The new information in an ancestry hint about my great grandmother, Elizabeth Webster, has been very interesting to investigate. (See previous post.)

I already knew that Elizabeth was born in Todwick, Nottinghamshire, in 1845.
Her parents were George Webster and his wife Sarah Newbourn.
Elizabeth was the second of their three children. Her older brother was George and her younger sister was Mary. 
At the time of Elizabeth's birth, her parents lived at Harthill. Sometimes Harthill is regarded as in Nottinghamshire; at other times it's in South Yorkshire. Either way it's near Rotherham and Sheffield. Today you'd be very nearby if you stopped at the Woodall service area of the M1.
​But Elizabeth's mother, Sarah, originated from Todwick so possibly she'd gone to stay with her own parents for the birth of her second child. Todwick is a village just a couple of miles away from Harthill.
Elizabeth's father, George Webster, worked as a labourer. Like the majority of the males in my family tree at this time, he was probably an agricultural labourer. But by 1871 he seems to have become a labourer in an ironworks although still living in Harthill.
This is the point where my great grandmother, Elizabeth Webster, leaves home.

The1871 census records Elizabeth, aged 26 years, working as a housemaid at Norbury Hall located in the Pitsmoor area of Sheffield. Originally a village, Pitsmoor is now a suburb of Sheffield.
Norbury Hall was owned by Mr John Hall, a wholesale grocer, who lived there with his wife, two teenage sons and two younger children.
In addition to Elizabeth, there was a cook, a gardener and two young women employed to look after the children and work in the house. The gardener lived with his family in a cottage in the grounds of Norbury Hall but no other members of the gardener's  family were employed at the Hall.

As the housemaid, Elizabeth would have been the cleaner of the house. Her duties were endless and she would have worked long hours. Dusting, sweeping, carpet beating, bed changing, scrubbing, polishing and worst of all the emptying of chamber pots into a slop bucket.

I found old newspapers that reported that Mr J Hall bought Norbury Hall at auction in 1870. He paid around £4400 which is about £275,000 equivalent today. (See the National Archives currency converter in a previous blogpost.)
As a wholesale grocer he must have been well established in the area. The old newspapers report his involvement in a court case related to trespass while out shooting although Mr Hall was exonerated. He was also involved with local politics being a sponsor for a candidate for the local school board.
Other than the auction, the house itself doesn't get any newspaper mentions until the 1920s when it became the headquarters for an army regiment after being used as a hostel for discharged soldiers and sailors.
Norbury Hall is now, as far as I can tell, adapted into the HQ of an army cadet unit and the HQ of a Muslim charity. There are some photos of what remains of Norbury Hall at the end of this thread on a Sheffield local history website.  There's also a copy of a drawing of Norbury Hall in about 1880.
This 1850 map shows the hall and its extensive grounds which appear to include a small lake. Plenty of work for the gardener!

Mr and Mrs Hall continued to live at Norbury Hall for several years. The 1881 census records a couple more servants and the old newspapers have regular adverts for staff to work for Mrs Hall at Norbury. The couple both died in the early 1890s.

By 1875 Elizabeth had left Norbury Hall and married my great grandfather, John Henry Buckle.
Before that she'd given birth in 1872 to a son, George Ullyet Webster.
I knew about this child and had always thought his name was unusual. (On some records Ullyet is spelt Ullyett.) And, of course, I'd wondered who his father was. 
Now I know where Elizabeth was in 1871 I think I might have found an answer.

George Ullyett (1852 - 1898) is regarded as one of the finest cricketers ever to have originated from the Sheffield area. He was born in Crabtree, Pitsmoor and if you go back to the map above, you'll see that Crabtree is next door to Norbury Hall.
As a boy, George played cricket for the local Crabtree village team and later for the Pitsmoor team. Between 1871 and 1873 George played professional cricket in Bradford. And he played for England in the first ever Test match against Australia in 1876. He had a good career and when his cricketing days were over he became a publican. He was married, had several children and worked in the steel industry when cricket didn't pay enough to cover the bills.
If you're interested there's a full account of George's cricketing prowess on this website. 

So, the question is, was Elizabeth a cricketing fan who named her new son after a local cricketing hero? Or did she have a fling with George and then lose touch with him as he rose through the dizzy heights of cricketing fame? Of course, George was younger than Elizabeth but not so much that they couldn't have had a relationship. Elizabeth's pregnancy coincided with George's time playing professional cricket in Bradford so it's easy to imagine that the young woman would have found it difficult to keep in contact. Who knows? I don't know and will never know. What I do know is that my great grandfather was a keen cricketer and played regularly for the Harthill team. There are several reports in old newspapers of his success as both a bowler and batsman. 

Presumably, Elizabeth and John Henry knew each other as they both lived in Harthill although she was about six years  older than him. John Henry would have been well aware of George Ullyett and might even have played against him at some point when George was starting off in his cricketing career. John Henry would certainly have been aware of Elizabeth's son. 

After the marriage, George Ullyet Webster soon acquired the extra surname of Buckle in all official records. Over time he dropped the Ullyet and by the time of his own daughter's wedding in 1915, he's recorded as George Webster Buckle. 

So, thanks to an Ancestry hint, I've a partial solution to a mystery that's intrigued me for years. 

I don't make many New Year's Resolutions other than get fit, lose weight, be happy!
But for 2021 I've decided to

Every year I re-new the subscription because it's cheaper than leaving it for a while and starting again from scratch. Plus, if the subscription terminates so does all the accumulated data.
So my plan is to go through all the Ancestry Hints, the little green leaves that attach to all the people in your tree to tell you that Ancestry has one or more records that you haven't checked out for that individual.
Despite using Ancestry for years, I've never made much use of the Hints. I've preferred to follow my own researches and use a mix of websites and record most of my data on an offline family tree on my computer.
Consequently there are almost 3000 unviewed records on my Ancestry family tree that may be of relevance or interest. 

So my belated New Year's Resolution is to start checking a few Hints every day and see what turns up. 

So far though, I've found that as I check the Hints and add some new ancestors to my family tree, this generates more Hints. I started with 2863 Hints and after checking about fifty, found there were now 2899 Hints.
However, already I've found Ancestry gold.
Some new information about my great grandmother:

My great grandmother was Elizabeth Webster (1845 - 1897). I already know that in 1875 when she was married to my great grandfather, John Henry Buckle (1851 - 1933), she had a child from a previous relationship.
Elizabeth named her little boy George Ullyet Webster and in due course he became known as George Ullyet Webster Buckle. 
I've always thought Ullyet was an unusual name for a child.
Now I have new information about Elizabeth's life in the early 1870s I'm going to see what I can find out.
​Thankyou Ancestry Hints.
Already a good mystery to investigate!
Keep checking my Blog or follow me on Twitter for developments!

