hall end, attleborough 1905...grave situations - by jacqui simkins 9 a genealogical a to z - by dr...

Hall End, Attleborough 1905

NUNEATON AND NORTH WARWICKSHIRE FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Member of the Federation of Family History Societies

http://www.nnwfhs.org.uk

JOURNAL JANUARY 2003 Price £1.50 (first copy free to members)

Photograph courtesy of Mr M Ensor

Nuneaton & North Warwickshire Family History Society - Journal Page 1

NNWFHS COMMITTEE

CHAIRMAN PETER LEE, P O Box 2282, Nuneaton, Warwicks CV116ZT Tel: (024) 7638 1090 email [email protected] SECRETARY LEIGH RIDDELL, 14 Amos Avenue, Nuneaton, Warwickshire CV10 7BD Tel: (024) 7634 7754

MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY JOHN PARTON, 6 Windmill Rd, Atherstone, Warwickshire CV9 1HP Tel: (01827) 713938 email [email protected] TREASURER & CELIA PARTON, 6 Windmill Rd, Atherstone, Warwickshire CV91HP NORTH WARWICKSHIRE CO-ORDINATOR Tel: (01827) 713938 email [email protected] LIBRARY & PROJECTS CO-ORDINATOR CAROLYN BOSS, Nuneaton Library, Church Street, Nuneaton, & VICE CHAIR Warwickshire CV11 4DR Tel: (024) 7638 4027 JOURNAL & PUBLICATIONS EDITOR PAT BOUCHER, 33 Buttermere Ave, Nuneaton,Warwicks CV11 6ET & MICROFICHE LENDING LIBRARIAN Tel: (024) 7638 3488 email [email protected] MINUTES SECRETARY & ALVA KING, 26 Thirlmere Avenue, Nuneaton, Warwicks. CV11 6HS BURIALS INDEXING PROJECT Tel: (024) 7638 3499 email: [email protected] PUBLICATIONS MANAGER CHRISTOPHER COX, 9 Binswood Close, Coventry, W Midlands. CV2 1HL Tel: 024 7661 6880 COMMITTEE MEMBER & RAY HALL, 4 Thornhill Drive, Nuneaton, Warwickshire, CV11 6TD BURIALS INDEXING PROJECT Tel: (024) 76 744647 email [email protected] COMMITTEE MEMBER ROBERT BUTLER, 16 Dovecote Close, Solihull, West Midlands B91 2EP Tel 0121 743 8526 email [email protected] WEBSITE MANAGER BILL BOSWELL, 21 Randle Road, Stockingford, Nuneaton,Warwicks CV10 8HR Tel: (024) 7634 3596 email [email protected] NORTH AMERICAN REPRESENTATIVE HARLOW G FARMER, 7427 Venice Street, Falls Church, VA, USA. Telephone 22043 703 560 6776 E-mail [email protected]

CONTENTS PAGE NNWFHS Committee 1 NNWFHS Diary - A Report From The Chairman, Peter Lee. 2 Letters to the Editor 3 Monty’s Buses, Attleborough - By Peter Lee 4 The Church of St John, Bentley - By Celia Parton 5 My New Found Spencer Cousins - By Vic Spencer 6 Battle Crosses County Line - By Mark Cocklin 8 Grave Situations - By Jacqui Simkins 9 A Genealogical A to Z - By Dr Ash Emery 10 Get Netted 14 Notice board 16 Publications 17


First of all I would like to wish all of our members a very happy and successful New Year. The Mike Palladino Memorial Lecture is becoming the best local heritage event in Nuneaton by far, the problem is keeping the standard up. On October 18th our lecture was presented by Stuart McKay, who is an authority on the De-Havilland Aircraft company. He gave us a talk on the his-tory of the company founded by Geoffrey De-Havilland who lived in Nuneaton for most of his childhood. His father Charles De-Havilland, was vicar at St. Mary's Abbey church in the last years of the 19th century. Olivia de-Havilland, the famous film actress, was a cousin, as well as Joan Fontaine, (from the Japanese based branch of the family I believe?) I understand that Olivia is alive, in her 80's, and lives in Paris. The problem with these lectures is that we are constrained by time and Stuart only seems to have just got into his stride after two hours when the caretaker at Nuneaton Town Hall wanted to close down for the night. Anyone who missed his talk, or who would like to hear it again please contact me as next year the Coventry Civic Society are presenting special events to commemorate the aircraft industry in the city, and one of their committee members has asked me to ask Stuart if he will repeat his lec-ture as part of their celebrations. In December I gave a slide show on Old Nuneaton to our annual Christmas gathering at the Nuneaton library. I was surprised by the reaction to the mention of "haunted Nuneaton" and real-ise there are a lot of people interested in ghosts particularly local ones. If anyone is interested I intend to do a Ghost tour of Nuneaton in February. This will be limited to just six participants so please contact me quickly if you are interested. If more than one party is required I will be happy to repeat the tour a few weeks later. Why six? The trouble is if you take any more along you tend to get stragglers and often have to repeat what you have pointed out to people who have kept up. I should hate a ghost to appear and only half the party see it! Not that I can guarantee that, of course. You will need good warm and comfortable walking shoes, (we will walk about one mile) a flashlight, umbrella, and a strong disposition. Another event you will perhaps be interested in takes place on March 1st at Holy Trinity Church Centre, Attleborough. Old Attleborough, Local and Family History Day. 10am-4pm. I am looking for displays for local families and photographs of the village. If you would like to exhibit please let me know as soon as you can.

NnwFHs Diary A Report From The Chairman, Peter Lee

If you have a photograph or an article which you would like to be published in the next journal please contact Pat Boucher either at the monthly meetings, telephone 024 7638 3488, email [email protected] or by post at 33 Buttermere Ave, Nuneaton, Warwicks, CV11 6ET. I am happy to accept word processed articles or scanned photographs etc on computer disk. Also, don’t forget items for help wanted, new websites etc

Thanks, Pat Boucher - Editor.

Deadline for all copy to be included in April issue of the Journal is March 7th

NNWFHS HELPLINE

Peter Lee (024) 7638 1090

6.30 - 8.00pm Mon to Sat

Or email: [email protected]


Letters to THE EDITOR Dear Pat 2 days ago I received an unsolicited email from a "Nigerian barrister" tell-ing me that he was acting for the $1 million estate of Michael Croshaw who was killed in a car crash and it was about to be appropriated by the Government if there was no claimant and would I be that claimant, etc, etc In fact I sent it to the fraud squad. My son in law tells me that Nigeria is top of the pops in "Scams" of this kind. I was wondering where they got my name from and whether there was a possible N&NWFHS angle? Per-haps a warning in the next Journal might be appropriate? Warm regards, Alan Croshaw Reply from Pat: The people that send these letters and emails obtain names and addresses from many easily available sources. It is, appar-ently, something to do with money laundering and you only stand to loose money and or get into serious trouble. Please do ignore them. I myself have received at least two emails along the same lines and my husband received a letter just last week which I have passed on to our local police.

Dear Pat I have in my possession, purchased a few years ago from a bookstall, a bible presented to Jesse Gunn by the Committee and Teachers of the Wesleyan Sunday Schools, Nuneaton, May 1899. I am willing to let this go to a descendent, for the cost of postage only, as long as proof is given of their relationship to Jesse Gunn, otherwise I would like to keep it, purely because of its age. It is in fairly good condi-tion. Yours sincerely, Pauline Roberts.


Many old Nuneatonians have fond memories of travelling to Caldwell, Bramcote and Attleborough on one of Monty's old buses. I say old because probably most of them were purchased second hand, and in some cases third or even fourth hand. Monty's services had a delightful home spun character to them, few buses were identical which made travelling on his routes something of an adventure. However, the character of these buses were just part of the fantastic Monty Moreton story and the founder of the business 76 years ago. Monty Moreton senior was born at Hartshill in June 1884 and started work at the age of 10 in a local stone quarry. A rapid succession of jobs in-troduced him to the mining industry and he then worked at Stockingford Drybread and Ansley Hall Collieries before spending the next 25 years with Stanley Bros. Ltd at their Nuneaton colliery at Stockingford. When that pit closed in 1922 Monty found himself out of work so he travelled around looking for a job. He fancied leaving the mining business and took up la-bouring at Desford. Whilst he was away in Leicestershire a chance con-versation in a pub in Market Bosworth led him to buy his first motor omni-bus. He paid £220 for it out of his sav-ings, and not being able to drive got the former owner to show him how it worked on the way home. He then set about working as hard as he could to build up his business. His first trip was at 5.30am every morning taking miners to work and then he would remove the bus body, fit a lorry body and use this for deliv-ery coal and general haulage through the day. He then re-fitted the bus body before taking the miners home at night. It was said when he died that he had spent his whole life at work. When his son, Monty Junior, was 17 he bought a second bus and the pair of them built the business up between them. At this time their joint wage bill was £9 per week! Monty junior was born in 1906 and took over the family firm when his fa-ther died. He was, like his dad, a very

