Category Archives: Uncategorized

Still more Scottish Ramblings

by thehistoryinterpreter

On a glorious sunny September day, with temperatures in the twenties, we set off for Leith Hall in nearby Kennethmont. One of the pleasures of visiting Scotland is that most of your journeys from a to b are through beautiful scenery and are as much part of the experience as the destinations. Here though the landscape is not stereotypically ‘Scottish’. Gone is the dramatic, stark scenery of further south. Instead, we have more benign vast vistas of rolling fields that are currently being harvested.

I like to take notes when I am going round places, or I forget everything that I have been told. I managed to find a writing implement in the bottom of the bag but struggled to find anything to write on. Finally, I unearthed a tiny scrap of paper, which I decided would have to do,  Leith Hall has a history dating back to 1650, when James Leith had it built. It has a chateau-like appearance and inside there’s an arts and crafts movement influence. We arrived just as a guided tour was beginning. Unlike English National Trust properties, where it is usual to have a guide who specialises in each room, here we have one guide who knows everything. There is a complicated family tree of previous owners and I am not sure I always quite grasped who was who. One was fanatical about recycling and the hall ceiling is panelled using pew backs from a church.

There is an elegant Georgian extension, by Alexander Leith, where Chippendale, Hepplewhite and Sheraton are all on display. When the money began to run short the estate was put up for sale, in the 1780s, by Alexander ‘Sandy’ Leith but it was his saved by his great uncle, Andrew Hay, who purchased it and gifted it back to the family. In return, the family hyphenated the name to Leith-Hay. Although they had been Jacobite sympathisers, the family had not been active in the uprisings, so kept their estates after Culloden. In stark contrast, the saviour of the estate, Andrew Hay, was an active supporter of the Jacobite cause. He fought at Prestonpans and Culloden, fleeing to the continent. After eleven years, he returned to Scotland and was pardoned in 1780. Allegedly, he was seven foot two tall, not ideal for a Jacobite trying to be inconspicuous.

There was an interesting photo of the tenants in 1902, including a few women. The estate extended to include the neighbouring village of Insch, which has ancestral connections, so I searched the list for familiar names, even though they’d left the area by 1902 but no luck. Charles and Henrietta Leith-Hay ran the Hall as a hospital in the First World War. Charles and his only son both died in 1939 and Henrietta gifted the hall to The Scottish National Trust.

We looked round the pleasant gardens. There was a sign urging us to close the gate behind us to keep the ’bunnies’ out but there was no gate on the hinges!

The tea room staff seemed a little distrait but the cake came in a variety of unusual flavours; my companion had plum and ginger and mine had an unpronounceable name but was possibly cherry based. Paying was an ‘interesting’ experience as we’d been presented with no bill but were trusted to return to the admission desk and recite what we had had. Surely this is a system open to abuse.

We visited Insch, a parish where my children and one of my sons in law both have ancestry, I have yet to find a mutual ancestor for my daughter and her husband but I will keep trying. A couple of the churches I was interested in are now private dwellings and one alludeed us completely.

We managed to fit in a visit to Fyvie Castle. Having already made the mistake once today, I compounded the difficulty of taking notes by arriving at the ticket desk without anything to write on or with. It was quite a long way back to the car to find the necessary equipment. I was willing to buy a pencil in the gift shop but they came without points, so that idea failed. I decided to blag something of the chap in reception instead. Here, Bob was our knowledgeable tour guide and we were the only people on the last tour of the day. Having worked at a tourist attraction, we strongly suspect that Bob was hoping we just wanted a cursory look, so that he could head off home early but we disabused him of that idea and assured him we’d like the whole tour. Sorry Bob.

Parts of the stone building were already in existence when Sir Henry Preston captured Ralph de Percy in 1390 at the Battle of Otterburn. Percy was a wanted man and the English Crown rewarded Preston by giving him Fyvie Castle. Allegedly, the castle was already cursed. Tammas the Rhymer and been asked to entertain the inhabitants but perceiving some slight when the door was blown shut in his face, he decreed that the eldest son would never inherit, which proved to be the case. Three specific stones have to be thrown from the castle to lift the curse. One of the stones is inaccessible but another is on display and is said to ‘weep’ filling the basin it is lying on with water. In addition, there is a sealed chamber that has not been accessed since the seventeenth century. Breaking the seal is thought to bring about the laird’s death and make his wife blind. Another gruesome tale is that of Lilias Drummond, who failed to give her husband, Alexander Seton, the required son.  Wishing to marry his wife’s niece but being a fervent Catholic, so divorce not being an option, in 1601, Alexander locked Lilias in what is now known as ‘The Murder Room’ and starved her to death. Lilias’s name can be seen carved on an outside window ledge, which supposedly appeared after her death. Her ghost, as ‘the green lady’ is said to haunt the castle.

