Two New Northern Ireland collections on Ancestry

Northern Ireland, Valuation Revision Books, 1864-1933, with 3,193,180 records, is the largest database in the Ancestry collection specifically for Northern Ireland. Records in the collection may contain the following information:

Names of property owners
Names of occupants
Description of property
Changes in acreage
Changes in property valuation
Name of street
Name of city, county, parish, and townland
Name of affiliated poor law union
Date of notation

Web: Northern Ireland, Freeholders Records, has 129,894 entries with links to images of the original at PRONI. Freeholders were men who either owned their land outright or who held it in a lease for the duration of their life, or the lives of other people named in the lease. They are for the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

OGS Ottawa Branch June Meeting

Here’s a last opportunity for an in-person genealogy event in Ottawa until activities resume after the summer break.

On Saturday, 17 June, local speaker Joanna Crandell will present “Indigenous Enfranchisement Records 1880- 1970 in Canadian Orders in Council (Ottawa).” It’s in person at 1 pm at the Ottawa City Archives building, 100 Tallwood, Nepean, Ottawa and also online.

Further information at https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/events/indigenous-enfranchisement-records-1880-1970-in-canadian-orders-in-council-ottawa/

Findmypast Weekly Update

If you have ancestry in Luton or elsewhere in Bedfordshire, FMP’s focus this week on parish BMB records for that home county gives you new records to explore.

The Bedfordshire set has 706,477 baptism records, created between 1466 and 2011. The marriage collection comprises 411,778 records from 1568 to 1989. And there are 103,433 burial records between 1329 and 1999.

For Luton there are 46,528 baptisms, 36,890 marriages and 16,604 burials.

These are transcript records obtained from FamilySearch.

This week marks passing the 68 million page mark in the British Newspaper Archive collection, accessible with a FMP subscription.

 

They found their resting place – finally

Three Canadian soldiers of the First World War, Private Harry Atherton, Corporal Percy Howarth, and Sergeant Richard Musgrave, were laid to rest with military honours at CWGC Loos British Cemetery, Loos-en-Gohelle, France on the 8 June 2023.

All three were born in the UK and migrated to Canada before the war. Identification of the remains is the responsibility of the Canadian Armed Forces Casualty Identification Program. Remains of Howarth and Musgrave were discovered in 2011, those of Atherton in 2017, longer than the duration of the war from discovery to burial!

Genealogy News from Ireland

The Spring issue of Irish Lives Remembered is free online, with, in addition to regular columns, feature articles:

Helen Moss & Fiona Fitzsimons – Bruce Springsteen: Born in the USA, Roots in Ireland
Brigit McCone – Gaels Who Sail: The Irish in the Caribbean, Pacific and Antarctic
Brian Mitchell – The Shipwreck of the Faithful Steward: The Importance of Family Information
Eamonn P. Kelly – Here Be Dragons: Áine’s Fiery Form
Donna Rutherford – Unlocking Secrets with DNA: My Unexpected Result
Conor Curran – Outstanding Families of Dublin Soccer
Elizabeth Cowan – Bride of MacBride: Catalina Bulfin
The Four Courts Press Photo Feature – Launch of “The Irish Defence Forces 1922-2022” By Eoin Kinsella
The Four Courts Press Book Excerpt – Leitrim:The Irish Revolution 1912-23 (published 2020) by Patrick McGarty
The Genealogical Publishing Company Book Excerpt – A New Genealogical Atlas of Ireland. Second Edition (published 2002) by Brian Mitchell.

Also now available, the Summer issue of Irish Genealogy Matters with news from www.rootsireland.ie .

A reminder that the best way to stay up to date on genealogy developments in Ireland is Claire Santry’s Irish Genealogy News at https://www.irishgenealogynews.com/

Internet Genealogy Magazine: June/July 2023

This is Volume 18, No 2, the first all-digital edition. That’s right, there’s no longer a print edition.

The content is much the same as previously You’ll find fewer ads and more colour and still with familiar writers like Sue Lisk, Robbie Goor, Diane L Richard, Joe Grandinetti and Dave Obee’s back page, 

The first article that drew my attention was “English Publicans”, by Michelle Dennis. As I have an ancestor who ran a pub in late 18th and early 19th century Barrow, in Suffolk, I was interested to see if there were any resources
I’d missed.  It turned out many of the article’s resources were London-specific and too late for my ancestors. Probate was a source mentioned that I’d mined. I’d not looked at Quarter or Petty Session records so appreciated the mention that a licence to sell spirits had to be obtained annually to ensure they kept an “orderly house.”