colourful, but well respected character. He became member of Nuneaton Bor-ough Council in 1949. Chairman of the General Works Committee and North East Warwickshire Water Board as well as being a Warwickshire County Councillor. He was mayor be-tween 1959-60. Monty Junior retired in 1971 and the business was carried on by his son also called Monty, his brother Bill Moreton and cousin, Sam Holland. Changing times and changing fortunes brought about lean times for the firm after this date and it closed in 1980 leaving behind many happy memories of summer excursions to Skegness, Yarmouth and Cleethorpes because in addition to his local routes he also ran a variety of trips out in the summer and regular holiday routes to the sea-side. All this in addition to taking workmen every day to the factories in Coventry. Monty was one of several bus operators that started in the 20's running either in competition with the Midland Red and each other. Gradu-ally some of the other routes were taken over by the Midland Red but Monty Senior carried on, with a war of attrition with big brother, the Midland Red, leaving only two independent operators in 1939. The other was A.J. & A. Kiteley trading as "Swift Motor Services" which was acquired by the Midland Red in 1939, the Swift buses themselves passing to their former ri-val Monty. Monty Moreton Limited was formed in May 1941. About 1944 he acquired the business of L & R York of Wolvey. In the post war period he developed the busiest stage service to the Cald-well estate. Amongst his services was the daily route from Chapel End to Gipsy Lane via the Bus Station. His Monday-Friday Wolvey-Hinckley ser-vice. Nuneaton-Wolvey and the daily Bus Station to the Caldwell Estate (Red Deeps). In the summer he ran regular trips to Mablethorpe, Great Yarmouth and the Isle of Wight. Works services comprised morning and evening routes to Hinckley, Bad-desley Colliery and the Chrysler works in Coventry.

His garage was located in Attlebor-ough almost opposite the Albion Buildings and extended down to the Wem Brook overlooking the Pingle Fields. The first bus purchased with his £220 appears to have been a Ford model T with a Dixie body acquired in 1923. This was a convertible model as the bus body could be removed and a lorry body fitted. In those days a lot of the early bus operators had these sort of vehicles. The services must have been successful despite the miners having a rather rough ride on indiffer-ent roads with solid rubber tyres and rather rickety wooden bodies, bench seats only loosely connected to the chassis. I have not yet come across any accidents due to this "Heath Rob-inson" arrangement as to failure to se-cure all the bolts resulting in bodies coming loose and depositing its pas-sengers on the road in a heap of splin-tered wood, I dare say there was some. His first two buses had this arrange-ment but they did not last long in ser-vice being withdrawn in 1926 possibly sold on to another operator. The body from one was used on another Monty vehicle a Chevrolet purchased in 1926. Over the years there were very many acquisitions including some from the War Department and operators as far away as Yorkshire and Cheshire. Monty's livery was a distinctive cream and red which looked very good on these old buses.

MONTY’S BUSES, ATTLEBOROUGH By Peter Lee

OLD ATTLEBOROUGH

Local and Family History Exhibition

Saturday 1st March 2003 Holy Trinity Church Centre

Attleborough Road NUNEATON

10am-4pm Admission £1.50

For details of exhibiting or attending, please contact:

PETER LEE 02476 381090 e.mail:[email protected]


The Church at Bentley was opened in 1837 and closed in 1972. Why you may wonder was the church not built until 1837 and why was it closed in 1972 less than a hundred and forty years later?

Historically Bentley was linked with Shustoke and not as it is today, with Merevale. Shustoke is about 5 miles away. Not very far today when it would only take a matter of minutes to travel that distance by car. But in the early 19th century the Bentley folk would have had to walk the 5 miles unless they had the use of a horse and cart. Even so it was not an easy jour-ney to make every Sunday, especially on a hot summer's day or a cold win-ter's day. So it made sense to have a church, or rather a chapel in the vil-lage. Then, as it is today, Bentley was a very rural village, the main occupa-tion being farming. There is no centre to the village, no village green, no post office or shops. There is just the local pub, the Horse and Jockey, situated on the Coleshill Road. It was decided to build the new church on land opposite to the Horse and Jockey - but then aren't most churches in local villages next to a public house? It was built in 1837 and was relatively small. It would have seated about 100 people. The church and the tower were built of

red brick. The tower had one bell and this is now kept in Merevale church. A new school was built in 1847 and some cottages were also built close to the school. Otherwise most people

lived in farmhouses or in tied cottages. The school also catered for children from the nearby villages of Merevale, Baxterley and Baddesley Ensor. In 1850 Baddesley pit was opened and so some men became coal miners. This was still a time when farming was la-bour intensive and there were many men employed on the Bentley farms and so the church had a good congre-gation.

It was after the Second World War that things changed considerably. Farming technology advanced. Trac-tors were introduced together with ma-chinery to do the jobs previously done by hand. Milking machines became the norm. There were therefore far fewer men employed on the farms and the population dwindled. Also the church, by then over 100 years old, was becoming in need of restoration. Subsidence, due to a new seam of coal being worked under the village, caused a large crack to appear in the main walls and the tower was in danger of collapse. Restoration work would have been expensive and at the time the Diocese was short of cash. In view of that and the dwindling popula-tion steps were taken to make it redun-dant. It was taken down in 1972. The churchyard was levelled and grassed over, although it remained open for burials. Some of the old gravestones were removed and placed up against the wall, which surrounds the site. The last burial took place in 1982. The churchyard is still maintained and people can still visit the graves of their loved ones. ******************************* The table below was kindly submitted by Valerie Pickard. It contains the sur-name and dates transcribed from the headstones in Bentley churchyard and There are also 10 small headstones un-dated and with initials only.

The Church of St John, Bentley By Celia Parton

St John, Bentley circa 1965, Courtesy of Vic Spencer

Aucott 1947 Booton 1943/60 Booton 1915 Bromley 1886 Brookes 1899 Burbidge 1868 Chapman 1877 Clamp 1898 Cooper 1859 Davies 1904 Deeming 1956 Deeming 1855 Ford 1905 Forrester 1920

Porter ? Shilton ? Shilton 1913 Smith 1860 Stevenson 1873 Stevenson 1904 Stevenson 1917/1930 Taylor 1839/69 Thurman 1918 Toon 1844 Upton 1867/1900 Upton 1906 Wright 1947

Foster 1840/64 Fox 1840/53 Gent 1871 Keen 1854 Leedham 1895 Morgan 1869 Mountford 1867 Mountford 1962 Oxford 1908 Parker 1926 Payne 1908 Pearson 1875 Pearson 1915 Pearson 1848


It all started when I had a phone call from Valerie Pickard, who explained to me that she had read an article in the Tamworth paper from a Bryan Spencer in Canada. It began by asking if anyone knew any Spencers from Hurley, as he and Doug Spencer (his father) were planning a trip to England in the fall and were hoping to meet some distant relatives or visit some old family heritage sites such as homes or graves. According to the article, Bryan’s great great grandfather, John Spencer, was born on March 7th 1851 in Hurley Warwickshire. He married Emma Shepherd, who was from Burton on Trent, on May 13th 1878. They went to Canada in 1889 and settled in a small town named Rathwell in the Province of Manitoba. John had a brother, named Thomas, who re-mained in England but Bryan did not know any of John’s other siblings or his parents’ names. On the 1881 cen-sus, Bryan had found John aged 30 with his wife aged 25 born at Winshill Derbyshire and their son named Charles aged one and also born in Winshill. Another son named Arthur who was Bryan’s great grandfather and who would have been perhaps one or two years old when they went to Canada was not born at the time of the Census. Also on the 1881 census Bryan had found Thomas living at Green Farm Kingsbury Warwickshire. At that time he was 19 years old and had been born in Hurley. He was working for Richard Thompson, also

me about his planned visit to England with his father on Tuesday 1st October and about Clive, another contact from Nuneaton, who had read the article in the Tamworth paper and been in touch with him offering to put them up the night. Tuesday 1st October came and I knocked off work early as Clive was going to bring Bryan and his father Doug to see me at about 2pm. Unfor-tunately they had had a lot of hold ups and eventually arrived at 4pm. We in-troduced ourselves and had a quick chat before setting off for a trip to our ancestors’ areas.

Our first visit was to Atherstone where Bryan and Doug at last met Valerie Pickard and her husband Derrick Pickard, Mayor of Atherstone, in his council chamber. Then we toured around Atherstone where Doug and Bryan had photos taken first in Long Street; outside the Old Swan on the corner of Welcome Street and not far from where the Union Work House used to be; and then at Atherstone School in South Street which was built in 1842 and was where the children of Atherstone attended. By this time it was about 6pm so off we went again, first to Bentley churchyard where some of our ancestors are buried. I explained who was buried there and about the Church and told them that, in the 1960s, my father used to scythe the grass in the graveyard and I clipped round the graves. More photos were taken and next we went to Bent-ley School, where children attended from Baxterley, Bentley and Badde-sley Ensor (our ancestors children had also attended there).

