Commemorating the Marginalised

Feb21 by thehistoryinterpreter

Rootstech is round the corner and with it the option to see if I am related to any of the many lovely fellow-attendee family historians that I have got to know over the decades, both in person and online. Along with thousands of others, I am attending the mega international conference virtually, from the comfort of home and I’m looking forward to learning new things. As well as the ‘Relatives at Rootstech’ fun, there are options to see if you are related to famous people. Allegedly I have connections to a few. Most of these relationships are based on some seriously speculative genealogy. So, although I probably am Winston Churchill’s tenth cousin three times removed, I have serious doubts that the late queen is my 14th cousin, at least not in the way that is suggested. I suppose it would be mildly interesting to find that ‘Gateway Ancestor’ that leads back into royalty but even though I am about to enter my 48^th year of serious research I have never found that connection. Do I care? Not in the slightest. My interest is in all those ordinary ancestors whose stories will never be told unless I tell them.

I find marginalised ancestors the most fascinating of all. What circumstances led them to become stigmatised, or to find themselves on society’s fringes? Was this down to their own actions, or society’s attitudes? I love to find the lawbreakers, the sick, the poverty stricken and the ostracised on my family tree. Not in the slightest because I want to reveal their stories in some kind of version of the sensationalist press but because their lives are so caught up in the social history and mores of their times. They become much more ‘real’ as their lives are revealed and of course they may leave traces in the documentary record.

It was this interest in those that history forgets that led me to give talks on the subject and my Rootstech presentation this year is about just that. Entitled ‘Tracing your Marginalised Ancestors in Britain’, I will be delivering this remotely but live at 8.30pm GMT (London Time) on Friday 1 March. If you register you can listen for free from anywhere in the world. I believe the session may be available afterwards too but that is still to be confirmed.

A couple of years ago, as a result of a magazine article I wrote on the subject, I was delighted to be approached by Pen and Sword to write a book to help others trace their own marginalised family members. It seems like forever since I finished writing it last March but it now exists as an actual book and those who ordered pre-publication copies should be receiving them any day now. If you have ordered a copy, please do post a photo on social media when it arrives, as I love to see where in the world my books end up. I am supposed to take a photo of me with the book for publicity purposes. This endeavour is hampered by the fact that I am the least photogenic person in the world. To detract from unphotogenic me, I decided it would be a good idea to utilise some of the spectacular landscape that is on my doorstep. This of course means it needs to be dry and ideally sunny. The first attempt was Monday. Bright, rather than sunny but unfortunately also windy. My fine, baby soft hair looks windswept when the Beaufort Scale is at zero. Let’s just say this photo shoot was not a success. It may have to be the ubiquitous, in front of the library shelves shot. You can order copies directly from Pen and Sword.

On the upside though, I have just signed a contract to write another book that may be out next year, or the one after; the writing is well underway.

The study of the marginalised ties in very well with my work with the A Few Forgotten Women Team and I am looking forward to talking about Forgotten Women, in person this time, at the Alfred Gillette Trust in Street, Somerset, to celebrate International Women’s Day on 8 March. A Few Forgotten Women will also have a small exhibition, tickets are available here.

Up the Garden Path 3

Feb18 by thehistoryinterpreter

A drizzly Sunday morning, what better than a gardening update? This week has seen a couple of days when it was neither raining nor cold and windy, so we’ve begun to excavate the raised bed that runs the full width of the garden. At present the garden is distinctly lacking in flower planting potential so it was important to dispense with things that were no longer capable of meaningful life. Three or four large dead shrubs were destined for the chain saw and much as I like winter jasmine, I really can’t have it taking up 30% of my growing space, so that is being drastically reduced. I have been personfully assisted by my partner in crime who has sustained a minor injury during a battle with a large dead bush when chain sawing. Fortunately, he didn’t chain saw himself, so he still has the full complement of fingers. My nose did also have an unfortunate encounter with a springy dead hydrangea branch but no one said gardening was not a hazardous activity, Two trailer loads have departed for the recycling centre and we are about a third of the way along the raised bed, with still the bed down the side, which is even more overgrown, to tackle. I am really cross that my ‘before’ photos didn’t include one that really shows the state of the raised bed but never mind. I’ve included the best of the before pictures below.

There have been more discoveries, including what my RHS app tells me is a quince blossoming away like mad. I am very excited by that. There is honeysuckle, which I do want, climbing all over unidentified definitely dead stuff, which I don’t; untangling the two won’t be easy. There is now space to plant some of the things on my ‘plants I want list’. Sadly, I am not sure that all of the things on the wanted list are going to fit but I am going to do my best. I did purchase half a dozen primulas this week. Two have been planted in a hedgehog (one of the many ornaments inherited from the previous owner – along with the elephant also pictured). The others are in a concrete planter – one of four left behind. I was going to move this to the front garden but it needs someone stronger than me on one end, as it is ridiculously heavy.

After a great deal of measuring, remeasuring and false starts, the plan I was attempting to draw is sort of done, not helped by the lack of right angles in the garden, nor me failing to realise at first that the bungalow is not set parallel to the back fence. At the very least the edges join up now. You can also totally ignore the dimensions in my previous post, where I was clearly so overwhelmed by too much gardening to be able to add up. The plot behind the house is now officially 22 feet deep and 60 feet wide, so twice the size I was claiming – 146 square yards or 120 square metres ish. You do still have to allow for the fact that the conservatory takes up a fair bit of space, compensated for by the weird shaped gap between the garage and the bungalow. Apart from a three foot deep bed long the 60 foot side and down one of the short sides, every last bit is currently paved.

Now I am excited to try to purchase some of the plants on my list to fill the spaces we’ve made. Plenty of fork wielding needed first as the soil is compacted and full of winter jasmine root. A few brave bulbs have been revealed, so I am waiting to see what they are.