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I received an email from the ancestry website recently informing me that my annual subscription was due for renewal at the end of the month.
I logged into the site to check that my payment method was up-to-date and was amazed to see that I've been subscribing to the site since the year 2000.
I started researching  my family history in the late 1990s. I was learning to explore the Internet as part of my IT up-skilling as a primary school headteacher. In the process I stumbled upon a database of the 1881 census maintained by the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints.
I was stunned when I began to find records that were definitely my ancestors. Finding the names of great grandparents was very exciting.
I was soon looking for more ancestors.
Then I found ancestry.co.uk;
​signed up for a seven day free trial;
found the records of lots more ancestors;
and was hooked!
Over the years I've explored the main branches of my family tree right to the most distant twiglet.
And the same for my husband's family tree; and my brother-in-law's; and cousin-in-law's; and even helped a close friend to track down his birth mother and sister.

I subscribed to Find My Past for the release of the 1911 census and the 1939 Register. And I've ordered over fifty Birth, Marriage and Death certificates from the Government Record Office.
​By 2012 I'd run out of new explorations and was becoming increasingly frustrated with banging my head against the ancestry "brick walls". But the British Newspaper Archive was live and so I subscribed to that too.

Great! I searched every name in my family tree in the BNA database and although the majority of my ancestors hadn't done anything newsworthy, a couple of my great grandparents had. And I've collected some fantastic stories about them which have helped me build up a greatly enhanced knowledge of the lives of each great grandfather and their families.
​One of the best things about the British Newspaper Archive is it keeps adding pages to newspapers already included in the digital records; and new titles are added from time to time as well.
I was delighted when the BNA added the Barnsley Chronicle to the archive and I rushed to re-search my great grandfather, John Henry Buckle. I'd already found reports about him several times in a different local paper such as his involvement with a coal miners' charitable fund. He appears to have had a well developed sense of civic pride and community responsibility.
Searching the Barnsley Chronicle I was thrilled to find a photograph which included my great grandfather at a presentation for a war hero in the local village during WW1. He is in the centre of the photo and although the image is rather blurry, it still gives a good idea of what my great grandfather looked like.

But after you've done the research and collected all the available information about your ancestors, hatches, matches, dispatches, occupations and places of residence in particular, you might want to search more broadly to fill out the details of their lives. To try and get to know your ancestors and the places and times in which they lived. And some of these websites will help you to do just that.

If you want to find out how many people share your surname check out this site.
Based on National Office of Statistics data you can find out how many other people have the same surname as yourself. The data is from 2002 so it's a bit out of date but it gives a general idea. My surname is rather commonplace (102 in the rankings) but my "maiden" name was more unusual being 1401 in the rankings.
My grandmother was a Smith which is number 1 in the rankings with 652,563 people sharing that surname.
The website displays some topical surnames, currently
there are 105 people called JANUARY.
Et il y a 91 appelée JANVIER aussi.
And there are a massive 18440 WINTERs, which probably says something about the British climate
I searched
Sun and found that 1003 people have that surname.
304 people are called Rain and 124 people are named Thunder.
Seriously, the website is useful for family historians but it's good fun too.

If you want to know what a location in your UK family history is like today, then the Geograph website is for you.
The website is a marvellous repository of photos taken by enthusiasts from all over the UK of the many places where they live or enjoy visiting.
The site is particularly useful if you want to visit a church that is connected to your family history without actually going there on a visit.
​I don't know if the project has managed to cover every inch of the British Isles yet but I shouldn't think there are many places that haven't been captured.
This is my favourite Geograph image.
​The photo was taken at Beaumont cum Moze in Essex.

Our Starling ancestors originated in Beaumont cum Moze and emigrated to London in the nineteenth century.
​I think the remains of the Thames sailing barge in this photo are so evocative and we often speculate that it was on a boat like this that the family made their move from Essex to London's East End.

​If you enjoy family history but are sometimes perplexed by an ancestor's occupation, here's the solution.
Dictionary of Old Occupations: A-Z Index
This has to be one of the most useful  websites for family historians available free on the Internet.
The Dictionary of Old Occupations contains over two thousand entries so if you're puzzled by the work undertaken by a Buddleboy you can easily find out that it was the person responsible for the upkeep of vats used to wash ore in the tin (or possibly lead) mining industry. Or how about a Cupel Maker which turns out to be a thrower in the pottery industry who made crucibles. Or was someone in your family a fripperer? Which means that they sold second hand clothes.
This really is one of the most fascinating and useful on-line dictionaries I've ever come across for both general interest and family history researching.
My husband's great, great grandfather was a coal whipper in the 1870s and I used the Dictionary Of Old Occupations to help find out more about the job.
The job of the coal whippers was to get the coal off the ships when it was delivered to the London Docks.
Coal was brought to the capital from the coal fields of the north and by the end of the nineteenth century over three million tons of coal were being transported by ship each year. It was the job of the coal whippers to get the coal out of the hold of the collier (ship used for transporting coal), into sacks and shifted on their backs onto the coal merchants' lighters (smaller vessels) for onward transport. It was hard, heavy, labour-intensive work which took its toll on the life expectancy of those involved.
I copied this fascinating account of the life of a coal whipper a few years ago. It's from The Mysteries of London by G.W.M. Reynolds. This was published in 1846 in weekly episodes. It was a "penny blood": one of the mass produced, cheap, sensationalist serials that were so popular in that era.
One of the characters in the story is a coal whipper and here he is describing his life to other drinkers in a pub, The Dark House.
He explains that the coal whipper works for a local publican who acts as middle-man between the captain of the collier and the coal merchant. The publican contracts to move the coal and hires the whippers and pays them directly; what is extra shocking is the fact that out of his meagre wages the coal whipper had to pay substantial amounts to the publican for beer in order to be sure of getting a job!!!
This is what he said:
"My father was a coal whipper, and had three sons. He brought us all up to be coal whippers also. My eldest brother was drownded in the pool (Pool of London) one night when he was drunk, after only drinking about two pots of the publicans' beer: my other brother died of hunger in Cold-Bath Fields prison, where he was sent for three months for taking home a bit of coal one night to his family when he couldn't get his wages paid him by the publican that hired the gang in which he worked. My father died when he was forty - and any one to have seen him would have fancied he was sixty-five at least - so broke down was he with hard work and drinking. But no coal whipper lives to an old age: they all die off at about forty-old men in the wery prime of life….
….He doesn't get paid for his labour in a proper way. Wapping swarms with low public-houses, the landlords of which act as middle-men between the owners of the colliers and the men that a hired to unload 'em. A coal whipper can't get employment direct from the captain of the collier: the working of the collier is farmed by them landlords I speak of; and the whipper must apply at their houses. Those whippers as drinks the most always gets employment first; and whether a whipper chooses to drink beer or not, it's always sent three times a-day on board the colliers for the gangs. And, my eye! what stuff it is! Often and often have we throwed it away, 'cos we could'nt possibly drink it - and it must be queer liquor that a coal whipper won't drink!
Well, I used to earn from fifteen to eighteen shillings a-week; and out of that, eight was always stopped for the beer; and if I didn't spend another or two on Saturday night when I received the balance, the landlord set me down as a stingy feller and put a cross agin my name in his book….
….not give me any more work till he was either forced to do so for want of hands, or I made it up with him by standing a crown bowl of punch. So what with one thing and another, I had to keep myself, my wife, and three children, on about seven or eight shillings a-week - after working from light to dark."
Tough times!
Our ancestor was Mark Starling  (1827 - 1894) who stopped working as a coal whipper and lived on into his seventies, although unfortunately he eventually died in the workhouse.