(Continued on page 7)

My New Found Spencer ‘Cousins’ By Vic Spencer

born in Hurley, who was a 60-acre farmer. Val had a word with Celia Parton (Treasurer of the NNWFHS) and they came to the same conclusion; that I may be related as I was researching in those areas of the same name. Val got in touch with me and, while thanking her for the information from the arti-cle, at the same time I was wondering who and where these Spencers may have come from. Val phoned Bryan Spencer in Canada and explained that I may be related to him. Val then wrote to me en-closing the news-paper cutting and explaining her con-versation with Bryan Spencer. She also suggested that we discuss it more the following Tuesday night at t h e L i b r a r y (Family History night). Val and myself checked the 1851 and 1881 censuses and both agreed that a John Spencer was born March 7th 1851 and Thomas Spencer born 4th November 1860. Both children had been born to Alice Spencer, my great great aunt (her father was my great great grandfather who had died at an early age). Further research showed Alice had two other children, Caroline born 4th December 1853 and

Louisa born 5th August 1855. On the 1881 census Alice was married to William Wood (they married in 1876) and living at Bentley Hall. A few weeks later Bryan Spencer phoned me. We had a good chat and I explained about my family and relations and he about his family and relations in Canada. He told

My father, Alfred Kitchener Spencer, scything the grass at Bentley churchyard circa 1965.

Bentley School


bottom of the door. In the winter sack-ing filled the gaps stopping you from turning into a snowman when it snowed. When visiting my Grandfa-ther I sometimes bathed in the old tin bath in front of the fire with the black-leaded grate and ovens on each side and the kettle hung on a hook above the flames. In the cottage I often used to see the smoke rise from the oil lamp because the wick always needed trim-ming, this stood on an oak table cov-ered with a heavy cloth that had a fringed edge, and I remember the loud tick of the old colonial clock that hung on the wall. By this time the day light had faded and you could only make out the sign of Gospel Oak by car head lights so we set back to my house for a quick brush up before meeting up with Clive at the Long Shoot Motel where a table was booked for an evening meal at 8 pm. Next day Clive took Doug and Bryan to Baxterley Church, where Alice had taken John (Doug’s great grandfather) to be christened. Then they went on a trip to Tamworth Castle as a treat. When I came home from work Clive brought Doug and Bryan to see me before they caught the train back to

London. As we said our good byes they thanked me for all I had done, e.g. a folder full of old pictures of the family, some going back a hundred years, plus copies of remembrance cards of Alice’s brother and sisters and also their own family tree. They also thanked Clive for the birth certifi-cates of John and Thomas Spencer he had got for them which completed the folder. I have since received an email from Bryan in Canada saying that they both en-joyed their short visit to England and Doug said that he would like to come again next spring for a longer visit. He also said that we would be welcome in Canada to meet the Spencer families over there. My special thanks to Valerie Pickard for making this fam-ily meeting possible.

GENEALOGICAL ONE-LINERS By Ernest Bullimore

My family coat of arms ties at the back... is that normal? My ancestors must be in a witness protec-tion program! Shake your family tree and watch the nuts fall! I'm not stuck, I'm ancestrally challenged. I'm not sick, I've just got fading genes. Genealogists live in the past lane. Genealogy: Chasing your own tale! That's the problem with the gene pool: NO Lifeguards. I researched my family tree... and appar-ently I don't exist! Infertility is hereditary. If your parents didn't have any children, neither will you. Any family tree produces some lemons, some nuts and a few bad apples. I'm searching for myself; have you seen me? Isn't genealogy fun? The answer to one problem leads to two more! Never mind the children, do you know where your Gr-Gr-Grandparents are to-night? A family reunion is an effective form of birth control. After 30 days, unclaimed ancestors will be adopted. Ever find an ancestor HANGING from the family tree? FLOOR: The place for storing your price-less genealogy records. Gene-Allergy: It's a contagious disease, but we love it. Genealogists are time unravelers. Genealogy is like playing hide and seek: They hide... we seek! "Crazy" is a relative term in my family. I think my ancestors had several "Bad heir" days. Only a Genealogist regards a step back-wards as progress. Heredity: Everyone believes in it until their children act like fools! It's an unusual family that hath neither a lady of the evening or a thief. Many a family tree needs pruning. Shh! Be very, very quiet.... I'm hunting forebears. That's strange: half my ancestors are WOMEN! Old genealogists never die—they just loose their census. My own thoughts on the process: As you trace your ancestors further back in time, records become more difficult to find, more difficult to read and contain less use-ful information. You know you have fin-ished your family tree when you can no longer find any records, when you find them you can't read them, and when you read them they contain no information.

(Continued from page 6) Then we drove on to Hurley where some of our ancestors came from; John Spencer and his cousin William Spencer (my grandfather) were both born there. As it was getting dark we did not have time to look for the ceme-tery. Then off we went to Gospel Oak where John Wesley had preached as he rode around the countryside on horse back preaching the gospel. I gave Doug a copy of a photograph of my great aunt Annie, taken circa 1890, standing next to the Gospel Oak Tree and told them about the toll house on the corner of the road where the stage coach used to stop to give the horses a rest and water them down. I also told Doug and Bryan that as a child I remembered my Grandfather’s cottage just down the lane from the Gospel Oak. In the out buildings at the bottom of the garden he had kept his pigs, horses and chickens. At the back of the cottage under the apple tree, which my father had planted as a child, the outside loo had stood. It was a wooden square box with a door with a bucket graced with a wooden lid. In the hot summer when the wasps were drunk from the fallen apples, they buzzed around your head and legs, coming from the gaps at the top and

My great aunt, Annie Spencer, at the Gospel Oak in Bentley circa 1890.


The Following article originally ap-peared in the Atherstone Herald on 12th September 2002, and is repro-duced herein with their kind permis-sion British history could be re-written to place North Warwickshire at the cen-tre of one its most significant events. The Battle of Bosworth did not take place at Bosworth but was actually fought near Atherstone, according to a new book which re-examines the evi-dence surrounding the battle. And, if the new theory becomes widely accepted, it could spark a tour-ism boom in North Warwickshire as the Ambion Hill battlesite near Bos-worth currently attracts 25,000 visitors every year. Bosworth was one of history’s most famous battles, which resulted in Henry VII taking the throne after de-feating Richard III. That famous clash took place in Warwickshire and not Leicestershire, as previously thought, argues historian Michael Jones in his new book Bosworth 1485 - Psychol-ogy of a Battle. He argues that the main part of the battle was fought on a piece of land known as Derby Spinney, north of Fenny Drayton. Dr Jones also con-tends that Henry’s battle manoeuvres took him and his soldiers through Mancetter and Witherley. “It is already commonly believed that Henry Tudor stayed at Merevale Ab-bey before the battle, and Bosworth always seemed a long a way to take infantry.” said Dr Jones. “One of the earliest sources even described it as the Battle of Merevale.” The main new evidence for the new theory is the discovery of an eye-witness account of the battle written by a French soldier of fortune who was employed by HenryTudor. Dr Jones discovered the previously un-tapped source in a French historical journal article about military reforms in France.

Together with an investigation of con-temporary cavalry battle strategies in 1485, the historian found his studies pointed him in the direction of Ather-stone It is not the first time, a revisionist his-torian has claimed the Battle of Bos-worth was not actually fought by the famous market town. A previous the-ory had placed the battle at Dadlington but Dr Jones argues that neither that location nor Ambion Hill is as plausi-ble a site as the one near Atherstone. He said: “The French mercenary said Richard’s charge was carefully thought. If that’s the case, then Am-bion Hill doesn’t work because there’s not enough room for cavalry to ma-noeuvre. In both of the previous ver-sions - Bosworth and Dadlington - one of the key details in a contempo-rary account by Polydor Vergil doesn’t work. He said as Henry Tudor is marching into combat, he does a ma-noeuvre to get the sun into the eyes of his opponents. There’s no way that could work if you believe the previous accounts. My theory is that Henry was marching in an easterly direction to-wards Mancetter and then swung north towards Witherley.”