In 1596, Alexander Seton bought Fyvie from the Meldrum family. Several carved finials adorn the roof. Some of these date from the sixteenth century and six are thought to have been added by Alexander; one strongly resembles a flowerpot man but is allegedly a ceremonial trumpeter. Later owners continued the tradition of adding finials

The future Charles I was brought up at Fyvie, being too sickly to move south with his father James VI when he ascended to the English throne in 1603. The present king celebrated his 60th birthday here.

The towers are named after three of the owning families, Meldrum, Seton and Preston. Steel bands (not the musical kind) have been fitted to the Seton tower to monitor movement and parts of the building are in need of conservation. In the 1890s, Lord Leith installed similar bands, fashioned from railway sleepers. Continued remodelling rendered the foundations insubstantial for the weight of the extended Seton and Meldrum towers. Cracking can be seen and is being carefully monitored.

In 1889, Alexander Leith purchased Fyvie for £175,000, which included the 10,000 acre estate. Born in Scotland, Alexander, along with his wife’s family, had made a fortune in the American steel industry. He added to the collection of armaments, portraits and tapestries at Fyvie. Other symbols of affluence and status include a 1120 piece Waterford chandelier and a large collection of portraits by Raeburn. One portrait bizarrely has a right foot that is always pointing towards you, no matter where you stand in the room. I have no idea how this illusion is achieved. There is a ‘great wheel’ staircase, basically an extra wide spiral staircase. Allegedly, General William Gordon raced horses up and down it.

More Scottish Adventures

by thehistoryinterpreter

Having been to the crannogless crannog centre it was time for the ospreyless Osprey Haven. This was not a surprise, as it is late in the year for osprey and there have been no young at the nest at Loch of the Lowes this year, following the death of the male in the spring. The regular female does seem to have formed a new bond and they have been protecting the nest so there is hope for next year.

This is not the sort of reserve where you go for a walk. There are two hides and there’s also a large window where you can watch a wide variety of small birds at the feeders. There are beaver at work on the loch but you only get to see them first thing in the morning and in the evening. There was no sign of the resident red squirrels either. Despite this, it was good to visit and the journey itself was scenic.

Next, we went in to Aberfeldy for a drink and some cake. The local cinema allows non-customers to use their toilets, which then has the desired effect, as we stayed to use their café. We also managed to stock up on food at the local Co-op. We were a little concerned about our booking at the next caravan site as we hadn’t received an acknowledgement or reminder. We telephoned to check, thinking that if something was awry it was easier to search for an alternative using a laptop and the, albeit very weak, site wifi than it would be on a phone when we got there. It turns out that they had no record of our booking but there was space so we booked by phone.

By this point we had been away for a while. Time for the feat of contortion that is changing a duvet cover in a caravan. You’ve probably tried this in a house but accomplishing the task in a 7 foot by 14 foot caravan takes it to a whole new level. Then there is the ‘getting the fitted sheet on the mattress when you can only reach one of the four sides’ challenge to add to the fun.

On a beautiful autumn morning, with sunshine, heavy dew and fog on the Tay, we took the high road (well the A827 followed by the A9 and A95) north. The first twenty-five miles or so of our journey was on a road full of twists and turns, with no duelling (as in road lanes, not the waving pistols or swords about sort). We were towing a caravan. We were not swift. This kind of journey is also known as how many drivers can you **** off in a very short space of time? Not many as it turns out. The road was quite quiet and we pull over to let speedier stuff pass whenever we can, despite very few acknowledging us. As we got to the A9 and A95 we were in whisky distilling country. There was a ‘whisky trail’ indicated on the road signs, illustrated by a symbol that looks a bit like a witch’s hat. I can’t work out what it is meant to represent that has any connection with whisky.

