Genealogy in 2016: Accentuate the Positive

With the 'Accentuate the Positive' geneameme, Jill Ball encourages us to focus on our recent genealogical achievements, not the things that are still on our 'to do' list at the end of 2016.

• An elusive ancestor I found was my gr-gr-gr-great-grandfather William WEBSTER (occupation: dyer), whose burial was among 79,000 new records added to the Greater London Burial Index on FindMyPast. I subsequently found an image of the original burial register in the London Metropolitan Archives collection on Ancestry.


• A precious family photo I found (courtesy of a distant cousin) was Helen Rebecca CAMPBELL (born Tiree, Argyllshire, Scotland) who married William Tasman WOOLDRIDGE in Tasmania, Australia. There is a strong resemblance between Helen and her brother John CAMPBELL, whose portrait (painted by Alfred Bock) was in the historical museum at Sale in Gippsland, Victoria.


• An ancestor whose grave I found was Carl Ludwig RIENECKER. I somehow missed it when I tramped through Forest Hill cemetery (Queensland), which has several sections separated by bushland. Luckily there is a grave location map linked to the Billion Graves Cemetery Index.


• An important vital record I found was the marriage of James WEBSTER and Mary GIBLETT in Bath, Somerset, in 1817. FindMyPast has an index (Somerset marriages post-1754) but the image of the original register is in Somerset, England, Marriage Registers, Bonds and Allegations on Ancestry.


• A newly found family member shared information about descendants of Annie Louisa WEBSTER (1848-1916) who married William SMITH, a builder in Camberwell, Surrey, England. Some members of that family use the hyphenated surname WEBSTER-SMITH.


• A geneasurprise I received was (1) Dick Eastman, in his famous online genealogy newsletter, recommended my Web page (Using and Compiling Indexes); (2) some of my English relatives were born or married in China (Ethel Winifred HUDSON, Edgar Murray HYND and their children) or died in Africa (Geoffrey Aubie TURNER). The sources I used included Andrews Newspaper Index Cards 1790-1976 and the National Probate Calendar on Ancestry, and British Nationals born overseas and British Nationals married overseas on FindMyPast.


• A 2016 blog post that I was proud of (because I think it will help a lot of people) was '40 of My Favourite Genealogy Indexes and Sources'.


• A new piece of software I mastered was IrfanView (see 'How to save source information so that it appears on an image' and 'Using IrfanView to Label Digital Photos').


• A social media tool I enjoyed using for genealogy was Tweetdeck. I make separate columns for selected people and topics (such as hashtags #genealogy and #AncestryHour) so that I can easily see those tweets. With Tweetdeck I can also schedule my own tweets to be posted when I'm away or asleep.


• A genealogy webinar from which I learnt something new was Publishing a Genealogy E-Book, by Thomas MacEntee.


• I was pleased with the presentation I gave to Toowoomba and Darling Downs Family History Society ('Not Just the Patient: how hospital and asylum records tell the story of a family' and 'Ancestors who moved or vanished'). Just before I left home, I broke my toe, so driving to Toowoomba and giving a long presentation was quite a challenge.


• I taught a friend how to use the full list of all record sets on FindMyPast to gain access to some that (inexplicably) can't be found via their A to Z Search.


• A genealogy book that taught me something new was Ancestral Trails: The Complete Guide to British Genealogy and Family History, by Mark Herber.


• A great repository I visited was the Borthwick Institute for Archives (Yorkshire, England) - but it was a 'virtual' visit, not an overseas trip! Many of the Borthwick's original records are now online as digital images. This year I downloaded several wills and hundreds of parish records via the magnificent Yorkshire Collection and Prerogative and Exchequer Courts Of York Probate Index on FindMyPast.


• A new history book I enjoyed was Shadows of the Workhouse: The Drama of Life in Postwar London (the beautifully written memoirs of Jennifer Worth).


• A geneadventure I enjoyed was a genealogy conference on a 7-night Barrier Reef cruise organised by Unlock the Past.


• Another positive I would like to share is... In 2016 I made a lot of progress because I took a close look at what I'd previously found (or failed to find). I studied certificates again, and suddenly realised the significance of witnesses' names. Taking one ancestor at a time (and then their siblings), I listed the records that were missing from my collection. I obtained certificates, wills, school records and other items that were unavailable (because of access restrictions) when I started family history 40 years ago. I checked what sources I'd previously used, and I looked for new indexes (and digital images of original records) on the Internet and in libraries and Archives.
  
  I'm sure that you, too, will enjoy success in 2017 if you follow Pauleen Cass's superb advice in My 3 Rs of Genealogy Research.

My previous posts in the 'Accentuate the Positive' series were in 2012 and 2013. If you'd like to join in, see Jill's blog.