Dr Jones also believes his theory is borne out by the recorded compensa-tion payments made by Henry VII to North Warwickshire parishes after the battle. “A grant was paid to a number of parishes including Merevale which was for help received on the way to battle,” he said “But the order to pay Witherley and Mancetter describes them as being ‘at the scene of battle’. This is very significant - why would Henry pay them unless he felt a great debt of gratitude?” He added that medieval battles were often not fought on one patch of ground but could be spread out, as in this case. There may now be calls for an ar-chaeological dig at a mound near to the junction of the A444 and the A5. Atherstone Heritage Centre’s Lorna Dirveiks has described the new theory as exciting. She added: “We’ve always said they camped here before the bat-tle, and not so much as a sword blade has ever been found at Ambion Hill.” Local historian John Austin, an expert on Merevale Abbey, also responded positively saying what he knows of Dr Jones’ theory fits in with information already documented

Battle Crosses County Line By Mark Cocklin ©

This map shows the spot which latest research has pinpointed as the possi-ble site of the conflict (Courtesy of Bosworth 1485 - Psychology of a Battle. By Dr Michael Jones)


ACCESS PROBLEMS AT LITTLE PACKINGTON CHURCH

I wonder if any NNWFHS member knows the legal situation (or can offer advice) regarding graves in Church of England churchyards where the church building has been sold off as a house. At Little Packington in Warwickshire, the graves and many stones are still in situ. Little Packington was in Lichfield Diocese, then transferred to Coventry and the parish/benefice now combined with that at Meriden. The church is now a "private residence": proclaimed by a large sign on the roadside gates. There is no public right of way adja-cent to the graveyard, and the access drive to the house was, when I went to take holly for Christmas, electroni-cally locked (this was on Monday 23 December). There is no pedestrian gate, nor stile over the fence, nor pub-lic footpath in the adjacent farm field that actually provides access to the graves. The local vicar was offering to ask the house owner if it would be possible for me to visit the grave. I pointed out that access should be for all who had family buried there and I would not countenance him asking permission for me alone. There was evidence on an earlier visit that some of the graves are visited. I have emailed the local diocesan of-fice and also the redundant churches arm of the church commissioners and await their comment/information. I know from another Lister that assur-ances (presumably verbal) were given by the Church at the time of the sale that "access to the graves would be maintained". This is blatantly not the case and I feel very uneasy that my gt-gran was buried at her local church with a stone to mark her grave for her subsequent descendants to pay their respects and care for her, yet she ap-pears to be now in private hands, sold off by the Church Commissioners (It took me years of searching to find her resting place as I had thought she had remained in Cheshire when her sons migrated to Warwickshire). I also

know that one parishioner involved at the time that the church was sold is "furious" to hear the gates are locked. I cannot believe that any private indi-vidual should be able to buy conse-crated ground and its burials, and then bar descendants access. It seems im-moral to me that it could happen. I could half-understand it if the church commissioners had arranged for the burials to be exhumed and transferred along with the benefice. Has anyone come across barred access to other churchyards where the church has been sold and converted? Or, has anyone any information on the true le-gal situation? Any specific advice would be appreciated. Please contact me, Mrs Jacqui Simkins at Langley Mill Farm, Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands B75 7HR Telephone: 0121 311 0455 email: [email protected] ******************************* GRAVESTONES AND LICHENS

Recently there has been comment in a neighbouring FHS’s publication about the situation regarding lichens on gravestones. Essentially the lichen-lobby do not wish these to be dis-turbed and their attention had been drawn by an article about the re-cording of memorial inscriptions in-volving the need in some instances to lift lichen growths in order to read the stones. Surely the purpose of gravestones is to provide a memorial to those buried; it is the primary reason for their exis-tence. It is undisputable that the mixed geological variety of stones used in the making of gravestones pro-vides a wider than naturally available lichen habitat within a small area – the graveyard. Whilst appreciating the importance of preserving wildlife, it is equally important to record the memo-rial inscriptions. A gravestone tells far more than individual entries in a burial register and often includes several generations: spouses, children – and their relationship to each other. It is understood there is currently re-

search into means of removing and re-instating lichens: this will obviously help with preservation of the species but whilst I am sure no family histo-rian unnecessarily moves lichens and mosses, the time has come for the li-chen specialists to realise the purpose for which the gravestone was created and the invaluable historical informa-tion it holds. Let us hope that when the current re-search results are available, these will be provided to all FHS to enable re-searchers both to record inscriptions and assist with the preservation of li-chens. *******************************

WALLS AROUND CHURCHYARDS

There is an ongoing survey of walls around churchyards. The purpose of the survey is to identify those church-yards that have walls built in natural stone without the use of mortar or ce-ment, but the database being created also needs to record those churchyards where there are other forms of bound-ary so that fullest information possible is known. No specialist skills are needed other than a pen and a form of simple option questions with descriptors for condi-tions of the walls. A survey form is available for printing directly from the website below, or by sending a stamped, self-addressed envelope marked “churchyard survey form” to: Dry Stone Walling Association, PO Box 8615, Sutton Coldfield B75 7HQ. Website: www.dswa.org.uk navigate to /Publication_frames_page.htm click on surveys in top right, then on churchyard survey form in left hand column.

GRAVE SITUATIONS By Jacqui Simkins


This A to Z has been taken from the pages at Genuki and is reproduced in this journal with the kind permission of the author. A few amendments and ad-ditions have been made by the editor. Please note that some addresses and telephone numbers may have changed since this information was written so please ensure that you check the details before either visiting or writing. Part one was published in the October 2002 journal - Pat Boucher AGRA - Association of Genealogists & Record Agents ASGRA - Association of Scottish Genealo-gists & Record Agents AUGRA - Association of Ulster Genealo-gists & Record Agents BigR - British Isles Genealogical Register BL - British Library BMD – Birth Marriage and Death BTs - Bishops' Transcripts CHI – Catherine House Index CLRO - County of London Record Office CRO - County Record Office FFHS - Federation of Family History So-cieties FHC - Family History Centre (of LDS), also known as FHL (FH Library) FHLC - Family History Library Catalogue FHS - Family History Society FRC - Family Records Centre FTM - Family Tree Magazine GEDCOM - Genealogical Data Communi-cation GOONS - Guild of One-Name Studies GRD - Genealogical Research Directory GRO - General Register Office IGI - International Genealogical Index IHGS - Institute of Heraldic & Genealogi-cal Studies IRCs - International Reply Coupons LDS - Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints LMA - London Metropolitan Archives MIs - Monumental Inscriptions NBI – National Burial Index NNWFHS - Nuneaton and North Warwick-shire Family History Society ONS - Office of National Statistics PAF - Personal Ancestral File PR – Parish Register PRO - Public Record Office RO – Register Office SH - Somerset House SoG - Society of Genealogists ———————————————— FFHS The Federation of Family History So-cieties links together over 200 societies throughout the world. FFHS publishes guides and books on family history re-search, and a half yearly magazine, Family History News & Digest. FFHS initiates and coordinates national pro-jects, such as the 1881 Census Project and the National Burial Index, and liaises in the running of family history training. For further details and a list of member societies, contact: The Admin-istrator FFHS, PO Box 2425, COVEN-TRY, CV5 6YX or e-mail: [email protected]. There will almost certainly be a society for the county or area where your ancestors once lived. FHS There are many Family History Socie-ties located in the UK and of interest to the researcher. Most are geographically tied to old county boundaries such as

the Northumberland & Durham FHS and the West Surrey FHS. The FHSs cater for those with interests in former residents and/or historic locations. An FHS meets regularly and publishes regular journals and a directory of members' interests. The FHS may un-dertake research from the IGI as well as from local sources such as census re-turns, monumental inscriptions, parish registers and newspapers. A compre-hensive list of FHSs is available from the FFHS and on the GENUKI website FRC The Family Records Centre (FRC) opened in 1997 and houses the Public Search Room of the ONS, previously at St Catherine's House, and the Census Rooms of the PRO, which were previ-ously in the PRO Chancery Lane build-ing. The GRO Search Room is on the ground floor of FRC. There is no charge for searching the indexes which cover births; deaths; marriages; war deaths; deaths at sea; births and deaths in aircraft; consular births, marriages and deaths; deaths abroad; marriages on ships; marriages abroad; and Common-wealth marriages. The PRO occupies the first floor of FRC where visitors will find access to the census 1841 to 1901, wills and non-conformist regis-ters. The census returns are held on mi-crofilm and copies of relevant pages may be made and purchased for a nominal charge. A PRO Reader's Ticket is not required for access to FRC. The FRC is the starting place for most individuals' family research and full justice cannot be done in a few paragraphs. For more information con-tact: The Family Records Centre, 1 Myddelton Street, London, EC1R 1UW or visit the website at www.familyrecords.gov.uk/frc For enquiries about Births, Marriages, Deaths, Adop-tions, overseas enquiries and general enquiries about certificates: Tel: 0870 243 7788, Fax: 01704 550013 or E-mail:[email protected] For census and general enquiries about the FRC (not Births, Marriages and Deaths): Tel: 020 8392 5300, Fax: 020 8392 5307, or E-mail: [email protected] GEDCOM Family historians who are also PC us-ers frequently wish to exchange pedi-grees with other researchers who may use different genealogy software pack-ages. The Genealogical Data Commu-nication package enables researchers to exchange files irrespective of package used and also submit their research to LDS under the Ancestral File project. In addition, IGI CD-ROM entries can be downloaded to researchers' floppy disks in the GEDCOM format. (See Computers and IGI.) GENUKI GENUKI is one of the best and most useful websites for the genealogist and can be found at www.genuki.org.uk The aim of GENUKI is to serve as a "virtual reference library" of genealogi-cal information that is of particular