We arrived at Huntly Castle Caravan Site, not without issues as the satnav insists it is where it isn’t, down a dead end with little caravan turning potential. Fortunately, just in the nick of time, I recalled our being led astray in this fashion on our previous visit and we were able to avoid a repeat of the million point turn that following the satnav necessitates. Strangely it turns out, on arrival, we still didn’t have a booking, despite yesterday’s telephone conversation but that was soon remedied.

We have setting up the caravan off to a fine art, so were soon ready to explore the castle from which the site takes its name. Should we partake of refreshments before heading off to the castle? We decided to treat ourselves at the castle refreshment rooms when we get there. Mistake. The castle has no refreshment rooms; rookie error. Here we benefited from the reciprocal arrangement that Historic Environment Scotland has with English Heritage, so entrance was free. There has been a castle on the site since the 12th century. The earth motte is all that remains as evidence of the original timber castle, which belonged to Duncan Earl of Fife. In 1307, Robert the Bruce came to recuperate in the castle. By the 14th century the Gordon family were in residence and remained so until the 1640s. The palatial stone castle was begun in the mid-fifteenth century and then later remodelled with a nod to the influences of France.

Mary of Guise, widow of James V and mother of Mary Queen of Scots, was entertained at Huntly by Gordon, in 1556. She was treated so lavishly that she felt that he was becoming too powerful. Mary Queen of Scots later defeated the Earl in battle and confiscated goods for the crown. The fifth earl collapsed during a game of football and died in 1576. This would presumably have been the more aggressive form of football, known as campball, with an infinite number of players and goalposts that might be at opposite ends of the village.

For some reason, James VI had the castle blown up in 1594 but it is unclear how much damage this caused.  In 1599, George Gordon became a marquis. In order to advertise his new elevated status, he commissioned an elaborate carving to be added to the front of the palace. Carved symbols advertised their Catholicism; these were defaced when Presbyterian Covenanters occupied the Castle in the 1640s. Seventeenth century tenants’ rents in kind provided the household with foodstuff including 167 cattle, 700 chickens, 40 barrels of salmon and 5284 eggs each year.  As ardent Catholics, they suffered during the English Civil War, with George, the second Marquis, being executed in 1650 for his support of Charles I.

An inventory of 1648 gives an impression of how luxurious the furnishings were at the end of the Gordon’s ownership. Tapestries, paintings and a map of the world could be found and there was also an organ. The castle also houses the oldest wooden toilet seat in the country. The castle came into the care of the state in 1923.

All About Places – well mostly

by thehistoryinterpreter

What with the job I must not mention and visiting family, I have been a little quiet lately but behind the scenes things have been as hectic as usual. Firstly, I have been writing and recording my contributions to All About That Place. This is a free online extravaganza of short presentations, all loosely associated with family history places. It runs from 27 September to 6 October. You can find out more and sign up here. There is an international line-up of speakers and there will be so much to learn and enjoy.

Both of my presentations are on 1 October, which is the day dedicated to Town and Country. I chose to record my sessions and you will be able to access them after the event if you can’t make it live. If you do want to watch live, 11am (UK time) is my first slot, when I will be telling the story of my great great grandmother, Anne Stratford. Anne counts as an ancestor that I am particularly attached to. After I had moved away, having spent three years living in Buckinghamshire, I discovered that the road I’d been living in was the road where Anne lived as a child. Until that time, I had no idea that I had any connections to Buckinghamshire. If that doesn’t make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck, nothing will.

The talk is about Victorian life in rural Buckinghamshire and the dependence of the community on the straw plait trade, with a bit of Swing rioting thrown in for good measure. Inevitably, the original talk was far too long, despite my talking very fast. I will also be mentioning Anne when I am talking about the role of women in farming communities for the Society of Genealogists on 30 August. You can join this day, which includes other excellent presentations about researching agricultural labouring ancestors, online, though this one is a paid event.

What is lovely about All About that Place is that so many of my friends are also presenting. Seven of the A Few Forgotten Women team applied to speak and all were accepted, so we have nine talks on the programme between us, most of which are Forgotten Women based. We are also frantically getting ready for the next Forgotten Women communal research day, known as Forgotten Women Friday, on 24 August, which focusses on pupils from two schools for the deaf.

Talk two for All About that Place is at 2.00pm and is an introduction to The General View of Agriculture, an invaluable series of books that don’t get anything like enough prominence. Come along, or listen after the event, to find out what you might learn about your rural ancestors from these volumes.