Did your ancestor leave a will and is it recorded at the Probate Office? If so you'll no doubt want to know how much cash your ancestor left to their nearest and dearest in today's money. This is where the National Archives Currency Convertor comes in. Select the amount of cash and the year you're interested in. Click enter and, hey presto, the National Archives will tell you what the purchasing power of your ancestors legacy would be today. Or you can enter the amount you received for pocket money or your paper round and see what you'd be able to buy today. Probably more then than now!

If your ancestor left a Last Will and Testament there's a good chance it will have been registered by a solicitor or the executors with the government Probate Office. These records are included in the subscription to Ancestry but are easily searchable for free as well. Just go to the UK government website and fill out surname of the deceased and the year of death. If you wish to order the whole Will there's the possibility of getting it as PDF for a fee. I've paid for several Wills but haven't found them to offer a great deal of additional information to what is in the public record.

If you find that one of your ancestors has a rather obscure nickname this ​List of Traditional Nicknames in Historic Documents could be helpful.
Scanning the list, these caught my eye.
Babe = Mary (or used as a name for the baby of the family)
Butch = (Butch is a common nickname used to separate "Sr" from "Jr" mainly in cultures with German backgrounds. Typically the father (Sr) goes by his first name, while the son (Jr) will be referred to as "Butch" by family and friends.)
Doc = name given to 7th child
Heinz = Heinrich
Iggy = Ignatius
Kissy = Calista
Kit = Christopher
Mimi = Wilhelmina
Norm = Norman
Rita = Margaret
Sadie = Sarah
Telly = Aristotle
And it occurs to me that the list might also be useful for fiction writers looking for something slightly unusual for their characters.

If you think your ancestor might have been involved in a railway accident there may be some information at the Railway Archives website.
In 1947, my mother kept a diary and one day she recorded: “Mr Eaton was killed today on the Railway”. Her father worked on the railway so Mr Eaton’s death must have been particularly significant. The Railways Archive website has 32 accidents listed for 1947 but none of them seem as though they would have involved the Mr. Eaton mentioned in Doreen's diary. Further scrutiny of the accidents recorded for 1947 show there were a staggering 111 fatalities and over 800 injuries. The worst accidents of 1947 were at Gidea Park (7 fatalities and 45 injured); Doncaster (18 fatalities and 118 injured); Burton Agnes (12 fatalities and 32 injured); South Croydon (32 fatalities and 183 injured); and Goswick (28 fatalities and 90 injured).
The causes of these terrible railway disasters were:
Goswick: excessive speed and human error resulting in derailment and the train splitting
South Croydon: signaller error resulting in derailment
Burton Agnes: collision with a road vehicle
Doncaster: signaller error resulting in rear collision and derailment
Gidea Park: fog, excessive speed and human error resulting in rear collision and derailment.
Reading these appalling statistics made me re-appraise what might have happened to Mr Eaton. I'd assumed he'd been killed while working for the Railway: now I'm not so sure.
Interestingly, sixty years later, in 2007, 54 accidents were reported on the railway in which there were 6 fatalities (5 were caused by collision with a road vehicle) and in the majority of cases there were no injuries at all.
The Railways Archive is easily and freely searchable and might provide you with interesting background for your family's story.

Probably most family history researchers have found one or more of their ancestors ending their days in the workhouse. To find out more about life in the workhouse then a visit to The Workhouse - the story of an institution is a must.
It's a massive website filled with information about every conceivable aspect of workhouse life but I've found that the most useful part is the directory of workhouse addresses with links to the pages of individual workhouses.
This is the link to the directory part of the site: ​http://www.workhouses.org.uk/addresses/​then just use the A-Z to search for the town you want and click its link.

If you're researching London ancestors, this website is very interesting and useful for expanding your family story.
Charles James Booth (1840-1916) was an English philanthropist and social researcher. He is most renowned for his innovative work documenting working class life in London at the end of the 19th century. You might have seen the BBC2 series The Secret History of Our Streets which referred to the Charles Booth Poverty Maps throughout the series.
This link will take you to The Poverty Maps and they are fascinating.
The population is categorised from the lowest class (Vicious, semi-criminal) through Poor (18s to 21s a week for a moderate family) to the top of the scale Upper middle and Upper (Wealthy). Click on "Legend" on the left of the map to see the categories in more detail and to understand the colour coding of the streets and their associated poverty levels.
You can zoom in and out of the map and if you're interested in particular streets then use the search box top left.
And not to mention the notebooks! You could spend weeks reading these fascinating documents.
Some of our London ancestors lived in the St-George-in-the-East, Watney Street, Commercial Road area of the East End which is categorised variously from "Lowest class. Vicious, Semi criminal" to "Fairly comfortable. Good ordinary earnings".
From about 1910 to 1940, Michael's mother, Rose Murray, lived with her parents and sister in Planet Street in the centre of this zone. In the nineteenth century, Planet Street was known as Star Street and there was a pub of that name in the vicinity.
In 1898 when Charles Booth visited Star Street as part of his mapping exercise he categorised the street as "Very poor. Casual. Chronic want" so life in Star Street was tough.
Later on, life in Planet Street was still tough.
Rose used to tell this tale from the late 1920s:
I'd gone out dancing with some friends and we'd met some boys who walked us home. At the top of Planet Street, my friend Phoebe said to the boys, "Come and have a drink with us at home."
One of these boys said, "What in Hammer and Chopper Street? No thanks. Good Night," and off they went.
Despite it's apparent reputation, Rose always had fond memories of the time she lived in Planet Street.
If you've ancestors who lived in London during the Victorian era, Charles Booth's London is a gold mine of information.

​Hansard is the edited verbatim report of the proceedings of both the House of Commons and the House of Lords in the British Parliament. It is a fantastic resource for adding detail to your family story. When I was researching the background to I Think I Prefer the Tinned Variety: The Diary of a Petty Officer in the Fleet Air Arm during World War II I was trying to find out about the Mobile Naval Air Bases (MONABs) that were set up to provide back-up for the British Pacific Fleet in 1945 and I found a fascinating reference in Hansard.
I also found a report in Hansard about a school that features in my family story which was most interesting.
Go to the Historic Hansard search page and enter the person or place you're interested in. You'll go to a page where you can narrow your search down or follow up on some of the suggestions. Well worth a visit!

You might also enjoy a 1930s trip down on the farm

​or a visit to Southport in 1908.

If you enjoy solving mysteries you might want to try "A Single To Filey" by Michael Murray.
​Click here to read a free sample.
​Fans of DCI Tony Forward will be pleased to know that a second novel is underway. Drop us a message via our Contact Page and we'll keep you informed about developments. We won't send you any Spam, tinned or electronic.

​Inside the rather drab cover of this book of Christmas music is an inscription which prompted a fascinating Family History inquiry.
The inscription reads:
To Norman
Christmas 1935
From Auntie Ivy
 Norman is my dad and by Christmas 1935 he was almost twelve years old.

 My father's parents had several siblings who were all my dad's aunts and uncles:
George, Frances, Agnes, Albert, Sarah, Dorothy, Charley, Edith, Ann, John, Ethel and Beatrice.
But no Ivy!