relevance to the UK & Ireland. It is a non-commercial service, provided by an ever-growing group of volunteers in cooperation with the Federation of Family History Societies and a number of its member societies. In the main, the information that is provided in GEN-UKI relates to primary historical mate-rial, rather than material resulting from genealogists' ongoing research, such as GEDCOM files. GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE This monthly journal was published be-tween 1731 and the early 1900s. It is a rich source for births, marriages, deaths, obituaries and bankruptcies. Various indexes have been compiled over the years: some specific to births, marriages and obituaries, and some cu-mulative for the early years. The SoG, the BL and the PRO all hold the com-plete run of the magazine. (See News-papers.) GRAVESTONES (See MIs.) GRD The Genealogical Research Directory is published annually. Each edition runs to about 1,200 pages and contains well over 100,000 entries submitted by thou-sands of researchers worldwide. The GRD enables researchers to find fellow researchers with similar interests. It is published in Australia in April and is distributed worldwide to contributors, societies and libraries. Each edition gives addresses and other details of ge-nealogical societies, record offices, ar-chives and libraries. GRO The General Register Office for Eng-land and Wales (GRO) is responsible for ensuring the registration of all births, marriages and deaths that have occurred in England and Wales since 1837 and for maintaining a central ar-chive. The GRO works in partnership with local authorities to provide a lo-cally based service at register offices (known as the local registration ser-vice). The local registrars send birth, marriage and death register information to GRO to make up the National ar-chive. It is situated at Southport except for the London based Family Records Centre. The Southport office deals with postal and telephone requests for cer-tificates and the registration of all adop-tions made through a court in England and Wales. The registers themselves may not be examined by the public but at the Family Records Centre (FRC) you can search the indexes of births, marriages and deaths without charge and obtain a copy of a certificate to as-sist in tracing your family tree or for any administrative purpose. The Gen-eral Register Office for England and Wales is based at: Smedley Hydro, Trafalgar Road, Southport, PR8 2HH Tel: +44 (0)870 243 7788 or e-mail (for England and Wales events):[email protected] Like England and Wales, Scotland, Northern


A Genealogical A to Z - Part 2 By Dr Ash Emery ©

Nuneaton & North Warwickshire Family History Society - Journal Page 11 (Continued from page 10)

Ireland and Ireland each have their own General Register Office (GRO) which looks after registration matters. The laws governing each office are slightly different, so although the basic services and roles will be the same, some issues may be different between each country. You can access records for Scotland and Northern Ireland at the Family Re-cords Centre (FRC). For Scottish re-cords, you can use the computer link which is available in the Scottish Link area of the Search Room. The records you can access include birth, death and marriage indexes from 1855; 1881 and 1891 census records and some old par-ish records. There is a fee of £4.00 per half hour up to a maximum of 2 hours. Copies of Scottish certificates and other extracts must be ordered from the Gen-eral Register Office in Scotland and not the FRC. Special application forms are available at the Customer Service Desks in the Scottish Link area. Certifi-cates will be posted to you. For more information visit the website at: www.statistics.gov.uk GUILDHALL LIBRARY This library is located in the City of London and holds an extensive collec-tion of genealogical material relating to the City such as lists of freemen and re-cords of livery companies and guilds. It has a superb collection of Kelly's direc-tories and some old manuscripts relat-ing to ships and shipping such as Lloyd's Register, Lloyd's List, Captains' Register and Loss Books. Guildhall Li-brary is at Aldermanbury, London, England, EC2P 2EJ. HALBERT'S Halbert's Family Heritage is an Ameri-can company that publishes 'World Books' of various surnames. The books are expensive and portrayed as some-thing they are not, ie beautiful coffee table editions rather than the reality of cardboard covered books containing computer produced listings of names and addresses. However, they offer two possible benefits for the researcher: ad-dresses of individuals carrying the same surname are listed and you may find a relative in another country as I did. Secondly, the names are listed by state (for the US) and by county (for the UK) so a researcher can draw a modern day distribution of the specific surname since most of Halbert's research is ex-tracting names from more or less up-to-date telephone directories. In recent times, Halbert's acquired a licence to the name Burke's Peerage and have at-tempted to add status to their publish-ing operation. Halbert's don't like print-ing their address and there is none in the book I purchased. HERALDRY Even if you cannot trace your ancestry back to William The Conqueror, it could be that your family is entitled to a coat of arms. Forget those organisations that will supply you a crest for a fee. A coat of arms belongs to the family to whom it was granted and only to male heirs. In Tudor England, King Henry VIII was concerned by the misuse of armorial bearings and commissioned Kings of Arms to travel throughout England and Wales to survey and re-

cord all arms. From 1530 until the late 1680s heralds travelled the countryside on horseback on a regular basis that be-came to be known as the heralds' visita-tions. The control of coats of arms is still today in the hands of heralds. In England, the College of Arms is situ-ated at Queen Victoria Street, London, England, EC4 4BT. Scottish heraldry is administered by Lord Lyon, King of Arms, New Register House, Princes Street, Edinburgh, Scotland, EH1 3YT. Further reading includes Heraldry for Family Historians (published by FFHS), the Observer's Book of Her-aldry (published by Frederick Warne) and A Complete Guide to Heraldry by Arthur Charles Fox-Davies published by Bracken Books (reprinted 1993.) (See IHGS.) IGI The International Genealogical Index is produced by LDS and is a valuable tool for the genealogical researcher. It is an index to entries in parish registers. The IGI is divided into countries and then, for example, is further subdivided into counties (UK) and states (USA.) The IGI is currently being delivered on mi-crofiche (available in the UK at Record offices and most libraries with a family history section), CD-ROM (available at LDS libraries), and on the internet at www.familyserch.org The user should be warned that there are differences be-tween the versions; your ancestors may be in one and not the other. The IGI is developed by the LDS from a combina-tion of members' temple submissions from 1840 to the present day and the systematic (carefully scrutinised) ex-traction program. Most of the IGI en-tries are baptisms but there are some marriages and a few wills. The IGI should be consulted by surname within county or state (fiche) or by surname (CD-ROM.) Any promising entries should then be verified against the original records which can be ordered (on microfilm or fiche) through LDS, records offices and some local libraries. The worldwide IGI includes hundreds of millions of names and is available at FHCs, the SoG, the PRO, most CROs and many FHSs. Since the LDS started making available IGI editions on the internet and CD-ROM it is now feasi-ble for a researcher to take floppy disks to his local FHC and download selected IGI entries or download them straight from the internet. Multiple downloads from the CD-ROM version will entail use of several disks. The data may be downloaded in GEDCOM or ASCII (text) format. Serious researchers will require further software such as IGIREAD, GIPSI or IGI255 to use this data on home PCs. Note: NNWFHS has several counties of the IGI on fiche which can be borrowed for home re-search by local members. (See LDS and Computers.) IHGS The Institute of Heraldic & Genealogi-cal Studies offers training by corre-spondence for both amateur and profes-sional family historians. The institute's library contains many indexes includ-ing Pallot's Index of Marriages; county maps; and many genealogical books. IHGS publishes a quarterly journal, Family History, which contains family

histories, genealogical and heraldic arti-cles, and guides to research. IHGS is at 78-92 Northgate, Canterbury, Kent, England, CT1 1BA, telephone + 44 1227 768664, fax + 44 1227 765617 website www.ihgs.ac.uk/ (See Her-aldry.) IMMIGRANTS (See Emigrants. It depends where you are going to or coming from!) INDEXES Indexes are valuable research tools and note that family historians insist that they are indexes, not indices. The most famous index is the IGI but there are many others of value to the researcher including many surname indexes pro-duced by various FHSs for the 1851 Census; the shoemakers index at North-ampton; the US Social Security Index on CD-ROM available at FHCs; the Great Card Index at the SoG; the Pallot Index of marriages at the IHGS; the small indexes at virtually every local history society and FHS; and Bernau's, Boyd's and Currer-Briggs indexes de-scribed earlier. Many MIs are indexed and available for examination at SoG, various FHSs and CROs, while the 1881 Census project was a major un-dertaking that has proved invaluable to researchers. Another major initiative is the National Burials Index being com-piled under the auspices of FFHS. INTERNET Without a doubt, the greatest boost to British genealogical research in recent years has been the impact of the Inter-net. The Internet is a worldwide net-work of computers that has been around for many years but opened up to "the masses" only in the latter half of the 1990s. Crude access software gave way to sophisticated browsers such as Netscape and Explorer and efficient search engines such as Yahoo and Alta Vista to make "surfing" the World Wide Web (WWW) a viable proposi-tion. Anyone with a PC and a telephone can, with relatively little outlay, acquire a modem, sign up with an Internet ser-vice provider and go online. As more and more users opted for the service an increasing number of news groups and mailing lists were made available for family historians. People discovered that e-mail messages and news group postings were answered in 24 or 48 hours. Whether a person lived in New Zealand, Hawaii or England made no difference. The growth in Internet us-age could not be ignored by the premier UK genealogical bodies. Innovators such as GENUKI had long set up so-phisticated and information rich home Web pages. The PRO, SoG and FTM established WWW sites as did many genealogists and record services. Dick Eastman of the USA started a quality weekly newsletter, Eastman's Online Genealogy, which became essential reading for all family historians. What we all wanted for years was archives available for search online and it sud-denly happened. Scotland put its in-dexes to vital records online, albeit for a charge. English and Welsh GRO reg-isters won't be online in the near future but don't assume that the LDS and the