There are various hazards when recording talks. Now that I have no landline, I can at least turn the phone off but I am left with the seagulls, which are fine in winter when you can shut doors and windows but in summer you have to hope they are elsewhere or boil.

More online fun starting next week with another run of my course for Pharos Teaching, which helps set folk on the right path to writing and interesting family history. This comes with the (optional) opportunity to have a short family history story critiqued. The prospect of this always engenders mild panic but basically I just comment on particular strengths and make constructive (I hope!) suggestions for improvement. Last time I looked there were still spaces, so why not decide that now if the time to put fingers to keyboard and make some sort of coherent end product from all those research notes.

I also have edits of my next book about the history of women at work to work through – busy times.

Things that go Wrong

by thehistoryinterpreter

It has been a bit of a week regarding things that should work. Firstly, the car. I don’t use my car a great deal so a planned solo trip some thirty miles over the border into Cornwall was a big event for it and me. Off I set. About twenty miles in, a little orange light showed up ABS. I was aware that this was something to do with brakes, a tad essential but I thought I’d keep going and hope it went away. Next a red light that looked like someone with a ball on their lap. I guessed (correctly as it turned out) that this was something to do with the airbag. I have been in a car when the airbag goes off; it definitely hadn’t but this now looked more serious so I pulled into a layby to summon assistance. Said trusty assistant, who was some forty minutes away, said ‘you are nearly there, keep going slowly and I’ll come along and have a look when you get there’.

I hang up and turn the ignition. Nothing, zilch, not even the strangled cow coughing noise. Another call to the trusty assistant who is on his way. I am now in a layby, in full sun, on the hottest day of the year with nothing at all to do for forty minutes. I am really bad at ‘nothing to do’. I am reluctant to use my phone whose battery drains like something that drains very quickly. The only blessing was I had opened the windows, which of course are electric, before everything died. I run through Cornish vocabulary in my head. This is frustrating as I have no means of looking things up when I can’t remember. The large lorry in front of me pulls out leaving a blessed patch of shade. More in desperation than hope, I try the ignition, ta dah! All working, I pull forward.

Trusty assistant and I have tracking things on our phones, not because we are obsessed with what the other is doing but in case I go for a walk on my own and fall in a ditch. I can see he is only ten minutes away. He arrives and agrees to follow me the remaining miles to my destination. We set off. A few minutes later the yellow light reappears, then the red light. I persevere. Just as I reach the outskirts of a town the CD player stops, then a few seconds later so does the car, with a gentle sort of ‘I’ve had enough’, it grinds to a halt. Good job I was only going slowly. I am now on the main road through north Cornwall, stationary, just as there are bollards to aid crossing the road on my right. My trusty assistant is behind me. We are totally blocking very a busy road. He rushes to my aid. I am not sure that a man of his advancing years should be pushing a car when the temperature is in the high twenties but needs must. Two slightly more appropriate car-pushers come to assist. My steering has locked, I am now stuck on a high kerb. We rectify this and I am able to pull on to a grass verge outside a vets, with my assistant behind me. A very long queue of traffic escapes. By now it is a good two hours since I left home. A big shout out to Penbode Vets in Bude. When I went to explain why I was parked on their verge, they offered refreshment, toilet facilities (hurrah) and the use of their air conditioned waiting room. I availed myself of one of these.

We ring the recovery service; I am covered under the breakdown cover of the trusty assistant. Oh. It turns out I am not, that’s new. The lovely vets have also provided the phone number of the garage. They can recover me in about an hour for an eye-watering sum (the garage is less than half a mile away) but can’t look at my car for a fortnight. Alternatively, they can recover me to a garage near home for very little extra. We opt for that. Trusty assistant meanwhile delivers me to where I was heading, only an hour late and returns to guard the car. In the end he was there two hours, then bless him, he waited to collect me from my day out. I did leave early but at least it wasn’t a totally wasted trip, even if it was an expensive one.