She's taken a bit of tracking down but I think Ivy is actually my dad's cousin.
Norman's aunt Agnes Buckle (1880 - 1968) married James Watson in 1898.
The 1901 Census records Agnes and James visiting her father, John Henry Buckle (Norman's grandfather), and his second wife, Ellen, at their home in Royston, South Yorkshire.
With them was their two year old daughter, Ivy.
The 1911 Census records the Watsons living in Barnsley and James' occupation is shown as a pianist.
James' twenty two years old brother, Albert, is living with them and he is also a pianist.
My dad, Norman, was born in 1924 so his cousin Ivy was in her mid thirties when she gave him the music book.
It's highly likely she was known as Auntie Ivy and I think this solves the mystery. 

A Google search for the Watson brothers has identified an Albert Watson (1888 - 1968) as a well known pianist and composer of the 1920s and 30s.
He lived in  Pontefract and Sheffield, was a self-taught musician and was very popular as a cinema pianist.
The YouTube video below is a modern day performance of one of Albert Watson's compositions.

​There's a full account of Albert Watson's life on this website if you scroll down to the bottom of the page.
It's been written by his grandaughter but she doesn't mention that Albert had a brother who was also a pianist.
She does write that Albert was born in Harthill. 
And Harthill is where Agnes and her parents (my great grandparents) were born too. So I'm feeling confident that the famous Albert Watson was James' brother and  Ivy's uncle. 
This leads me to conclude that James could have been a cinema pianist too and this musical background probably explains why Auntie Ivy was so supportive of my dad's learning to play the piano.

Norman became a highly competent pianist managing to accompany Beethoven violin sonatas performed by his friend.
He encouraged me to learn to play the piano when I was a child.
I had a lovely piano teacher called Miss Heaps whom I wrote about in Cabbage and Semolina but I stopped having lessons when I was about fifteen.
In retirement I've started practicing the piano again and keep acquiring more music.
I had a yen to play Jerome Kern tunes and ordered this out-of-print selection from an Amazon second hand dealer.

​ I don't know who Vera and Eric are but I thought this inscription in the top left corner of the cover page was very poignant.

Imagine how Vera and Eric must have been feeling at Christmas 1945.
World War II was barely over;
they were probably still suffering from bereavement and trauma;
rationing had continued
and yet they were once again living in peace.
​I hope they had a really wonderful Christmas and enjoyed singing along to someone playing their Jerome Kern songs.

We decorated our Christmas tree a couple of nights ago and as usual put my childhood fairy doll on the top.
I don't know exactly when she was bought but I can't remember a Christmas without her.
 We must have had her before 1958 because that was the year my sister and I were given our first vinyl dolls.
I was seven and my sister was five years old.
The Christmas tree fairy doll is made out of what we used to call "pot" and we noticed the difference to the vinyl dolls.
The fairy doll's hair is just moulded onto her head but the new vinyl dolls had "real hair" which was rooted through pin-holes in the head and could be washed and combed.
The arms of the fairy doll are jointed with elastic bands and her legs don't move at all.
The new vinyl dolls had fully jointed arms and legs which didn't fall off like the pot dolls did.
What a lot of our family history the fairy doll has witnessed.
She was looking down from her perch when we got our new baby sister just in time for Christmas in the early sixties.
She must have noticed when Michael (my husband-to-be) made his first visit to my family home just after Christmas in 1974.
No doubt she joined us in our tears when we found out mum's cancer had returned one Christmas at the start of the eighties.
And a few years later she'd have enjoyed the laughter and excitement when I stuck her on the top of the tree at the village school where I had my first headship.
She came with us to each of our new homes and has seen Tom, Toby and Caleb come and go.
​And now she's up on the top of this year's tree waiting for the festivities to begin.

For years the fairy doll spent the months between each Christmas packed away with the rest of the Christmas decorations in an old leather suitcase that had belonged to my dad.
His mother gave it to him when he volunteered for the Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm during World War Two. He packed his stuff into it when he went off for his initial training at HMS Royal Arthur.
Once he was enrolled, he got a Royal Navy kit-bag but he kept the suitcase anyway.
Throughout childhood the suitcase accompanied us on our annual summer holidays and our first family trip to London.
​Even empty it was really heavy but that was the style for luggage in those days. Eventually the leather handle broke and attempts to repair it with string always ended up in disaster so the suitcase was relegated to becoming a storage box in the loft.
A couple of years ago, the leather developed a strange, greeny-grey mildew. I don't know what caused the mildew but it didn't look very healthy. So, I photographed the suitcase for posterity and dumped it.

 Saturday 1st January 1944
"Rang in the New Year well and truly on the ship’s bell.
Nearly all the officers and ratings were in various stages of inebriation.
The first lieutenant vainly trying to drink someone’s health from a bottle with the top still on.
Foul taste in mouth this morning due to excess of port wine."
That's what my dad (Norman Buckle) wrote in his diary on New Year's Day 1944.
He was stationed at H.M.S. Spurwing, the Royal Navy Air Base at Hastings, near Freetown in Sierra Leone, West Africa. He was nineteen years old.

​This photo was in Norman's collection and it looks like it could have been the New Year's Eve celebrations. Looks like it was a fun night!
Considering that high temperatures and humidity made a posting to Freetown very unpopular with services personnel they look like they're making the best of it! 
Freetown was surrounded by malarial mangrove swamps and the humidity was so high that if a pair of shoes was lost underneath a bed, in a week the shoes would be covered with mildew.
Norman was a Radio Mechanic in the Fleet Air Arm who'd joined up in August 1942. He'd been sent on various training courses before being shipped out to West Africa in October 1943.

By that stage in World War II, Freetown had become a significant place in the war effort.
Freetown was (and remains) the capital and largest city of Sierra Leone.
It had the third largest natural harbour in the world. 
During World War II, Freetown was crucial in the convoy route from Britain to South Africa, India and Australia.
The base served a total of thirty two different convoy routes. It was home to large warships of the Royal Navy, destroyer escorts and submarines. The ocean off the West Coast of Africa was a hunting ground for German submarines.
Hastings was fifteen miles east of Freetown and an aerodrome had been constructed there from which Fleet Air Arm planes operated. 
710 Squadron was formed in August 1939 as a seaplane squadron searching for U boats attacking convoys and commercial shipping. Later, 777 Squadron was formed at Hastings on 1st August 1941 as a fleet requirements unit. It had a small number of Swordfish aircraft to which Defiants and Walruses were added in 1942. Throughout 1943 the squadron was responsible for the air defence of Sierra Leone.
H.M.S. Spurwing was a shore base which had been hacked out of the bush at Hastings, near Freetown. 
It was commissioned in March 1943 and had capacity for eighty four aircraft. 
​According to his service record, Norman's job at H.M.S. Spurwing was A.S.U. (Aircraft Storage Unit) Maintenance.
Later in his diary Norman recorded:
"Incidentally, Spurwing has two functions – a squadron for anti-submarine work, and a storage depot for naval aircraft; so that a carrier coming in with its planes shot up, can remain in Freetown and be completely refitted from Spurwing."
When I was researching the background to my dad's diary I found out that the Radio Mechanic's job was to remove the aircraft's heavy radio set for testing and repair and then after re-placing the radio set in the aircraft go on a test flight to check the radio was working properly.
In April 1944, Norman recorded:
"Went in H.S. 599 on Radar test with Dick doing a W/T [Wireless Telegraphy] test at the same time.
Felt some nasty quakes when the pilot went into a corkscrew dive over the harbour but otherwise unimportant. Pleased to write that I am no longer troubled by air sickness."