Registrar General won't reach an agree-ment to copy the certificates, index them and publish them on the Web or on CD-ROM. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission went online with records of 1.7 million British and Com-monwealth men and women who lost their lives in the two World Wars. The details given vary according to infor-mation available but it is a magnificent facility and a boon for one-namers. British Columbia in Canada led the way in placing vital records online and, hopefully, other Canadian provinces will follow. The National Archives of Canada has Books of Remembrance for members of the Canadian Expedition-ary Force who fell in various conflicts. I have found several English born rela-tives in these Canadian sites. Enthusias-tic surfers will find obituaries, shipping lists, college alumni, census records, land records, etc., etc. For a low monthly subscription there is a wealth of information waiting for the genealo-gist and the number of useful family history sites is growing monthly. (See World Wide Web). IRCs International Reply Coupons were de-vised as a means of payment for the cost of a reply from a foreign corre-spondent. IRCs can be purchased at post offices in many (but not all) coun-tries, can be mailed overseas and can then be exchanged for postage stamps to enable the foreign correspondent to reply. An unwieldy and expensive sys-tem but many a British FHS or genea-logical service insists upon IRCs. IRELAND Irish research is more difficult than that in the rest of the British Isles. Civil reg-istration commenced in 1864 but many Irish records at the Public Record Of-fice in Dublin were destroyed in the 'Unrest' of 1922. Records from 1864 to 1922, for all Ireland, and from 1922 for the Republic are held at the Office of the Registrar General, Joyce House, 8-11 Lombard Street, Dublin 2, Ireland. Northern Irish records since 1922 are held at the GRO, Oxford House, 49-55 Chichester Street, Belfast, Northern Ire-land, BT1 4HL. Virtually all 19th cen-tury census returns have been destroyed but the Irish censuses for 1901 and 1911 may be examined at The National Archives in Bishop Street, Dublin 8, Ireland. (Researchers should note that the 100 Year Rule prohibits disclosure of the 1911 returns for the six Northern Ireland counties of Antrim, Armagh, Derry, Down, Fermanagh and Tyrone but they may be scrutinised in Dublin.) The SoG has a collection of printed books on Ireland including Dublin di-rectories from 1761 to 1846. You will almost certainly have to use a re-searcher in Ireland. Hibernian Research Company Limited claim they are Ire-land's oldest and largest research com-pany. They also claim they proved the ancestries of former President Reagan and former Prime Minister Mulroney. HRCL is at PO Box 3097, Dublin 6, Ireland, fax number + 353 1 497 3011. Irish Roots is a quarterly genealogical publication from Belgrave Publications, Belgrave Avenue, Cork, Ireland. The Irish Genealogical Research Society

has a library located at the Irish Club, 82 Eaton Square, London, England, SW1W 9AJ. The society publishes The Irish Genealogist annually. JEWS See Non-Conformists. LAY SUBSIDIES Lay subsidies were early taxes from 14th century. Lay subsidy rolls may be examined at the PRO. The rolls record details of parish inhabitants and taxes due for a period of about 300 years. LDS Part of the faith of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints requires members' ancestors to be baptised into the Church. It follows that all Mormons are interested to a greater or lesser de-gree in genealogy. Many years ago the LDS began a worldwide program to microfilm parish registers in order to identify deceased ancestors for temple work (ie baptism into the Mormon faith.) The Mormons were pioneers in the development of computer indexes for the family historian and today pro-duce the International Genealogical In-dex (the IGI) every few years. Initially available on microfiche, the IGI is now produced in both fiche and CD-ROM versions and is also available to be searched on the internet. The hundreds of millions of entries in the IGI repre-sent a combination of members' temple submissions from 1840 to the present day (with many inaccuracies) and the professional systematic extraction pro-gram. Users of the IGI should treat it only as an aid. All information should be verified with the original parish re-cords or with microfilmed copies avail-able at a small fee from the LDS. The LDS set up FHCs throughout the world. Use of these libraries is available free of charge (although a small donation is welcomed) to non-members of the church and the facilities include many other items of genealogical data on fiche and microfilm including census returns. The LDS regularly publishes The Family History Library Catalogue (FHLC) which is a computer produced guide to books, parish records, census returns and other historical data, and is available on fiche and CD-ROM. Searchers use the FHLC as an index to other fiches and microfilms that may be ordered at a nominal viewing charge. There is also extensive paper-based ma-terial including guides and books. The LDS encourages genealogists who are not members of the church to submit their own work for worldwide distribu-tion. Pedigrees can be submitted as part of the LDS Ancestral File computer da-tabase, and published works are grate-fully accepted for microfilming. In 1998 the LDS embarked on a new phase of making genealogical informa-tion available to the public on CD-ROM. The first release was a single CD containing the 1851 Census for the three counties of Devon, Norfolk and Warwickshire. These were the counties used in the "dummy run" for the 1881 project and there are no further plans for 1851 Census releases. The 1851 census CD-ROM was followed by the 1881 census CD-ROM package. Both are fully indexed and contain compre-hensive details from the enumerators' returns. The LDS quickly followed up

with three multiple CD-ROM packages of Vital Records for Australia, British Isles and North America. The British Isles package contains a database of five CD-ROMs, one for marriages and four for births and baptisms. In all there are 5 million records indexed and the vast majority are new (ie not in the IGI) and are from the controlled extraction program. All these CD-ROMs are user friendly and are ridiculously low priced in comparison with other CD’s of ge-nealogical data available for purchase. For full details of CD’s available visit the website at www.lds.org.uk/genealogy/software.htm You can now order most of the LDS collection of computer CD’s by telephone and pay by credit card on 08700 102051 You can also post your order to: The Distri-bution Centre, Family History CD’s,The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 399 Garretts Green Lane, Birmingham, B33 OUH. Cheques should be made payable to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saint (See IGI.) LOCAL HISTORY SOCIETIES There are local history societies throughout the UK who publish valu-able material relating to their areas of interest. The British Association for Local History at PO Box 1576, Salis-bury, Wiltshire, England, SP2 8SY will provide further information including a back number of the magazine, The Lo-cal Historian. LONDON METROPOLITAN AR-CHIVES The LMA, formerly the Greater Lon-don Record Office (GLRO), is the larg-est local authority archive in England. The LMA's extensive array of records includes parish records (many indexed), bishops' transcripts, electoral registers, school registers and other records relat-ing to persons, places and institutions within the former counties of London and Middlesex. There are collections of maps, prints and drawings and a library of old photographs. The LMA is lo-cated at 40 Northampton Road, Lon-don, England, EC1R 0HB. Tel 020 7332 3820 Fax 020 7833 9136 MANORIAL RECORDS These are typically found in a CRO. Manorial records extend back to the time of the Conqueror and cover such events as the conveyancing of land and the holding of courts to hear major crimes and petty offences. There is a Manorial Documents Register which is an index giving the location of known existing records. It may be examined at The National Register of Archives, The Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts, Quality House, Quality Court, Chancery Lane, London, Eng-land, WC2A 1HP. MARRIAGES Marriages can be traced in the civil reg-istration system from 1837 on and in the old parish registers before 1837. A couple could marry by banns or by li-cence. A marriage by banns necessi-tated the banns (announcement of mar-riage) being called in the parishes of both the intended at three weekly inter-



vals before the marriage. Wealthier people frequently married by licence to avoid the unnecessary publicity. Many old banns books and copies of licences are still available. It is worth checking the FHLC at an FHC or the archives at the appropriate CRO. Be aware that an entry in a banns book or the existence of a licence does not prove a couple was married. I have one ancestor whose name was entered in a parish banns book twice within twelve months but she married only the second of the two men named therein. (See Civil Regis-tration, Certificates and Parish Regis-ters.) MIGRANTS These are the people who moved within the UK. The Industrial Revolution brought phenomenal changes to the population distribution in Britain. Hun-dreds of thousands moved from the countryside to the city. Manchester's population grew from 75,000 in 1800 to 400,000 by 1850. The populations of London, Glasgow, Liverpool and Bir-mingham all tripled during this period. Tracing ancestors during the first half of 19th century can be difficult. MILITARY (See Army, Navy & Air Force.) MISCELLANEOUS RECORDS Genealogical research is not limited to tracing through the civil registration system, the Victorian census and old parish records. There are extensive re-cords available to the family historian in many archives. The PRO and the SoG have huge holdings whilst the CROs have records relevant to their area. Miscellaneous records that may interest the overseas researcher include American & West Indian Colonies re-cords before 1782 (PRO), apprentice-ship records (CROs), apprenticeship registers (PRO), Chancery proceedings (PRO), coastguard records (PRO), for-eign office records (PRO), heraldry publications (IHGS and SoG), Hugue-nots collection (SoG), land grants in America and American loyalist claims (PRO), militia muster rolls (PRO), op-erational records of the British Army, Navy and Air Force (PRO), profes-sions - biographies and listings of ar-chitects, lawyers, doctors, MPs, etc. (SoG), shipping, seamen and ship-wrecks (PRO), Royal Irish Constabu-lary (PRO), etc., etc. Access to ar-chives, a new website at www.a2a.pro.gov.uk is an excellent online catalogue which gives valuable information about archives in England - who holds them and how to access them etc. MIs Monumental inscriptions can supple-ment information obtained from parish registers. Gravestones are subject to the ravages of the British weather but many are still legible and a church or chapel often contains MIs, (which are not unique to tombstones.) Gravestones are also subject to the ravages of local au-thorities who prefer to maintain level lawns for easy mowing and thus re-move the headstones. Fortunately, many FHSs have recorded and indexed their MIs. Transcripts may have been lodged in the CROs. Churches and