Then the dishwasher. I am new to dishwashers; this one came with the house. Apart from commercial dishwashers in places of work, I had never had anything to do with dishwashers before. I’ve been using this one a couple of times a week since I moved. I’ve run ‘cleaning washes’. I’ve even taken out the filter thingy and given it a bit of a wash, Increasingly though, things have come out of the dishwasher covered in stuck on gritty mank. I sought advice from dishwasher owning friends (pretty much everyone I know). ‘Maybe you’ve run out of salt’. Salt? Dishwashers need salt? ‘Or rinse aid’. This was getting more complicated by the minute. Sure enough I have red lights that indicate that I need both rinse aid and salt, who knew? ‘Oh and clean out the blades’. With a bit of tugging I remove the blades and they are best described as pretty unsavoury. With the aid of a needle and tweezers I even removed a piece of tape that ties up bread bags from those tiny holes. Some more expensive ‘three in one’ tablets were purchased. To be fair, the ones I inherited were also three in one but were probably a couple of years old. Do dishwasher tablets go out of date? The first wash went like a dream, the second one not quite so much – no mank but not everything was clean. Maybe I still need salt and rinse aid.

I am still not convinced I ‘get’ dishwashers. Mine is meant to take ten place settings – goodness knows how. My plates are too large for the underneath section and surely what you really want to wash is pots and pans. I can’t fit in all our roast dinner for two pots and pans without piling them up, which I understand is a no no. So my understanding is, you have to rinse stuff off (probably more than I have been) before you put it in and some stuff doesn’t always get clean, so you need to wash it afterwards, so really you might just as well wash it properly by hand in the first place. At the moment it just seems like a way to use electricity and a lot more water for not great results. It is however still a bit of a novelty, so I may buy the salt and rinse aid and persevere for a bit. The jury is definitely out.

Oh and good news about the car. It was a faulty alternator. This was new only a couple of months ago, so they replaced it totally free of charge, not even charging for the labour. Good job I went to my own garage and not the one near to where I ground to a spectacular halt.

Just because things are good, here is last week’s sunset, minutes from home.

Forays into the Sixteenth Century and other news

by thehistoryinterpreter

There’s not much to report but I thought I should mark the fact that it is exactly six months since I moved house. The time has flown by, not helped by losing a month to Covid. The house is pretty well settled. There are things I want to do but nothing urgent. Everything has a place and I am just awaiting some shelves to unpack the last two boxes of ornaments. I am loving being able to see the sea almost every day, although I am ashamed to say that I have not yet co-ordinated time, tide and temperature to dip my toe in. I’ll leave gardening progress to a post of its own. Much of my local walking takes place in the early hours of the morning. This photo was taken at 6am less than ten minutes from home.

Recent excitements have included a few days seeing family and walking on the Isle of Wight. ’Walking’ makes it sound like we going on ten mile hikes; sadly those days have passed. We did manage a couple of five milers but it was mostly strolling along the cliff path. Then there was a trip on PS Waverley in full OAP mode, using my bus pass to get to the pick-up point. There have been meals out with friends and more to come. Mistress Agnes may also have been spotted at an event commemorating the 475th anniversary of the Prayer Book Rebellion, trying armour on unsuspecting passers by and killing people off sixteenth century style. This was quite fun as members of the audience succumbed to plague, warfare and accusations of witchcraft amongst other things.

It hasn’t all been fun and games and I have yet to comprehend what ‘retirement’ might mean. The job I must not mention is now in full flow, so other things will take a back seat for the next couple of months. I do still have some talks to give and my online One-Place Studies course for Pharos Tutors starts on Monday. That will be swiftly followed by another run of Writing your Family History. There’s a new course in preparation for next year but more of that another time. It won’t go public until I’ve actually written it! I have managed to get another non-fiction book off to the publishers but that won’t see the light of day until well in to next year.

April Ancestral Adventures

by thehistoryinterpreter

Apologies for the recent lack of blogs. After four months, the overwhelming waves of post-Covid exhaustion are, I hope, finally abating but I still seem to be working at half speed. Apart from the gardening, of which more another time and some lovely beach-side walks, now it has, at last, decided to stop raining, there have been some family history forays.

In no particular order: I have been working on finishing off another book. This won’t see the light of day until well into next year, so I don’t want to say too much but I needed to find a case study of a Victorian midwife. This will be similar to the case studies in my Marginalised Ancestors book. Usually, you have to false start several possibilities before finding one that goes somewhere but this time I found a brilliant one first time. To be fair, I did put ‘midwife AND murder’ into the newspaper search but what a story. This lady claims to have been born in three different countries in the census returns and gave birth in a fourth country. She is also vague about her age and doesn’t always use the same forename. To add to the complications, there is another midwife, with the same, not very usual, name, well the same as one version of her name, who has a husband of the same name to boot. Once I’d realised that these were two different people I was away.