Sue Lisk’s articles “Within A Legal Framework:
The Law and Our Ancestors” and “Like Shooting Fish In a Barrel: Formulating Research Questions” have good advice for both US and Canadian research. Joe Grandinetti extends the geographic scope to Italy and Ireland in “Marginal Success…. Fringe Benefits in Genealogical Research”.

Dave Obee’s back page, finds him hopping on the Genealogy and AI bandwagon with a caution about being skeptical owing to “hallucinations.” He does admit that some of the ideas AI produced weren’t bad, I agree. The trick is to know enough to distinguish those from the crap.

For cardholders at a public library, like the Ottawa Public Library, with a subscription to Flipster eMagazines, you should now be able to access the magazine without charge.

 

Billion Plus Genealogy Database Update

Here, according to the MyHeritage and Ancestry published catalogues, are the increases (bold) in the number of items contained.

Org Database April 2023 June 2023
MyH MyHeritage Family Trees 5,464,569,377 5,545,306,712
MyH Newspaper Name Index, USA and Canada 2,300,027,369 2,300,027,368
Anc Public Member Trees 1,895,402,199 1,895,402,199
Anc Geneanet Community Trees Index (France) 1,525,138,110 1,579,942,127
Anc Private Member Trees 1,515,901,512 1,515,901,512
Anc U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995 1,385,585,015 1,385,585,015
Anc New York, U.S., Newspapers.com™ Stories and Events Index, 1800’s-current 1,260,074,233
Anc California, U.S., Newspapers.com™ Stories and Events Index 1,067,030,708 1,067,030,707
MyH FamilySearch Family Tree 1,056,564,440 1,063,207,304
Anc U.S., Newspapers.com™ Obituary Index, 1800s-current 1,056,609,084 1,056,705,244

FamilySearch also advertizes more than 1.2 billion in its Family Tree without giving an exact number.

Prime Minister’s Intriguing Origins

The new Bytown Pamphlet Phyllis Turner Ross – Career Woman and Single Mother has a title it would be easy to gloss over until you twig to the fact that Turner refers to former Canadian prime minister John Turner.

The pamphlet is in two parts.

First, Paul Litt recounts the influence the extraordinary Phyllis Turner Ross had on the formative years of the future prime minister.

Then, Christine Jackson, recounts her search for records that challenge and augment what is commonly understood about Phyllis Turner’s pre-Ottawa years.

A mystery remains.

Family Tree Magazine: July 2023

FAMILY HISTORY NEWS
Rachel Bellerby reports on the latest from the genealogy scene.

IMMIGRATION
Chris Paton looks at some of the motives for migration to the British Isles and provides useful leads to track down the records to trace our family histories.

DISCOVER THE SIX HATS METHOD FOR GENEALOGY
Do you feel as though you’re juggling many balls when doing your genealogy? If so, you’re not alone. However, introducing a sound methodology can dramatically improve your genealogical thinking, and enable you to more
effectively assess the historical records that you encounter time after time. To that end Dr Sophie Kay is here to help you master the Six Hats method!

94% EUROPEAN & 6% AFRICAN DNA
TRACING MY AFRICAN ANCESTOR
Many of us are aware that over the centuries, there have been inter-racial relationships between Africans and Europeans and recent advancements in consumer DNA testing further confirms this. Genealogist Yetunde Abiola
reflects on our shared history and the unique stories that we may come across in the course of researching our family’s history.

INVESTIGATING CLANDESTINE MARRAIGES
A case study by Dave Annal.

THE SOUNDTRACJ OF OUR LIVES
Charlotte Soares invites us to add some richness to our research by imagining the variety of music our ancestors would have experienced — from a sing-song around the piano to a performance in a concert hall.

‘RESEARCHING THE FATE OF THE SS BARON ERSKINE
In late 1941 crew member Thomas Parker White was bound for the UK, on the SS Baron Erskine. Separated from the relative safety of the convoy, the Baron Erskine’s future swiftly became vulnerable. Deborah Pugh relates the events that unfolded next.