graveyards are worth visiting since the MIs may offer details of births and deaths of previously unknown family members. (See Cemeteries.) MORMONS (See LDS.) MUSEUMS There are some magnificent museums with archives waiting for the genealo-gist. Some with obvious interest are: Imperial War Museum, Lambeth Road, London, England, SE1 6HZ (British & German documents); National Army Museum, Royal Hospital Road, Lon-don, England, SW3 4HT (military pa-pers covering British and Common-wealth forces); National Maritime Mu-seum, Romney Road, Greenwich, Lon-don, England, SE10 9NF (crew lists, Lloyd's Surveys and ship plans); and the British Telecom Museum, Baynard House, 135 Queen Victoria Street, Lon-don, England, EC4V 4AT (Historical Telephone Library with telephone di-rectories from 1880.) NEWSPAPERS Newspapers have been published in Britain since at least the 17th century. A family history may be "fleshed out" with information from papers such as obituaries, editorial or advertisements. Unless your ancestor was a well-known personality or criminal, local newspa-pers are likely to provide more infor-mation than nationals. The largest col-lection of national and local newspa-pers can be found at the Newspaper Li-brary, which is part of the BL (see ear-lier for address.) The Guildhall Library holds a complete set of the London Ga-zette and further newspaper holdings will be found at the SoG, the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and most CROs and museums. Many FHSs and local muse-ums have indexed their holdings and I was surprised and delighted to read about my great grandfather in 19th cen-tury newspaper archives on a chance visit to the Dorking & District Mu-seum. The (London) Times is indexed and the SoG library has Palmer's Index to the Times on CD-ROM for issues covering the period 1790 to 1905. NONCONFORMISTS Non-conformists or dissenters were people who did not follow the doctrine of the Anglican church (the Church of England.) Britain broke with the Catho-lic Church of Rome when Henry VIII declared himself 'Supreme Head of the English Church' by the Act of Suprem-acy of 1534. Some priests refused to accept the new Anglican Church and religious meetings were held by Roman Catholics, and people were baptised and married in secret by RC priests. Mary I reigned as a Catholic queen for five years but Elizabeth I reintroduced the Church of England in 1558. Reli-gious persecution continued in 17th century and independent (dissenting) chapels were established by Presbyteri-ans, Quakers and Baptists. James II briefly reigned as a Catholic king in the 1680s but was overthrown in the 'Glorious Revolution' of 1688. Non-conformists include Huguenots, Con-gregationalists, Methodists, Moravians, Lutherans, Quakers and Jews. Many non-conformist registers have survived

and are today in the safe-keeping of the PRO. Jews and Roman Catholics re-fused to submit their registers to the PRO (see Catholics.) CROs or existing synagogues should have Jewish re-cords. The Anglo-Jewish Association can help historians trace their Jewish ancestry. The AJA is at Woburn House, Upper Woburn Place, London, Eng-land, WC1H 0EP. The American Jew-ish Archives has comprehensive re-cords of Jews arriving in the US before 1900. The Archives are located at He-brew Union College, 3101 Clifton Ave-nue, Cincinnati, Ohio 45220, USA. Some Presbyterian and Congregational records may be found at Dr Williams Library, 14 Gordon Square, London, England, WC1H 0AG. Baptist records may also be at Dr Williams Library and at Baptist Church House, 4 Southamp-ton Row, London, England, WC1B 4AB. Huguenot ancestry may be traced through the Huguenot Society, 54 Knatchbull Road, London, England, SE5 9QY. Quaker records are reputed to be the most comprehensive of all non-conforming faiths since the regis-ters were transcribed before being de-posited at the PRO. An index to the registers may be examined at The Soci-ety of Friends Library, Friends House, Euston Road, London, England, NW1 2BJ. OCCUPATIONS One's ancestors may have been kings or carpenters. Many of us will have agri-cultural labourers (ag. labs.) in our fam-ily history as well as individuals whose occupations have disappeared over the years. SoG's bookshop has several books on occupations including Dic-tionary of Old Trades and Occupations by Andrew & Sandra Twining. Useful guides include the Shire Album series and a recommended initial buy is FFHS's An Introduction to Occupations (available from FFHS). OFFICE FOR NATIONAL STATIS-TICS The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is the government department that provides statistical and registration services. The National Statistician, Len Cook, is the Director of ONS and Reg-istrar General for England & Wales. ONS is responsible for producing a wide range of key economic and social statistics which are used by policy mak-ers across government to create evi-dence-based policies and monitor per-formance against them. The Office also builds and maintains data sources both for itself and for its business and re-search customers. It makes statistics available so that everyone can easily assess the state of the nation, the per-formance of government and their own position. The Office also incorporates the General Register Office for England and Wales (GRO). The GRO is respon-sible for ensuring the registration of all births, marriages and deaths in England and Wales, and for maintaining a cen-tral archive dating back to 1837. The Genealogical A-Z will continue in April’s journal or you can see the complete A to Z through links at www.Genuki.org.uk


ous that many genealogists have not updated their com-puters. Don't know what version of Microsoft Internet Ex-plorer you have? Launch the browser, click on the Help menu and select About Internet Explorer to find out. To prevent infection, Windows users be sure your system is current: http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com/default.htm and everyone should update their antivirus software and re-frain from opening any attachment unless the sender con-firms that he or she sent it to you. The major antivirus (AV) software companies have updated their files to include pro-tection from Bugbear -- but you need to be sure your AV is up-to-date. Moreover, don't rely exclusively on your AV to protect you from every virus or worm that comes along. If you use Outlook or Outlook Express for your e-mail ap-plication, be sure to set your VIEW options to show attach-ments. In Outlook Express make sure that the Preview Pane option is off. In Outlook, under VIEW, turn off the Auto Review and the Preview Pane. Some e-mail clients treat mailing list digests as separate attachments, but those will always have the mailing list digest request address as the FROM address and they will have the digest volume and number in the subject line. However, be wary, if attachment is exactly 50,688 bytes, it probably is the Bugbear. www.familyrecords.gov.uk Whether you have just started your family history research or are something of an expert, the newly re-launched family history website is an invaluable resource for genealogists. It brings together information about records held throughout the UK of interest to family historians, from birth certifi-cates to military records. www.curiousfox.com I have received the following from Roseanne , who has set up this site. Curious Fox is a contact site aimed at anybody interested in local history, genealogy and local distinctiveness. The site is organised by villages, so that you can find the right village and add an entry. You can also check the village location on modern maps or an old map, see what other villages are nearby, store villages on your own page, be emailed if any-body else adds an entry for the village etc. You control all your entries and can add, edit and delete at will. The system is spamsafe. No email addresses appear on the site and all initial contacts are made through a messaging system. You can also search by surname and see all entries for a county. A search all facility (coming soon) will allow searching for other words such as canal, workhouse, clergy. I'm hoping that the site will appeal to local historians and not just people researching family history so that the two can interact. Ideally people who know a village and are willing to help or answer queries will make entries as well


Computer Viruses– Are You Protected As a computer and internet user who has suffered from de-structive viruses, I felt it might be useful to pass on this in-formation about recent viruses courtesy of RootsWeb Re-view: Vol. 5, No. 40, 2 October 2002. - Pat Boucher. Be Careful Out There. The Bugbear is no teddy bear. It is an e-mail worm containing backdoor components that can al-low an infected system to be remotely compromised; it also includes the ability to kill antivirus and firewall software, leaving infected systems wide open to further attacks and lulling you into a false sense of security thinking your sys-tem is virus-free. Genealogists have much more interesting things to do than deal with an Internet worm with a Trojan horse, but such is life online. Bugbear, which hit Great Britain and Australia users first on Monday, September 30, according to news reports, is also known as Tanatos. It arrives via e-mail with no distinct char-acteristics except that the attached file is always 50,688 bytes long. The subject line and text are stolen from existing e-mail it finds on an infected machine. Many RootsWeb us-ers are expressing concerns about this latest varmint because unless you pay extra-careful attention you might think an e-mail with the attached Bugbear worm is coming from a trusted genealogy friend, family member, or from your fa-vourite Mailing List. Most mailing lists do not allow any attachments, but that doesn't mean you won't receive something that will fool you into thinking the message is from a mailing list which you have subscribed to. This is one clever worm. There are con-firmed reports of Bugbear even forging some prepends com-monly used on many mailing lists. If you receive e-mail with an attachment that appears to be from say [SURNAME-L] and you are not subscribed to that mailing list, that is a good indication that it is a message with the Bugbear worm at-tached. Even if you are subscribed to a certain list and there is an attachment, do not open it. Many of us are still fighting off the Klez worm, which steals and forges our e-mail addresses and subject lines, and now along comes Bugbear and the Opaserv worms. The latter is a network worm that was discovered September 30 also. Are you at risk? You certainly are if you are a Windows user, and especially if you use Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.01 or 5.5 browsers and have not applied the patch found in MS01-020. [Note: Copy and paste carefully; this is a 2-line URL:] http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS01-020.asp?frame=true According to CNET News.com, a flaw in MIME (the multi-purpose Internet mail extensions) lets a malicious program attached to an e-mail message execute (start) when the text of the message appears in Outlook or Outlook Express (popular e-mail applications). The software problem was patched by Microsoft almost 18 months ago, but it is obvi-