We’ve had another Forgotten Women Friday, which saw me tracing a staff member from the Fleming Children’s Hospital in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. I’ve helped a member of my no longer quite so local, local history group take a dive into his ancestry and am hoping to find his ancestor’s parentage, despite the lack of a baptism.

Next, a brick wall to solve ahead of the August Devon Family History Society brick walls session. I only started this yesterday but I think I may have cracked it. It relies on signatures in marriages registers. Hopefully I can tie that one up today. Also yesterday, a history group outing to Coldridge; just possibly the resting place of Edward V aka the elder of the princes in the tower. Assuming, of course, that the ‘murdered by Richard III’, or even ‘murdered by Henry VII to discredit Richard III’ narratives are not true. The food provided by the local village ladies’ pop-up café was excellent, the company was good and the presentation in the church was thought provoking. I remain to be wholly convinced by the ‘evidence’, which is of the circumstantial variety but there are certainly several factors to consider. An interesting story if you are prepared to take it with a healthy dose of scepticism but also an open mind.

What else? I’ve led another cohort of Pharos online students through my ‘Writing up your Family History’ course. I’ve given several online talks, including the one about the Smith family of London. Excitingly, a DNA link, made just the day before, allowed another Smith descendant to attend. Mistress Agnes has chatted to a WI group meeting about her herb garden, with the bonus of being treated to an Elizabethan style meal. I’ve talked about Uproar and Disorder and Marginalised Ancestors and this weekend it is In-migration, with a dash of illegitimacy and Insanity on the horizon.

I’ve been creating a new presentation about surviving the sixteenth century, which will also be adapted to become surviving the seventeenth century. This is going to be an interactive experience. No spoilers but the audience probably won’t survive. Conversations such as, ‘bother I have six people left ……… not to worry they can get syphilis’, have been heard. Just a shame that I don’t think this one will work other than in person.

Sometimes people think speakers charge a lot for ‘one hour’s work’. Quite apart from researching and writing the talk in the first place, which will probably take several days, any speaker worth their salt will run through and tweak before every performance, checking slides, handouts and links. With this in mind, I’ve adapted my heirlooms presentation and also worked on one for the 50th anniversary of the Family History Federation, to deliver in person at their AGM. I wasn’t quite in at the beginning but I was at the 10th anniversary, having already been involved in family history for seven years. How to make yourself feel old in one easy lesson.

I’ve had committee meetings, met up with friends and tried to learn Cornish (even after eighteen months I am still at the lots of words not many sentences stage – I did say that languages were not my forte). I’ve also had a visit from one half of my descendants, which involved extremely windy beach visits, guarding coats while they behave like ninjas (best not to ask) and building Lego, including the Lego family tree that was their birthday gift.

I guess, put like this, I’ve had a productive month but I am haunted by the twenty-five things still on the April to do list. I guess there’s always May, except I have a very full May diary (currently stands at one free evening), including a family reunion weekend and hopefully a trip to Kresen Kernow (Cornwall’s Archives), which means I need to prepare for said archive visit and then there’s the job we must not mention looming, a journal and newsletter to edit aka write much of and …. and ….. and…….   Good to keep busy I guess.

Up the Garden Path 6

by thehistoryinterpreter

We moved the shed into its new position! It was quite a performance involving crashing through undergrowth and nearly getting stuck behind the shed, as we attempted to get it as far back as possible, without knocking next door’s fence down. We had to do a bit of random shoving of bits of wood and stone under the corners to get the doors to open and close. There was plenty of ‘a bit more under this side’, ‘no a bit more under that side’, rather like cutting a fringe and trying to get things level. Getting the pipe we’d rolled the shed into position on out from underneath it was a challenge. It involved my trusty assistant manfully lifting one corner a fraction, me laying on wet gravel and risking life and fingers trying to shove the pipe sideways with a spade until it finally rolled out from under the shed. This is not the last of the shed moving saga, as it really is very wobbly and we should have constructed a better base. When we can face it, it will be emptied, moved a little and have slabs put underneath. It is also just a couple of inches too large to fit, so it does slightly cover the office window but I am going to live with that.

