Day invasion which ultimately led to France becoming a free nation again.

There’s a convenient link, and the opportunity to sign a petition at https://www.savejunobeach.ca/

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.