THE LOST GARDENERS OF WORSLEY
Adele Emm uses census records and online research to chart the varying fortunes of eight young men who were photographed working in the gardens of Worsley Hall in the early 20th century.

WRITING A GENEALOGY ARTICLE
Simon Wills has over 30 years’ experience of writing for magazines, books and websites. Here, he shares some tips on the right approach to help get you published.

YOUR DNA WORKSHOP
This month, Karen Evans helps reader Mark use DNA techniques to delve into the mystery of who the father of his maternal great-grandmother was.

QUICK & DIRTY TREES TASK OF THE MONTH
You’ve found a promising DNA match, but they have no tree. What’s the next step? Learn how to create a ‘quick & dirty” tree — to help identify how you and your DNA matches may be related.

SPOTLIGHT ON… The Airedale & ‘Wharfedale Family History Society
Stanley Merridew introduces a society that marks its fifth anniversary this year, showing how the merging of two separate societies created a stronger group.

SAYING NO TO NOTIFICATIONS
This month, Diane Lindsay urges us to take a step back from those tempting online family history hints that seem to promise the world — or a new ancestor at the very least — and instead go back to basics with our older research.

And more …

This Week’s Online Genealogy Events

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. Looking for more options? Additional mainly US events are listed at https://conferencekeeper.org/virtual.

Tuesday 13 June

2 pm: OGS Ottawa Branch Virtual Drop-in, with local experts Gloria Tubman, Ken McKinlay and Mike More.
https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/events/

2 pm: The Top 10 DNA Features on MyHeritage, by Richard Hill for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/the-top-10-dna-features-on-myheritage/

2:30 pm: Introducing American Ancestors, by Claire Vail for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/8553409

7 pm: Genealogy with Google, by Dave Obee for OGS Lambton County Branch.
https://lambton.ogs.on.ca/

Wednesday 14 June

7 pm: The Wreck HMS Speedy-The Tragedy That Shook Upper Canada, by Dan Buchanan for OGS York Region Branch.
https://york.ogs.on.ca/meetings-events/

8 pm: Putting it All Together: Making Sense of All the Research You’ve Done, by Robyn Smith for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/putting-it-all-together-making-sense/

Thursday 15 June

6:30 pm: Introduction to Arab American Genealogy Research, by Reem Awad-Rashmawi for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/8592759

Friday 16 June

2 pm: Finding Your Ancestors in Canadian Land Records, by Tara Shymanski for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/finding-your-ancestors-in-canadian-land-records/

Saturday 17 June

1 pm: Indigenous Enfranchisement Records 1880- 1970 in Canadian Orders in Council, by Joanna Crandell for OGS Ottawa Branch.
https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/events/indigenous-enfranchisement-records-1880-1970-in-canadian-orders-in-council-ottawa/

 

BIFHSGO Awards

Want to know about the awards given at the British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa Annual General Meeting?

Barbara Tose
Past president and Anglo-Celtic Roots editor, among many other contributions, Barbara was inducted intio the Society Hall of Fame.
If you don’t quite recognize her in the photo, Barbara is now adapting to life with less need for glasses following cataract surgery.

Pam Cooper
BIFHSGO librarian, working in support of the Ottawa Branch Ottawa Genealogical Society, Pam was inducted into the Hall of Fame for that and her many other contributions to the Society. Pam couldn’t be at the meeting so no photo!

David Jeanes
Was presented a certificate of recognition, to add to the many others from his various volunteer roles, past and present, in the Ottawa community, for his excellent technical work at BIFHSGO monthly meetings and conferences.

Find the other awards and news from the AGM at  https://www.bifhsgo.ca/news

 

 

The Long Shadow of Ancestry

The recent article The Inheritance of Social Status: England, 1600-2022, shows a strong persistence of social status across family trees, progressively weakening but detectable even to the fourth cousin level.  

Despite social changes in England between 1600 and 2022 people remain correlated in outcomes with their lineage relatives in exactly the same way as in pre-industrial England. There are also conclusions on marriage partners social status.

The study, by Gregory Clark from UC Davis and the LSE, preliminary in nature, is based on data from the Guild of One-Name Studies and the FreeReg organization. While I don’t pretend to follow the detail, what should we make of the comment that “Since 1920 there have been increasing levels of public provision of education, health care, and basic needs. These services should have helped, in particular, poorer families. Yet we see no corresponding increase in rates of social mobility.”