The shed is a must. Having just retrieved what I hope is the last lot of things from my old shed, that were being stored in a handy barn, there were a lot of diverse bits and pieces to fit in. Believe it or not, the shed contents was triaged and things were disposed of, before I moved. Nevertheless, I seem to have seven tin of brown fence paint and having just purchased two tins in sage green to repaint things, I won’t have much brown wood left, apart from the back gate. I could probably paint that every year for the rest of my life and not run out of paint.

I was asked where I would like to go to celebrate my birthday. My previous birthday was spent at a funeral, so the bar was pretty low. I opted for Trago Mills, hoping that their garden centre might provide cost effective plant, planter and potential replacement summerhouse buying options. It was Easter Sunday, so I checked online and was informed that it was open. After a forty mile drive we discovered that it wasn’t open. We were also going to walk round Stover Country Park but there was no space in the car park, so some frantic Googling of ‘garden centres near me’ ensued. The first one we tried, about six miles further on, was also shut, despite being advertised as being open. Returning to Stover to see if there was a parking space, we spotted Plants Galore, allegedly open Monday to Friday but with a discrete sign that said ‘Open Easter Sunday’. This was huge, with plants at very reasonable prices. I did go just slightly mad. Amongst the purchases was a wisteria, an apple tree, some hanging basket plants, three herbs, some lavender and tomatoes, peas and beans, because growing veg is always fun. As a bonus, we did manage to park at Stover, though the cold wind made it less pleasant that it might have been.

If you are thinking, surely she won’t have room for all those plants in her tiny garden, you would probably be right. We have investigated the lifting some of the patio option and it does seem particularly well concreted down, so I have ordered a raised bed instead. There is just enough earth beyond the patio, behind where the shed used to be, to plant the wisteria and apple tree. They are still waiting patiently because I want to paint the fence first and there hasn’t been a dry enough day to do that yet. I have also decided to go for the repairing the summerhouse option, as I prefer the shape and size of the one I have to any that are available. I am using the summerhouse as a greenhouse come potting shed. The search for fence paint and liner for the impending raised bed took me to other outlets where a clematis and some heather found their way into my trolley. So, some planting as been going on between showers but there’s still a long way to go.

RootsTech Round-up Days 2 and 3

by thehistoryinterpreter

I didn’t get the chance to watch as many presentations as I’d like on Day 2, as life got in the way but I have reduced my playlist to something more realistic, partly because some of the talks I’d earmarked are not available virtually and were live at times when I wasn’t available, or was asleep. It is great that so many can be watch online, especially as they are free of charge. So this is my round up of Days 2 and 3. I enjoyed giving my own Marginalised Ancestors talk live but remotely and thankfully the technology behaved itself. This is one that is available for you to watch when you have an hour to spare. It was so difficult to decide what to miss out and I have fun varying the categories and case studies each time I give this talk.

I watched Liz Craig’s second One-Place Studies presentation on studying a street; a great introduction and Liz’s enthusiasm is infectious. I saw the Impact Forum live, with several presenters discussing the impact of family history on resilience, metal health and a sense of identity. Also on my watch list was ‘Reconstructing the Lives of our Female Irish Ancestors’ with Stephanie O’Connell. Plenty there for those with Irish ancestry and it was good to hear the emphasis on the importance of the social historical context. I have squeezed several short, Ancestry-sponsored, case studies from television programmes into odd moments. These included Every Family has a Secret and Finding your Roots.

With my Smith ancestors in mind, I watched Shaunese Luthy’s ‘Finding your Common Name Ancestor’. She utilised the F(riends) A(ssociates) and N(eighbours) principle in her case study of the Brown family. My interest in the history of medicine meant that ‘Diseases our Ancestors Faced and how those Illnesses Changed our World’ from Gregory C Gardner, was a must-watch. This is highly recommended and covered UK and US records. I am very envious of the US mortality schedules.

‘From Research to Draft: Rapidly Writing Your Ancestor’s Story’ by Devon Noel Lee contained some interesting ideas for turning basic facts into a narrative, although using AI for this doesn’t appeal to me personally. Her marking-up technique is similar to the work that I do with my writing your family history students and I am looking forward to leading a new cohort of Pharos students through the writing process in a couple of weeks. There is still time to join in on this one.

I have some great RootsTech talks still to watch, including Nick Barrett’s ‘Researching English Industrial Labourers’. I may even catch up on some that are lingering in the playlist from previous years.

A Bit about Grass but Nothing to do with Gardening

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.

