Many members of my family share the middle name of Collingwood, including my great-uncle, two of his sons and one of his great-grandsons, as well as my great-grandfather. This name has in fact made researching my mother’s paternal family history relatively easy as although it is not hugely rare, it is by no means common …
A family legend told to my mother by my grandmother was that there was an ancestor, “Jane Gray”, who had an affair with a landed gentry which resulted in an illegitimate child. I had uncovered a fair bit about my grandmother’s ancestry and hadn’t found anything that confirmed my grandmother’s story. After I realised I …
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When the 1911 census of England and Wales was released a year early, it was great news for genealogists as for many, it could crack unsolved mysteries or knock down brick walls. I had relative ease finding most of my ancestors (those of whom were still living) in 1911, but there was one person who …
Read more “Solving the mystery of finding an ancestor in the 1911 England and Wales census”