Week 32 (Aug. 6-12): Neighbors and Community - #52Ancestors

Wherever they lived, our ancestors were a part of their local community, although finding records of how they interacted with their neighbours can be sparse.  Census records are one resource for finding out about our ancestors' neighbours.

For example, below is the 1851 census for Isaac Green.

Isaac Green is a farmer, age 58, living in Fordham, Essex.  This census record tells me that his household consistes of his wife Betsy 57, son William 17, and servants Maryann Blakeley 45, Harriet Clark 30 and Betsy Woodward 17. 

If you look at the household directly beneath Isaac's in the census, you find Edmund Woodward 59, wife Rebecca Woodward 55 and mother (actually mother-in-law) Rebecca Fairclough 77.  Edmund is a labourer - and yes, he works for Isaac Green.  Isaac's servant Betsy Woodward is Edmund's eldest daughter - shown in the 1841 census - who has gone into service up in the big house.  Following through the census, Betsy Woodward stays on working for Isaac Green for decades, through the 1861, 1871 and 1881 censuses until Isaac's death in 1882.

It would be all too easy to overlook this information and simply concentrate on the main family, noting family members and occupations and overlooking all that lovely extra information about Isaac's ties to his neighborhood.

Week 31 (July 30-Aug. 5): A Day in the Life - #52Ancestors

Newspapers can be an excellent source of finding out more about or ancestors daily lives.  They can provide information about not only the major events, but also about how they spent their leisure hours and the clubs and societies they belonged to. 

Included in my newspaper records, I found several articles relating to musical events and concerts in which various ancestors performed, especially my Argent branch of my family tree.

The article above is from the Essex Standard published Friday 7 January 1876 and has several members of my Argent family preforming.  My Great Great Grandfather John Thompson Argent was Chair or the event and his sister Ada Emily Argent was the pianist.

When my great grandfather James Nicholas Clark passed away in 1924 there were two death notices inserted in the newspaper - one from his family and one from the Masonic Lodge of which he was a member. 

Had it not been for this Masonic notice, I would never have known that James was a Mason.  It is also worth noting the spelling error - the heading of the Masonic notice has CLARG, not CLARK.  The family notice also gives me his occupation - Overseer at Brighton City Council.

Week 30 (July 23-29) Free Space - #52Ancestors

Free space in my family history records generally means I have work to do, a gap to fill, a mystery I have not yet solved.  Often when I am looking through my family history notes I will look for the free spaces and pick one in particular to work on and try to fill.

Perhaps it is a missing baptism or burial record, a gap in census records, an unusually long time between the births of children.  Any free space in an ancestor's timeline deserves investigation.

I find it is a useful exercise to go back through my notes, charts and timelines and look for free space, to see what I have missed or not followed up on as well as I should.  It is all too easy to follow the information I do have on to another generation or another individual, to go down the rabbit hole of a new discovery and not return to an individual whose information is incomplete.

Noting the free space in my family history helps to prompt me to go back, research more thoroughly and fill in the gaps, until hopefully on day all those free spaces are filled. 

Week 29 (July 16-22) A Source I Want to Understand Better - #52Ancestors

One particular type of record I have always had difficulty with are shipping records.  Over the years of my research I have slowly learned about these records, but locating my ancestors in shipping and immigration records has always been problematic.

For a couple of my ancestors, making the assumption that they moved directly from A to B let me astray, in one case for several years.  The family of my great grandfather, James Nicholas Clark, came from Bristol in England.  They left England at about the time James was born and eventually settled in Melbourne, Australia.  It took me several years of fruitless searching for their immigration details before I widened my search to find the family first arrived in Launceston, Tasmania, which is where James was born shortly after they arrived.  The family spent at least 5 years in nearby Port Sorrell before travelling across Bass Strait to settle in Melbourne.

So why is it so difficult to find some of our ancestor's immigration records?

• Consider alternate spelling of their name.  The clerk who recorded their embarkation or arrival was unlikely to ask about spelling and just recorded the name as he heard it.
  
• If the person travelled in steerage/was an unassisted immigrant/was a crew member who jumped ship, the details recorded about them may be scant or non-existent.
• Females, children, servants and steerage passengers were frequently left off the passenger lists altogether.
• Did they migrate in stages?  Not everyone went straight from A to B – some visited other points along the way, sometimes taking years to arrive at their final destination.
• Prior to 1852, ship's masters were not required to record the names of unassisted passengers travelling from Britain to the Australian colonies.
• Port Phillip District of New South Wales was established on 10 April 1837.  Victoria was not proclaimed a separate colony until 1 July 1851.  Check NSW records if your ancestor arrived earlier.
• After 1923 records of people arriving by sea and air are held at the National Archives of Australia.
• Not all records have survived the passage of time and remained legible.

Family Tree UK Magazine August 2026

The latest issue of Family Tree UK magazine is now available free online for Campaspe Library members via our subscription to Libby eMagazines.

Inside this month's issue : 

• Professor Turi King Awarded Julian Bickersteth Memorial
• Crowd Cymru wins national award
• One-name website resource recognised
• Preparations underway for Family Tree Live
• Family historians invited to create time capsule
• Findmypast partners with Heritage Open Days to celebrate ‘Everyday Histories’
• ‘Pedigrees of paupers’ - Analyzing class and social mobility in the records
• Advanced approaches - Taking your research to the next level
• Putting your ancestors in their place - Agriculture
• A Legacy of the heart - Your Voice Matters part 2 
• Part 3 rural role models - like mother, like daughter
• Extra, extra! Read all about it!
• Building effective family trees from your DNA matches 
• Digging Deeper into sources - Learn how to get every last clue

Who Do You Think You Are Magazine August 2026

The latest issue of Who Do You Think You Are magazine is now available free online for Campaspe Library members via our subscription to Libby eMagazines.

Inside this month's issue : 

• Putting AI to the test
• London Library membership records go online
• British documents added to Memory of the World Register
• First World War soldiers buried after DNA identification
• Historic coal mining plans go online
• TheGenealogist adds British Railways magazines
• Toilet tales - Dealing with bodily functions
• AI: The answers at your fingertips? 
• Full text search at FamilySearch
• 6 free websites
• Lost in Ireland
• My journey began with a pedigree
• The Royal Naval Reserve
• British in India
• More great websites - fantastic sites you can't afford to miss
• Prerogative & Exchequer Courts of York, Probate Records 

Week 28 (July 9-15) Leisure Time - #52Ancestors

A fascinating and often difficult to research aspect of our ancestors' lives is what they did in their leisure time.  How did they relax and unwind?  Did they have hobbies?  Play sports?  Read? Take trips or go on holidays?  For many leisure time would have been rare and therefore precious - so how did they spent that time?

Newspapers have been a great source of information for me about my ancestors' 'play time' and leisure activities.  My Argent ancestors from West Bergholt took part in an amateur concert, reported below in the Essex Standard of Friday 7 January 1876.
 

A similar article reported on a pigeon shooting match in which my great-grandfather Walter Green took part - sadly he lost the match. 

Another newspaper report concerned another great-grandfather, Henry Arthur Pike, who was the umpire for his local quoits club in Bradfield St George.

All fascinating insights into the lives of my ancestors 'Play Time'.