This photograph is the Radio Section of H.M.S. Spurwing. 
Norman wrote the names of the men in his photo book:
Back Row: J. Ridgway, A. Jones, N. Buckle, C. Perry, W. Rowlands
Front Row: F. Knowlden, G Quick, S/Ldr Munby, D. Bell, A Hutchinson.
I don't know what happened to them.
As I explained in the introduction to I Think I Prefer the Tinned Variety, Norman never really talked about his war-time experiences.
​When we were young my sisters and I were never very interested in what he'd been doing what seemed like years before. By the time we were interested our dad was no longer around to answer our questions. His diary is all that remains to tell us about that period in his life when he left a coal mining village in South Yorkshire to live and work for over a year in equatorial Africa.
By the end of 1944, Norman was back home again but it wasn't long before he was sent off on his next voyage - to a tiny island in the Pacific Ocean as part of the British Pacific Fleet.

You might also like to find out about some family history treasure that was almost lost forever.

​Or meet my ancestor William Buckle who emigrated to Australia in 1842.

If you enjoy solving mysteries you might want to try "A Single To Filey" by Michael Murray.
​Click here to read a free sample.
​Fans of DCI Tony Forward will be pleased to know that a second novel is underway. Drop us a message via the form below and we'll keep you informed about developments. We won't send you any Spam, tinned or electronic.

​The girl in the front row of this photo is holding a board with the words. "Royston N. School" written on it.
N. School stands for National School and I would guess the photo was taken early in the 20th century.
Why is the image in my family history photo box? Perhaps one of my ancestors could be one of these children. I really don't know. But I do know the teacher isn't on my family tree.
I found a really interesting story in Hansard (the record of the proceedings of the British Parliament) about the National School in Royston. 

In 1907, a new Headmaster was to be appointed and at the interview the school managers were divided equally in favour of two candidates: Mr Milnes and Mr Gardam. The Chairman of the managers, the local vicar, came out in favour of Mr Milnes. The supporters of the other candidate appealed to the local education authority, the West Riding County Council, who turned down Mr Milnes. The case became increasingly controversial and ended up with a full-blown debate in the House of Lords. You can read the transcript at the Hansard Archives.​

​So far I haven't managed to find out who was appointed as the new Headmaster.
Local Education Authorities (LEA) were created after the 1902 Education Act. The Royston case typifies the power struggles that occurred between the new LEAs and the existing individual school boards.
However the unofficial reason why Mr Milnes was the preferred candidate was that he was a married man while Mr Gardam was a bachelor and all the teachers were women! Clearly some members of the school board thought that heads might be turned by Mr Gardam. I might add that an attitude like that was still not uncommon in the 1970s when I commenced my teaching career! 

Meanwhile, you might not know where Royston is. It's a former coal mining village in South Yorkshire situated between Wakefield and Barnsley.
In the mid twentieth century when I was born all my immediate ancestors lived at Royston.  My father's side of the family were employed in coal mining for decades. In the 1911 census my grandfather (Sidney Henry Buckle), great grandfather (John Henry Buckle) and great great grandfather (Christopher Buckle) were all working down the pit at Royston. In fact, John Henry was the under-manager and he'd managed to get jobs there for all his male relatives.

Against the wall you can just make out a board with "Infant School Royston" written on it. I think that the young assistant teacher standing at the back on the right might be Annie Smith. She was my grandmother's sister and I know that she was a school teacher. She looks as though she's got curly hair which is typical in my family and her face shape resembles other known ancestors. It's so frustrating when you have photographs which are fascinating but you're not sure who the people are. Everyone who knew about the photographs has died long since and there is no way now to be completely sure. I've gone through all my own photographs and stuck labels on enough of them so that anyone interested in years to come will know who we all are. I would guess that this photograph is from the same era as the previous one. Looking at the size of the class, hopefully both the women were teaching it or they've doubled up two classes together for the photo.

My grandmother was Elsie Buckle nee Smith (1885 - 1952). One of her sisters was Annie Wray nee Smith (1881 - 1926). The 1911 census records Annie's occupation as an assistant schoolteacher.  You can imagine my amazement when I was contacted by a reader of one of my earlier family history blogs to tell me she also had an ancestor who taught in Royston, South Yorkshire. And she had some photos which she was prepared to share.
A few days later she emailed copies of the photos and they are a truly wonderful record of her own grandmother from schooldays to retirement. 
Amongst the photos was this one from 1914:

​And on the reverse are the names of some of the people in the photo. (I've obscured a more recent annotation to protect privacy.)

​So now I've got an authenticated image of my great aunt Annie! In my experience it's rare for old photos to be annotated with names; and even more rare for the annotations to include additional details. So, I think this photo is really special. After peering closely at the reverse of the photo however, I've been unable to identify the male teachers and whether either of them is Mr Milnes or Mr Gardham.
Countless thanks to Jackie who so generously shared her grandmother's photos with me. 

I found another fascinating entry in Hansard related to teachers. In 1913, an MP asked the President of the Board of Education if he is aware that the majority of the women teachers in the elementary schools wanted to have the option of retiring with a suitable pension at an earlier age than sixty-five. He said that many had commenced class teaching at  fifteen to twenty years old. They were now upwards of fifty years old and had become conscious of their inability, through physical or mental weakness, to perform their work in the most efficient manner. Yet they were unable to claim a breakdown allowance, not being medically certified as permanently incapable owing to infirmity of mind and body. He asked whether, in fairness to these women and in the interests of the efficiency of their schools, the President of the Board of Education would consider the advisability of inaugurating a system of earlier optional retirement for women teachers? The answer wasn't encouraging but somewhere along the line they did bring in retirement at sixty. I think nowadays it's been taken back up to sixty eight years. Don't we learn anything from history?

​Poor old Annie wouldn't have had the option of early retirement; she died in 1926 aged 45 years.
​Her "In Memorium" in the  Royston church magazine shows that Annie was held in very high regard in the community.

The "Mrs Smith" referred to above is Ann's mother, Eliza Ann Smith nee Hall, who outlived her daughter by several years. 

In a completely different era, this photograph is from the 1930's.
It's the Speech Day at Normanton High School for Girls where my mum (Doreen Buckle) was a pupil from 1938 onwards.
I've enlarged this image on several occasions to such an extent it was just a mass of dots, trying to work out which girl is Doreen. I decided she was on the right hand side, two rows from the front, three girls in from the end.
Normanton was a few miles away from Royston but it was where children had to go if they passed their 11+ exam and wanted to have a grammar school education. Although there were no school fees to pay by that time, the cost of uniform and equipment was often prohibitive and lots of children who were academically suitable for a grammar school education didn't get it because their family couldn't afford the expense.
​Doreen was able to go to the High School at Normanton because she had two aunts who were both unmarried and childless and who agreed to help with the costs.