A Bit about Grass but Nothing to do with Gardening

Feb11 by thehistoryinterpreter

There is life beyond the garden. I am three talks in to an eight talks in eight days marathon. Why did this seem like a good idea at the time?

Then, last weekend, we braved drizzle and bracing winds to take part in a harvest mouse survey in the nearby country park. Given that I had barely moved further than from chair to bedroom since New Year (thanks Covid), we decided to drive to the car park rather than walk, as we normally would have done. We had studied the risk assessment – we were therefore aware that we night get hit by a golf ball (it is near the golf course), or get sand in our eyes, or get kicked by a horse, or get spiked by spiky grass. Spoiler alert, none of these calamities befell us. A couple of dozen intrepid volunteers set out to ferret around in clumps of grass, on muddy terrain, looking for last year’s abandoned nests. As you can see from the photograph, these are pretty jolly tricksy to spot, yet within about thirty seconds one was found. As usual our luck with wildlife, or even evidence of wildlife, was out so, although we didn’t find any, in all the team located ten, a significant increase from last year, which bodes well for the population of our second smallest native mammal. Having wandered a couple of miles across the country park in our quest, we were very glad we’d decided to take the car, especially as, by the time we’d finished, the drizzle was seriously persisting and the wind was positively howling.

What’s this with the grass? You might well ask. Well, deep breath and bear with. In the new house the former garage has been converted into two rooms. What has become known as the ‘posh’ half has double glazed patio doors leading on to the garden and a smart light fitting. The un-posh aspect was the flooring, which was very bumpy, painted concrete and I clearly needed a floor covering. I wasn’t up for spending a fortune on a room that isn’t really part of the house, so I investigated the options. What might be described as a glorified shed really wasn’t suited to cream, deep-pile carpet, so I was looking for something rather more hard-wearing and dirt resistant. I headed off to the local carpet shop, thinking I might get some form of coir or jute matting. The first problem was that carpet tends to come in four metre widths. The room was 2.6 metres square, so I’d be paying for a lot that I wouldn’t be needing. They could order me the sort of thing I was thinking of but it would, at nearly £400, be a tad over budget. I looked at the remnants but again may of these were larger than I needed. Then my eye alerted upon a fake grass offcut. Hard wearing, cheap, fitting for what may become a garden room when it is no longer required for toy storage for visiting grandchildren.

I headed to the check out. Firstly my partner in crime asks if he qualifies for a staff discount. The assistant asks how long ago he worked for that establishment. He truthfully admits that it was fifty eight years, to be told his qualification for a staff discount must have expired the previous day! She tactfully describes my choice as ‘unusual’. I didn’t tell her that she was speaking to a woman who once papered a room with rolls of brown wrapping paper. A couple of days later the carpet was duly fitted and that’s another space almost sorted. The shelves still need to be arranged but I am pleased with the result. I’ll draw a veil over the condition of the adjoining half a garage, which currently contains everything that won’t fit in the roof or anywhere else.

Up the Garden Path 2

Feb10 by thehistoryinterpreter

To be honest, it hasn’t really been the weather for fair-weather gardeners like me, or indeed any sort of gardener but yesterday the sun came out and the temperature was in double figures, so I ventured forth. The previous owner of my garden had left me numerous pots containing plants in various stages of liveliness and an eclectic selection of garden ornaments. I decided to triage these into ‘will keep’, ‘will humanely dispose of’ and ‘not sure yet’. Plant wise, there are more exciting finds as the year moves on; today’s included hellebores and miniature daffodils.

We began to trim back the winter jasmine, which is rapidly taking over the one flower bed. Other tasks for the afternoon were to deal with my many troughs of geranium cuttings which have been keeping warm in the summer house. Obviously not warm enough as about half are dead, or covered in what Mr Google tells me is powdery mildew. Sick plants were removed and what remained were rationalised into fewer troughs.

Next came the task of measuring the garden, in preparation for trying to draw up a plan. I decided to go for feet and inches, rather than anything metric as I still have to ‘translate’ metric measurements in my head. This was a test of my mathematical skills as my trusty assistant kept calling out the measurements in feet and inches, rather than just inches, which us what I wanted. Good job I know my twelve times table. The whole measuring thing was definitely not easy as I can’t actually reach some of my boundaries due to shrubbery and the many sheds. Added to that, the plot isn’t even remotely rectangular. Not only are there some funny angles created by the perimeter fencing but the garage and sheds are also not all set square. I have a load of scribbles and numbers but whether I will stand any chance of making it into a coherent drawing whose edges join up remains to be seen.

For those who are interested, very roughly, the plot is 35 feet wide by 22 feet deep, minus the space taken up by the conservatory and plus the extra space along the side between the bungalow and the house. One pretty much counteracts the other space wise. Note for some of my overseas readers, in the UK, a bungalow is a single story dwelling not a shack. If my maths is right, I have about 70 square yards, not, of course, at all the same as 70 yards squared! For those of you in foreign, about 58 square metres, which, unbelievably because it seems really tiny to me, is classed as a medium sized garden by the RSPB (Royal Society for Protection of Birds) when you submit your results for their great garden bird watch. By UK standards, particularly with a newer built property (mine was built in 2000), small gardens are the norm. On the subject of birds, I was concerned that this would be one thing I’d lack when I moved but I’ve seen eleven different varieties of bird in the garden (or viewed from the garden on neighbouring roofs or trees) so far in February, a similar number to the old garden, although very different regular visitors. Not bad considering the property had been empty for a fair while before I moved in, so, despite the bird table that was left behind, I doubt the birds had been fed here for over a year. The bird bath, another legacy from the previous owner, is very popular and that will definitely be staying.

This is a long-term project. Don’t expect swift progress!