Remembrance Day

Remembrance Day, once known as Armistice Day, is one of our most important commemorative dates. On 11 November 1918, the guns on the Western Front fell silent, and the armistice with Germany to end the fighting on land, in the air and at sea was signed.

Each year on 11 November we pause as a nation at 11am for one minute of silence to honour all those who have suffered and lost their lives during wars, conflicts and peacekeeping operations.

A wonderful resource for hosts of a Remembrance Day service, or those commemorating at home, is available from the Department of Veterans Affairs.  Through their ANZAC Portal, they have a free Remembrance Day Kitbag.  It includes the order of service, music, making a speech, the Ode of Remembrance, a brief history, suggestions for a personal commemoration, guidelines to making a paper poppy, and more.

This year my home town hopes to finally have a normal Remembrance Day service, after being impacted by Covid in 2020 and 2021 followed by a major flood in 2022 which saw a number of army personnel deployed to the area to assist with sandbagging, evacuations and cleanup.

So wherever you are at 11am this 11th of November, take a minute to pause and remember those who have served to protect our freedoms.

Lest We Forget.

Family Histories Podcasts

It has been announced that series 6 of the wonderful series of The Family Histories Podcasts is now complete.  Hosted Andrew Martin, seven more genealogy-obsessed guests will share how they got hooked on researching their family history, tell us the life story of one of their most fascinating relatives, and finally share one of their own current research brick wall.  

Series 6 will feature the following quests;

• James Danter
• Jackie Depelle
• Phyllis Biffle Elmore
• Rick Glanvill
• Sven Grewel
• Clare Kirk
• Teresa Vega

 

For Evermore - Stories of the Fallen

For Evermore - Stories of the Fallen is a new site to honour those from the Commonwealth forces who lost their lives in the world wars.

 
Part of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, the site allows members of the public to submit stories about those who gave their lives during the world wars, and link the story to the individual's casualty page within the CWGC database.

As you submit your story, you can identify the conflict in which the person lost their life, their role (Army, Navy, Air Force, Merchant Navy, Civilian Casualty), Nationality, and even a theme (Women at War,  Post Office, Art and Literature, and more).  You can add images and even video to enhance your story if you wish.

The site even has a tutorial with an instructional video and step-by-step manual to help you post your story.

You can browse submitted stories by conflict, role, nationality or theme, or you can use the search box to search by name, role, conflict etc.

Famiy Tree US Magazine

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

Inside this month's issue :  

• Ancestry.com Updates: Fans, Dogs and DNA
• New Project : 10 Million Names
• DNA and Privacy • GEDmatch breach renews concerns about DNA and law enforcement
• Fine Print • Celebrate and share your ancestors by printing a family tree.
• Types of Family Trees • During the course of your research, you’ve probably encountered a few different styles of family trees.
• Stories Worth Telling • Learn how to adapt family letters, journals and other documents into easy-to-read narratives that relatives will love.
• Stronger Together • These four steps will help you find and meaningfully help genealogy groups in our post-pandemic world.
• Smart Photos • MyHeritage has made headlines for its library of AI-assisted photo tools.
• Season’s readings • New genealogy book releases.
• The Tin Age • Age, photo format, and clothing are just the starting points for identifying a subject.
• Saving Family Papers
• Scandinavian Genealogy
• And more..... 

Wards of the State Records Digitised in Victoria

The Public Record Office of Victoria (PROV) and the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing have recently announced they have made records from 1864-1923 available online for the first time, putting out the following statement.

The records relate to children under care of the state in Victoria, (Wards of the State). Ward records are "a central departmental record detailing each child committed to State ‘care’, why and for how long a child was made a ward of the state and where they were placed during that term". They remain closed for 99 years from their creation, at which point they are opened to the public. These records are the only substantial record that still exists about each child, case records having been destroyed prior to 1973 and the creation of PROV.

For a child who was put in care due to concerns for their welfare or because they had committed an offence, Ward records are singularly important – providing a starting point on their journey to answer questions about their identity and their history, and containing otherwise disparate information about the places they lived and records that may have been created about them. "For many people institutionalised as children, the bureaucratic information in the Ward Register has to ‘stand in’ for the web of information contained in memories, personal and family memorabilia that most of us take for granted."

The records have recently been digitised and include the children’s:

• Ward Number
• Name
• Date of Birth
• Sex
• Native place
• Religion
• Ability to Read or Write
• Date of Commitment
• Commiting Bench
• Date of Admission
• Term
• Cause of Commitment
• Whether Parents are living
• Vaccination details
• Previous history
• Where stationed
• Licensing out details
• Discharge details
• Half yearly report information.

You can find the records at: https://prov.vic.gov.au/archive/VPRS4527

WW2 Medal Recipients Online

The details of thousands of civilians who were recommended for and awarded medals for bravery in the Second World War including George Cross recipients, are now available to search for free online.

The names are taken from the records of the Treasury Committee which decided on the recipients of honours including the George Cross, the George Medal, the OBE and the MBE. The records are now held at The National Archives (TNA) in Kew. 

Adding the complete collection of about 6,500 individuals from 166 files to TNA’s online catalogue Discovery took a team of staff and volunteers two years.

Searching for each name brings up a short description of why the person was commended, what their action was, and what medal they received, if any.

Awards for agents in the Special Operations Executive (SOE), a secret organisation that carried out espionage, sabotage and reconnaissance in occupied Europe during the Second World War, are also included in the newly digitised collection.  

Australian Coastal Passenger Records 1852-1924

A wonderful new set of records has been made available on Ancestry.  The new dataset of Australian Coastal Passenger Records contains images of passenger registers for ships traveling between ports in Victoria, Australia, and ports in other Australian cities.

Records in this collection may include the following information:

• Name
• Age
• Gender
• Marital status
• Occupation
• Family relationship
• Nationality
• Departure port
• Departure date
• Arrival port
• Ship captain's name

Some names may be abbreviated, and children may be listed as "child with" and their parents' surnames. The registers have printed column headings with handwritten entries.

The registers were created by officials working for the government of the state of Victoria.  Laws enacted shortly after the state of Victoria was established in 1851 required ship masters to fill out register forms and submit them to customs officials before departing a port. The lists are formally called "Inward Passenger Lists (Australian Ports)" but are commonly referred to as coastal passenger lists. Beginning in 1924, documentation of interstate maritime passengers was transferred from the states to the Commonwealth.  The original documents are housed by the Public Records Office of Victoria in Melbourne.

These newly digitized records are a valuable record set for many whose ancestors did not migrate straight from A to B.  My Clark family, for example, emigrated from Bristol in England and settled in Melbourne, Victoria.  It took me several years of searching for their immigration records to discover that they actually travelled from Bristol to Launceston, Tasmania, then settled in Port Sorrel, Tasmania for several years.  At least 6 children were born in Port Sorrell or Launceston before the family moved to Victoria and settled in the Melbourne suburb of St Kilda.

This new dataset will hopefully allow me to establish exactly when the family moved from Port Sorrell to St Kilda, finally solving a long standing family mystery.  Time to get searching.