There's a nice photo of Normanton High School for Girls on this website. Doreen left the school in 1943 and went to work as a trainee librarian with the West Riding County Council.
A few years earlier, my dad also passed his 11+ and attended Normanton Grammar School for Boys. 

​​Norman left school in 1940 and went to work in an office. There's a contribution from Norman In his school magazine for the Summer Term 1940.

Few of us will be going away for holidays this year for we carry out the "Go to It" slogan. We shall smell the Chemical Works rather than that "honest, seafaring smell compounded of tar, rope and fish, known to the educated as ozone" - (W.W. Jacobs)
 
We all know that intense feeling of satisfaction we have when we walk along the sea-front for the first time after twelve months and see Mr Spaghetti with his ice-cream in the usual place. If we were to go this year I'm afraid we should not see him as a friend but should miss him as an internee. Is "Punch and Judy" still there and does the conjuror still push swords through the lady in the cabinet?
 
We dream of nights with velvet skies, with a bright moon, thousands of twinkling stars, a low wind rustling the leaves, the rumble of the surf and a …….but never mind, let's leave it.
 
We remember the colossal suppers eaten in the ultra-modern restaurants which serve anything from a milk-shake to a four course dinner (including cheese and biscuits and all for 2/6!); the amusement arcades with their rows of 'Penny-in-the-Slot' machines; the crowds of people on the beach, including very stout ladies dressed in bathing costumes; the motion-picture machines, with very alluring pictures, around which crowds of weedy looking youths congregate; and of course we remember the old salt sitting in his boat, chewing thick twist and sending spurts of tobacco juice into the atmosphere with mechanical precision. But there will be no preparing to return home; no buying of presents; no pushing of dirty shirts and socks into a suitcase, and no feeling of sadness as the train steams out of the station carrying us home.
 
This year all will be changed "and they will beat their fishing rods into hayforks and their bathing costumes into farmers' smocks." Let us hope that next year we may return again to the seaside to pay one shilling to see Hitler in a glass case, fasting to death for a wager of five pounds.
 
[The "Go to It" slogan described those who were involved in the war effort on the home front.]
 
[The W.W. Jacobs quote is from a book titled "At Sunwich Port" written in 1902.]
 
Norman volunteered to join the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy in October 1942 and, after training, became a Radio Mechanic. He was sent to a naval air base in Sierra Leone and later to a tiny island in the Pacific Ocean as part of the British Pacific Fleet. When he returned from the war, one of the first things he did was to go on holiday: to Butlin's at Primrose Valley, Filey, Yorkshire. Check out this page for more about Norman's wartime experiences.

E.R Braithwaite was my teacher at Chapman Street Junior Mixed and Infant School in the East End of London. I don't think many people are aware that before Braithwaite taught at the East End secondary modern school on which 'To Sir, with Love' was based he'd already been a teacher in the East End for some years. And that's how in 1956, when I was nine years old, I was fortunate to become one of his pupils.

As a teacher he was simply inspirational: by which I mean that my young life would have been so much the poorer if he hadn't been in it. I vividly recall him reading aloud in class extracts from the short stories he'd written about his boyhood in Guyana. From these we learned that his name was "Ricky", because that's what his mother called him in the stories. This was extraordinary: in those days primary pupils never got to discover their teachers' first name. Mr Braithwaite read beautifully. His voice seemed deep and cultured and contained a few unfamiliar but attractive vowel sounds. It was also curiously resonant and his sentences seemed to hang suspended in the air well after he'd finished speaking. It was a most distinctive voice and if I close my eyes now, even after all these years, I can still hear it.

On another occasion, in 1957, I remember Mr Braithwaite gathering the whole class around his desk and excitedly informing us that this was a momentous day because the Gold Coast had achieved independence and was henceforward to be known as Ghana. I recall him showing us where the Gold Coast was on the world globe which every classroom had in those days. The happiness and delight on his face made a deep impression on me.

Mr Braithwaite encouraged us to write. He set a literary competition with the prize of a book token for the best essay. I won the prize with my piece about a film I'd seen which was set in Venice. I never traded the token in for a book because it was my most prized possession and I never wanted to relinquish it. Unfortunately, I lost the token, which disappeared when we moved home in 1960. I also recall Mr Braithwaite telling my mother that I would never be a mathematician but I could become a writer.

Mr Braithwaite was a strikingly handsome man (my single parent mother was always saying how incredibly good looking he was). He dressed immaculately in beautiful dark suits, crisp white shirts and lovely silk ties. He illuminated the drab world of our 1950s primary classroom with the technicolour charisma of his arresting presence. He was the first real star I ever met, even before he became famous.

His shiny black shoes always fascinated me; they were so unusual. I craved a pair and dragged my mother round all the shoe shops in Watney Street market and Whitechapel but could never find a pair of shoes like his. Of course, I hadn't the courage to ask him where he bought them.

E.R also encouraged my secretly nursed ambition to become an actor. I remember coming into school one day and he pressed a book of poems into my hand and told me that I'd be reading one of the poems in assembly. The poem was 'Leisure' by W.H. Davies, and despite my initial nervousness, reciting it to what in those days seemed to be a massive audience did wonders for my self-confidence. E.R also gave me a substantial role in the group recitation of Longfellow's 'Hiawatha' which was presented as a piece of choral speaking on Speech Day. Unfortunately, the parents were not appreciative of Longfellow's extremely long, epic poem, and there was much fidgeting, talking and restlessness in the audience by the time we'd got half way through. Visibly annoyed, E.R. stepped forward, snapped his fingers at the choral speakers and ushered us all off stage.
​
In 1959, when I was at secondary school, I became aware that Braithwaite had published 'To Sir, with Love'. I acquired a copy and was amazed to find that it reproduced vividly life in the East End as I knew it. The Commercial Road and other places familiar to me had been recreated in an altogether different ontology - within the pages of a book: and it was thrilling to know that I had actually been taught by the man who had written this amazing work.

Eustace Edward Ricardo Braithwaite died in 2016. This remarkable teacher, social worker, diplomat, academic and writer was 104 years old.

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​The story of my great, great Uncle William Buckle who emigrated to Australia in 1842.

An invitation to an Ashworth family wedding in Lancashire in the 1930s.

If you enjoy solving mysteries you might want to try "A Single To Filey" by Michael Murray.
​Click here to read a free sample.
​Fans of DCI Tony Forward will be pleased to know that a second novel is underway. Drop us a message via the form below and we'll keep you informed about developments. We won't send you any Spam, tinned or electronic.

