genealogy

In Search of Ethelberts

I like strong unusual names, so when I came across an Ethelbert Holborow in my tree it was too good of a rabbit hole to ignore. Although I don’t have a direct Ethelbert Holborow as an ancestor, I do have a number of other Ethelberts in my tree – mostly all connected with the Neal family in some way.

We’ve already seen one Ethelbert – Harry Ethelbert Stevens/Teagle/Holborow – but there are a few more stories attached to other Ethelberts in my tree, as we shall see …

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Little Ethelbert

Recently I’ve been delving into the Ethelberts in my tree – a master post about them will be coming in the next couple of weeks (so that’s something to look forward to) – and I found something rather unexpected, hence this post first rather than the main post!

One thing I do love about genealogy is the never-ending possibility for surprises. And sometimes those surprises are a lot closer than you think …

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52 Ancestors: Nearly Forgotten

I know, it’s been a while since I actually wrote a post for 52 Ancestors (in fairness, it’s been a while since I wrote a post at all), but I was having a thorough muse on this week’s theme and thinking about ancestral stories to share.

And then had a bit of a realisation …

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Holborow in Australia 2: William the Convict

When you’re researching Australian family, there’s always the spectre of transportation, much like Massachusetts in the late 17th century. Back in 2007 it was reported that up to 22% of living Australians were descended from convicts (over 4 million people). There is also a one in 30 chance for us Brits.

I remember studying the topic of transportation when I was at primary school (er, about 30 years ago), but I thought that I could do with a bit of a refresher course – and its amazing to find what records are out there for individuals, alongside the social and political history that goes along with it.

And spoiler alert: I feel some degree of sympathy for our William …

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Holborow in Australia 1: From Wales with Love

One of my long-standing genealogical projects is to create a one-name study of the surname Holborow (variously Holbrow, Holborrow, Holb(o)rough and many transcription errors such as Holbron …). My first step in this has been to document every Holborow event documented in Australia. Why Australia? I couldn’t tell you. Because it’s less than the UK and more than the US? Possibly.

I soon found, thanks to Ancestry and the various state archives (special shout out to Libraries Tasmania, but we’ll get there), National Archives of Australia and the brilliant Trove website with its digitisation of newspapers, that there were only a handful of primary progenitors of historic Holborows in Australia. There are a few outliers, a few arrivals who didn’t leave much of a trace, but plenty of stories to tell: we’ve got mayors, we’ve got murder, we’ve got mystery (and, yes, we’ve got a convict…).

But first, we’ve got Wales …

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52 Ancestors: Favorite Discovery

This marks my inaugural post in this year’s 52 Ancestors prompt series, as devised by Amy Johnson Crow. I’m a bit late in starting, but that’s not going to stop me!

This prompt – Favorite Discovery – struck a chord with me as I have had a few solid discoveries that have had me sitting back in my chair. After all, I’ve been doing this for over 25 years – it’d worry me if I hadn’t!

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Eddie Taplin, His First Wife & Her First Husband …

It’s funny what becomes the root cause of a post of mine. Sometimes it’s a new piece of research that solves an old mystery, maybe a new record set becomes available shedding new light on a family – or sometimes it can be something a bit more unexpected.

For example, this one. A few days into the New Year my mum messaged me saying that my father (who has never really been hugely interested in the family history) had asked about Grampy Eddie’s first wife and did I know anything about her. Of course I did, I swiftly replied, and sent her what I knew. Only, it turned out that what I knew wasn’t exactly the truth …

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Rounding Out Hicks

Taking a look back at my recent posts, you’d be forgiven for thinking that I have a sudden yen for two-part posts. This isn’t entirely the truth, but as I’ve made corrections to my family tree, I’ve discovered other family that warrant a call out. Hence I am back again with more information on the new, extended Hicks family thanks to Charlotte Hicks.

Its longer coming than I originally hoped for – I’ve been busy working on (read: avoiding completely) the first year of my Masters in Creative Writing – but I thought that I should close off the Hicks family for now …

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Of Hicks and Half-Truths

Lately I’ve been going over my old research and either adding to it, solving the odd mystery or just plain correcting mistakes. Some of those mistakes were mine to make, but some were inherited – although the onus is still on me (and all of us) to check the veracity of this borrowed information. One such mistake has been my focus this week, up in the Wiltshire / Gloucestershire borders.

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Frank Cartlidge and the Women He Loved

I have previously introduced you all to the wonder that was my husband’s great-grandfather, Ernest Arthur Cartlidge, and his foray into acting. He and his wife, Edith, had two children – one being my husband’s grandmother, Winifred Elizabeth Alice Cartlidge. This post is about her brother, Frank Alfred Cartlidge, and the ladies in his life ….

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