GET NETTED


(Continued from page 14) I've developed a red box green box system so that people can use the site totally free or pay a small subscription. (£5 or $8). More goodies are planned such as history files for each vil-lage, members profiles and urls but I need to get the basics working first. Don't expect miracles. It will take a little while for the site to get known and begin to work but the initial feedback from the first few users has been extremely good so it's fingers crossed time. If you think the site is good and can give any links, publicity or recommendations it will really help me get the whole concept working. Thanks. Your help and any feedback will really be appreciated. Rosanne. Rob Thompson gave the following review of the site in his Genuki Newsletter. It is re printed here with his kind permis-sion. This is an unusual website in many respects for family histo-rians. Certainly a different concept. Basically entries are ar-ranged geographically, so you can see people searching for families in an area you are interested in. This does fall down a little when people select a whole county and you select a particular village or town. It is also very much in its infancy, with few entries on the site. It also works on a double tier system for ‘free’ and ‘paying’ members which I dislike a little. Although it must be said the fee is very low at the mo-ment. The site requires a little thought to work it out in the first place, and is not the easiest to navigate and work your way around, but a little patience will pay off as once you have worked out the system it will be interesting. You will need to pay really as you will get little for nothing! As far as I am concerned the jury is out as to whether family histori-ans will like the geographic breakdown or prefer the older and more familiar name breakdown. http://homepage.ntlworld.com/jeffery.knaggs/RNShips.html A nice little website which lists the name and position of Royal Navy Ships when the 1901 census was taken. This website will have a use for those people who want to know where their ancestor was at the time. The site does not list names other than captains, but it does give you the PRO cen-sus reference number to enable you to go straight to that par-ticular ship. Easy to use and simply designed. www.archivecdbooks.com New releases from Archive CD Books (reviews by Rob Thompson): Nottinghamshire 1861 census. Complete scanned images of all of the original census enumerator's books for the whole of Nottinghamshire The Herts Genealogist and Antiquary Volume 2 - William Brigg 1897 Feudal England- J.H. Round - An excellent collection of the results of the author's research into feudal England of the 11th and 12th centuries. The Green Howards in the Great War - An incredibly de-tailed history of this famous Yorkshire regiment during the Great War and the third Afghan War of 1919.

Leicestershire & Rutland 1928 Kelly's Directory - Excellent historical background and details of the institutions and fa-cilities of each place, along with directories of private resi-dents and tradespeople. www.hunimex.com/warwick/w-a-p.html Warwickshire Ancestors Project I have received the following email from Michael McCor-mick Perhaps you would like to draw your members attention to this new and growing resource for Warwickshire family his-torians. This project is providing a "free-to-view" transcrip-tion of the 1891 Warwickshire census returns. It is part of an initiative aimed at helping make high quality primary (or near-primary) records of relevance to UK family history conveniently and freely available online. The project makes use of specially developed software mod-ules for data entry, checking, validation and database up-load. My objective in writing to yourselves, the BMGSH, Coven-try FHS and so on, was to draw your members attention to a new, and free, resource. Of course, I would also like to re-cruit more transcribers and checkers. Volunteers need a computer and access to a microfiche reader. Microfiche, software, instructions and lots of advice will be supplied by the organisers. There is also a dedicated mailing list to ask questions on and to receive advice about changes or up-grades to the software There are two phases. In the first, the volunteer transcribes the data and enters it into the project software. In the second phase, another volunteer checks the transcriptions against the microfiche using a separate piece of software. Currently we have over 120,000 records for Aston and Bir-mingham online. The project has recently expanded to cover north east Warwickshire, including Nuneaton Coven-try and Rugby. One of the two Nuneaton pieces has already been transcribed by Alva King from NNWFHS. You might like to know in addition to Cornwall, we also have Yorkshire, Hampshire, Bedfordshire, Middlesex and Devon returns online. They can be accessed via the main web site which is on http://freecen.rootsweb.com/ This project will help not just ourselves and others who are researching Warwickshire family history now, but to build a resource that will help future family historians. Online family historians can participate no matter where they live. If you believe, as we do, that this information should be available for free and freely available, then drop me a line: Michael McCormick, Warwickshire Ancestor's Project email [email protected]


Forthcoming Events

Please note that there will probably be a small admission charge for the talks listed below. Tuesday 29th January 2003. Dr Johnson, His Life and Legacy* A lec-ture by Annette French, Museums and Heritage Officer, Lichfield. At the Arnold Building, King Edward 6th Form College, King Edward Road, Nuneaton. 7.30 pm - 9.00 pm. This talk is a joint venture between NNWFHS and the Historical Association. 1st of Feb - 30th March, 2003. Post Mortem and Forensic Science. An exhibition by Sir Bernard Spilsbury. At the Royal Pump Rooms Art Gal-lery, The Parade, Leamington Spa.

Tuesday 25th February 2003. Hinckley in the Hungry 40’s. The Framework Knitting Trade and its effects on Hinck-ley life in the 1840’s. A lecture by Hugh Beavin, Chairman of the Hinckley Local History Group. At the Chilvers Coton Heritage Centre, Avenue Road, Nuneaton. 7.30 pm - 9.00 pm. Saturday 1st March 2003. Old Attleborough, A Local and Family History Exhibition. At the Holy Trinity Church Cen-tre, Attleborough Road, Nuneaton from 10am-4pm Admission £1.50. For details of exhibiting or attending, please contact: Peter Lee 02476 381090 e.mail:[email protected] Saturday 22nd march 2003. Bates Family History Day. See details below. Tuesday 25th March 2003. An Aspect of Old Coventry. By Keith Draper, retired historical feature writer for the Coventry Evening Telegraph. At Nuneaton Town Hall, Coton Road, Nuneaton. 7.30 pm - 9.00 pm. Tuesday 22nd April 2003. The Coventry Silk Trade. Presented by staff from the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum, Coven-try. Venue to be confirmed but will either take place at the gallery itself or at Chilvers Coton Heritage Centre, Avenue Road, Nuneaton. 7.30 pm - 9.00 pm. Tuesday 20th May 2003. My Time as Mayor. By Don Jacques, former Mayor of Nuneaton and member of the Nuneaton Society. At the Chilvers Coton Heritage Centre, Avenue Road, Nuneaton. 7.30 pm - 9.00 pm. Saturday 7th June 2003. Trip to Kingsbury and Coleshill Churches. Arrive Kingsbury church 11am and Coleshill church 2pm. Subject to confirmation. More details later.

Help Offered

A gentleman has contacted John Parton with the following: I have researched the Jee/Gee family name from Bedworth back to 1681 with about 85 named descendants and some of their spouses. I am willing to share this information with any-one researching this name. If you are interested please email Teddy at [email protected].

Warwickshire County Record Office - Update

The County Record Office, on its re-opening in the spring of 2003, will be introducing a series of induction sessions for new (and old!!!) users of the office. So if you would like to find out how to find your great grandfather or how to look at a map of your village, these sessions are for you. Please con-tact the office in March 2003 for dates on (01926) 412735.

Notice Board

BATES’ FAMILY HISTORY DAY Saturday 8th March 2003

At the Chilvers Coton Heritage Centre, Avenue Road, Nuneaton

A day for everyone who has a connection with any of the Bates families of Nuneaton and North Warwickshire. If you have any Bates research, bring it and show it off to everyone! If you have any photographs, bring copies for all to see (only copies, not precious originals – better to be safe than sorry!). If you simply THINK you have a Bates married into your family or if you are stuck trying to find the right Mr or Ms Bates, come along – you might unravel the con-nection or identify which of the Bates clan is “yours”. If you have solved all your riddles, please come and tell the rest of us mere mortals who are stuck at a seemingly dead end. Interested? For tickets and or more information, please contact either Pat Boucher, 33 Buttermere Ave, Nunea-ton, Warwicks, CV11 6ET. Tel: 024 7638 3488 or email [email protected] or Jacqui Simkins, Lang-ley Mill Farm, Sutton Coldfield B75 7HR ([email protected]) and we will gladly send you details of times, location map, etc. If enquiring by post, a stamped, self-addressed envelope would be much appreciated.

NEW PUBLICATION Coming Soon

Burial index 1813 - 1837 for the parish churches of:

St Nicholas, Baddesley Ensor Baxterley

All Saints, Grendon St Peter & St Paul, Kingsbury

The Church of Our Lady, Merevale

Price £2.75 Available from Chris Cox, Publications manager