This is another lovely image from the box of old photos found in the loft.
WHO?
My grandmother (Minnie Ashworth) is with her three children, Doreen, Jack and Sylvia.
WHEN?
My mum is the little girl on the left. She was born in 1927 and her baby sister in 1932.
So I'm sure the photo was taken in 1932.
WHERE?
My only surviving elderly relative recognised her Uncle Fred and his family in some of the other photos in the box.
​The 1939 Register records a Fred Ashworth employed as a Dairy Farm Foreman and living at Pool Crooks Cottage, Wharfedale Rural District, Yorkshire.
Many years ago my mother used to occasionally reminisce about childhood visits to her uncle and his family who lived on a farm in Pool near Otley.
The Pool-in-Wharfedale A Journey Back in Time website identifies a Pool Crooks Farm from 1646 and some of the buildings are still in existence today. 
I am confident that this beautifully rustic photo of my grandmother in the hay with her children dates from 1932 and speculate that it was taken at Pool Crooks Farm, Wharfedale. 

My grandmother doesn't look too happy sitting in the hay. But that's understandable as she wasn't by any stretch of the imagination a country girl. 
​Before she married my grandad (Horace Ashworth) in 1927 she lived in the centre of Wakefield (Yorkshire) and worked in a shop. I don't think that life on a farm would have suited her at all!

This is Minnie with Fred's wife, Edith. 
Fred and Edith were married in Normanton in 1928. Fred was a farm labourer working at Nunnery Farm, Arthington at the time of his wedding. Edith lived in Normanton where most of the rest of Fred's family also lived. (Nunnery Farm appears to be just a few miles away from Pool Crooks Farm.) By 1932, Fred and Edith had two children, Kathleen and Dennis.
So in this photo, Minnie aged 26 years and Edith, a couple of years older, had five children between them all under five years. I can't imagine the visit was much of a holiday for either of the women.

​Minnie was the third child of Thomas and Harriett Barratt. She was born on 12th November 1906 at 120, Brickhouse Lane, West Bromwich in Staffordshire. Her father, Thomas Barratt, was employed as a haulier. 

By the time of the 1911 census Thomas was working as a labourer and there were five children in the family. They continued to live in West Bromwich but by 1914 the family had re-located to Wakefield in Yorkshire and Thomas had become a coal miner. They lived at 28, Picadilly, Westgate in Wakefield.

Minnie was employed as a shop-girl and at the time of her wedding in 1927 she was still living in the family home. This was now 38, Picadilly and her father was once again working as a labourer. Minnie had nine siblings: Sarah (1902 - 1996) and Thomas (1904 - 1953) were older. The younger ones were: Edith (1909 - 1966); Annie (1911 - 1913); John (1914 - 1914); Mary (1915 - 1987); Celia (1919 - 2006); Edmund (1921 - 1966); Dorothy (1923 - 1941).

Horace was the youngest child of John Thomas and Emma Jane Ashworth. He was born on 20th January 1905 at 27, Scotland Road, Nelson in Lancashire. His father, John Thomas Ashworth, was employed as a Master Butcher.

By the time of the 1911 census John Thomas was employed as a Butcher's Manager for the River Plate Meat Company and had re-located to Normanton near Wakefield in Yorkshire. There were six children in the family and they lived at 12, Altofts Road, Normanton.

Horace worked on the railways and by 1927 had progressed as far as becoming a Railway Fireman.
It can only have helped Horace that his older brother Arthur had been working on the railways since Horace was a schoolboy.

At the time of the wedding, Horace still lived in the family home at 12, Altofts Road but his father was by then employed as a night watchman. Horace had five siblings: Richard (1894 - 1969), Arthur (1896 - 1970), Frank (1898 - 1970), Tom (1901 - 1952) and Fred (1903 - 1952).

Fred was the only one of my grandad's brothers to work in agriculture. Arthur, Frank, Tom and Horace were all employed driving steam trains while Richard was a colliery worker. But there was precedent for working in agriculture as their grandad, Richard Ashworth (1839 - 1924) was a small scale farmer near Bacup in Lancashire. At first Richard worked on his parents' 20 acre farm but by 1881, Richard was farming 26 acres for himself. He continued to farm throughout his life becoming a dairy farmer at Holmes Barn Farm in his later years. He was still farming in 1911 aged 71 years and his youngest daughter, Alice, was employed at the farm as the dairymaid.

Richard was known as Dicky and was one of several farmers in the locality  who went around the streets with their horses and milk floats, selling milk to householders. It was usual to carry at least two x 12 gallon cans on the float and the farmer filled smaller containers for those who wanted to buy a jug of milk. There's a photo at the end of this blog post taken at Holmes Barn Farm in 1908 of all Richard's descendants including Fred Ashworth, so perhaps that's where Fred decided that he would follow in his grandfather's footsteps and work in dairy farming.

There's no way of knowing how many times Horace and Minnie visited Fred on the farm. Maybe this was their only visit making these photos family history gold! 

The marriage between Horace and Minnie took place on July 2nd 1927 at Wakefield Cathedral. This seems to be a wonderfully grand venue but presumably the cathedral was the parish church for the area of Wakefield where Minnie's family lived.

After they were married Minnie and Horace set up home together at 33, Favell Avenue, Normanton near Wakefield. Five months later their first child, Doreen, was born.

By 1933 Horace and Minnie had re-located to Cross Lane in Royston, near Barnsley, Yorkshire. Minnie and Horace had two more children and Horace reached the pinnacle of his career and became a railway engine driver.

Minnie and Horace lived at Cross Lane for nearly fifty years before moving into sheltered housing nearby where they celebrated their Golden Wedding.

In the box of old photos found in a loft were more images from the farm visit by Minnie, Horace and their young family. 

This last photo rather looks as though the visit is over and they're going home.
​Is that a look of relief on Minnie's face?

If you enjoy solving mysteries you might want to try "A Single To Filey" by Michael Murray.
​Click here to read a free sample.
​Fans of DCI Tony Forward will be pleased to know that a second novel is underway. Drop us a message via the form below and we'll keep you informed about developments. We won't send you any Spam, tinned or electronic.

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned a box of old photos that were almost lost forever.
​At the bottom of the box was a newspaper clipping from 1938.
The clipping is a report of the marriage between my grandfather’s brother, Tom Ashworth, and Miss May Pickup.
The newspaper is The Rossendale E??? but I haven’t been able to find the full title.
The date is on the reverse of the clipping: June 18 1938.
The newspaper clipping is rather faded and crumpled but it’s still legible and I've been able to transcribe it.

A pretty wedding took place at Whitewell Bottom Methodist Church on Saturday morning. The bride was Miss May Pickup of 16 Woodlea Road, Waterfoot and the bridegroom Mr Tom Ashworth, third son of Mrs and the late Mr J.T. Ashworth of Altofts Rd, Normanton.
The bride, who was given away by her father, was attired in a two piece suit of ice blue crepe, with hat and shoes in navy and a spray of red roses.

Her attendants, Miss Edith Pickup (sister) and Mrs Ronald O’Hara (friend) were in two piece suits of yacht blue silk crepe with navy hats and shoes and sprays of sweet peas. They carried handbags, the gift of the bridegroom.
Mr James Cooper (cousin of the bridegroom) discharged the duties of bestman and those of groomsman were undertaken by Messrs William Gardiner (cousin of the bride) and Mr Sydney Hardman (brother in law of the bride).