Battling Storms and Other News

by thehistoryinterpreter

Having barely moved from my chair for three weeks, whilst desperately search for my energy and motivation, which have both gone awol post Covid, Sunday was a day to venture out. We’d booked to see a Fisherman’s Friends concert in Torquay, about 70 miles from home. Although driving back after the concert was an option, plan a was to take the caravan down overnight. Site duly booked, all was well until the prospect of Storm Isha loomed. ‘Keep clear of the coast’, they said. The theatre is right on the sea front. ‘Don’t drive unless you have to’, they said. Hmm. Having braved both Storm Agnes and Storm Gerrit with the caravan this season, the decision was made to think of a plan b. Driving back along country roads in the dark at the height of the storm wasn’t it. Because it was a last minute booking, we managed to secure a budget motel room at little more than the cost of the caravan site. This seemed like a win so far.

With wind freshening, we set off on Sunday afternoon. We even avoided the learning curve of struggling with the accommodation’s parking app, as there was a space in the road, which had the added advantage of being free. Next, a drive down to the seafront car park that is fairly close to the theatre and not too far from where we’d booked to eat. ‘Not too far’ when there’s a 70mph wind and rain is actually quite a long way. I know from my handy not actually very fit watch that it is 1100 steps, about half a mile. Still, getting as far as the restaurant wasn’t too bad, considering my step count had averaged under 300 a day for the last three weeks. The only casualty so far was my feet. I’d gone for comfortable shoes, which, it seems, have holes in the soles as I was now squelching along nicely.

Meal eaten, it was time for the return walk paddle to the theatre. We waited for a heavy hail shower to pass and set off in what was a light drizzle. As a bonus, the wind was behind us to begin with. Optimistically, I was heard to mutter, ‘I don’t want to speak too soon but this isn’t too bad.’ Dear reader, I spoke to soon. About half way along the sea front, with wind crashing in the masts of the moored yachts and Torquay’s palm trees struggling to stay upright, we turned a corner just as driving hail hit us straight in the face. We could see the theatre up ahead, we knew we were walking towards it but somehow it didn’t seem to get any nearer. By the time we reached it, everything from neck up and knees down was as if I’d been plunged in a bucket of water. I was also really noticing how I so hadn’t recovered from Covid. I went to ineffectively attempt to dry my hair under the hand dryer. Not helped by the fact that it cut out automatically after about five seconds. What was really weird was that people who arrived moments before and after us seemed to be completely dry. Women with beautifully coiffured hair surrounded my drowned rat look at every turn as we crowded into the foyer. The rain hadn’t stopped, how had they kept so dry? I’ll admit, the wait to be let in to the auditorium and thus gain access to the ability to sit down, was a struggle. Upright is not a position I’ve encountered much lately, especially not after fighting against wind and rain.

We gradually got our breath back and steamed our way through an excellent concert. Then it was back out into the elements to the car park. I sat dripping in the car whilst my brave companion queued in the rain to pay. We were very thankful to have a few minutes’ drive to the hotel, rather than best part of two hours to home.

Next up, breakfast. We’d opted not to pay £9.95 each for an all you can eat breakfast that we didn’t actually want. I am though really bad at missing some kind of breakfast. Not to worry, we had brought the ingredients with us. Granola, formerly frozen berries and yoghurt awaited. What, in our hurried change of plans, we’d neglected to do, is remember that a bowl and spoon would have been a good idea. We managed to improvise by using one of the ingredients’ containers as a bowl and appropriating the room’s tea spoon. Then it was time to return home, in conditions that were much calmer than the night before. Now we await storm Jocelyn.

In other news, box emptying is awaiting more energy and slightly warmer weather, as I am on to the rooms in the garage and the sheds now. Current total of emptied boxes is 189 and we are not quite done yet. I was also challenged to count my books. Despite several serious culls, 1145 remain, with the children’s books still to be counted. The next challenge is trying to fix heavy shelves to a cavity wall. This is not going to be easy folks.

Some fruits of research that I did last year can now be revealed. Back in the summer, I was contacted by a BBC researcher, in conjunction with Lucy Worsley’s Lady Killers podcast, which was due to feature a local murder. Could I identify the property involved in the story? With help from a friend, I located the ruins of said property and was able to report back to the production team, along with providing other information to help with the local background. I am not sure this quite came across in the finished episode but I did get an honourable mention. You can listen to Sarah Bird’s story here.