The Rev D.R Dugard performed the ceremony and Mr James Whitehead (brother in law of the bride) played suitable music at the organ. The hymns “Lead us, heavenly Father” and “The voice that breathed o’er Eden” were sung during the service. As the bridal party were leaving the church the bride received a horseshoe from a friend.
Lunch followed at the Station Cafe, Waterfoot, after which the newly married pair left for their honeymoon, which is being spent at Blackpool and the guests had a motor coach trip to Southport.
Mr and Mrs Ashworth who are to take up residence at “Ashdene”, Ashfield Rd, Normanton were the recipients of many gifts including a cake stand from the bride’s Sunday School class at Whitewell Bottom Methodist and a mirror and rug from the choir. The bridegroom’s gift to the bride was a dressing table set and she gave him a travelling case.
Mr R.H. Ormerod of Crescent Garage, Waterford supplied the wedding taxis.

I think you'll agree that the photos of the wedding are charming and the detailed account in the local newspaper makes for a great family history story.
​The wedding was held at Whitewell Bottom Methodist Church.
Whitewell Bottom is situated between Bacup and Rawtenstall in Lancashire. 

The 1939 Register records Tom and May living at 10, Ashfield Street in Normanton. Tom was employed as a locomotive fireman and May ran the household. Their only child, a daughter Edith, was born in 1940. 

​Family anecdote tells that Tom and May relocated to Buxton in Derbyshire where Tom died in 1952 and May in 1964.
Edith qualified as a nurse and after her mother died, she emigrated to Australia.
​This photo of Edith was in my mum's photo collection but apart from a name, there are no more details. 

My mother kept in touch with her cousin Edith for a while after she left the UK but that eventually fizzled out and like so many family stories, that's as far as I can go. ​​

In our family history photo collection are some more photos which seem like 1930s weddings.
​My dad is the tall young man standing behind the groom in this photo but no idea at all who anyone else might be. My dad, Norman Buckle, was born in 1924 so probably late 1930s.

I don't know who anyone is in this photo but still maybe 1930s?

Don't know who this happy couple is but possibly 1940s?

And I think, looking at the suits, this wedding might be 1940s too. But I really don't know. Suggestions on a postcard please!

This is another 1930s wedding in Bacup, Lancashire.
The bride is my grandad's cousin Eva Ashworth.
The wedding is in 1938 and Eva has married Albert Howarth.

You might also like this story of some hidden photos.

Or perhaps a visit to Southport in 1908?

If you enjoy solving mysteries you might want to try "A Single To Filey" by Michael Murray.
​Click here to read a free sample.
​Fans of DCI Tony Forward will be pleased to know that a second novel is underway. Drop us a message via the form below and we'll keep you informed about developments. We won't send you any Spam, tinned or electronic.

This is the transcript of an interview I gave to an on-line magazine (now closed down) about I Think I Prefer the Tinned Variety: The Diary of a Petty Officer in the Fleet Air Arm during World War II.

The interviewer asked where the title of the book came from?

The title? Well, it was originally The Diary of a Petty Officer in the Fleet Air Arm during World War II but I thought that was too boring so I asked Michael for suggestions and he said, "Look in the book and you'll find it in there waiting for you."
So that's what I did.
Norman was brought up in a coal mining village in South Yorkshire but after his initial training he was sent to an air-base in Sierra Leone, West Africa for over a year. The diary records his daily life there. On 20th January 1944 he wrote:
"The oranges' season is now well in and the crop is excellent. Pineapples are also in and I had my first the other day. They are quite juicy but rather woody. I think I prefer the tinned variety." I thought this encapsulated the complete contrast he was experiencing in his new life in West Africa. I speculate that his preference for the tinned variety was an expression of his home-sickness.
So that's how I found the title and what Michael said was true: it was right there waiting for me. I kept the original as the sub-title so readers would know what the book was about after, hopefully, being intrigued by the title.

The interviewer suggested that it must have been emotional for me to read the diary of a young man, his hopes, dreams, desires, even his fears, knowing this young man would become my father. She asked how I coped with that and if I was able to detach myself from the personal feelings and if the relationship was an asset in interpreting the diaries?

Norman never talked about his war-time experiences. Sadly he developed cancer and died when he was fifty four. I was in my late twenties at the time so I expended huge amounts of emotion many years ago. Discovering the diary and sharing it with my sisters was wonderful. We found a side to our dad that we'd never known. Thirty years after his death we were able to talk and laugh and joke about him in a way we'd never done before.
This was my inspiration and motivation to turn the diary into an ebook.
As I studied the diary I found myself constantly questioning what he meant. You know how it can be with a diary, the entries are meaningful to the author but an unintended reader has to try and piece it together. I also realised that my knowledge of WW2 was patchy and I had to do a lot of reading to try and match his experiences with the bigger picture.
I thought long and hard, and talked with my sisters, before I made the diary public. Norman hadn't written for an audience and we tried to imagine how he would feel about it and whether he would have agreed to publication if he'd still been alive. We decided that he would have been amazed by the opportunity of Internet publishing. He was an ambitious man and took advantage of the opportunities that came his way throughout life so we think he would have been pleased.

The interviewer asked what discovery had surprised me most about my father's teenage/young adult years.

Norman was a committed Christian all his life but I didn't know until I read the diary how much his faith had meant to him when he was young. I speculate that he might have gone into the church if the war hadn't intervened and sent him to the other side of the globe. In the last months of WW2 he was stationed on a tiny, tropical island in the South Pacific as part of the British Pacific Fleet. He was there when Enola Gay was dropped on Hiroshima which must have been a traumatic experience.
When I was doing the background research I discovered that before being sent out to join the British Pacific Fleet the training had included jungle survival and hand-to-hand combat. As Norman couldn't even manage to tie his hammock properly when he was on a troop ship I don't think he would have survived very long in the jungle. Fortunately, the island he was stationed on had been prepared to accommodate service personnel by the American SeaBees (the United States Navy Construction Battalion [CB]). There was even an outdoor cinema!

The interviewer commented that Norman was very much an ordinary person, living through extra-ordinary world changing events, the basis of all great literature – only Norman's story, was of course, all true. Did I think there was a particular message for readers?
​
The book isn't about battles or heroics. I think some readers have been disappointed by this but you know thousands of young men (and also some young women) had their lives completely turned upside-down by their war-time experiences even though they weren't on the front-line. All fighting forces need their logistics and back-up in order to succeed and I hope that readers get insights into what was going on in the background during those challenging years.

And finally she asked what emotions had I hoped to inspire in my readers?
That's a very interesting question. I didn't particularly plan for any emotional impact on the audience. I just wanted to share the diary and make it more accessible by explaining the background. I wasn't able to find much information about the West Africa part of the story so I hope my dad's diary is filling a gap in historical writing. Readers I've talked to who knew my dad have expressed surprise as they had no idea where he'd been during the war years. I hope that the book will inspire empathy towards all those who played their part in WW2 even if they weren't called on to make the ultimate sacrifice. An Amazon reviewer said: "It was like listening to my old workmates when I was a callow apprentice in the early sixties some of them had a very action packed war and some just got to go places they wouldn't have seen in their lifetimes. This reminded me of those wonderful people of a marvellous generation who will go down in history as a fantastic example of what ordinary human beings can achieve given the opportunity." I liked that a lot.

I thought these were very insightful questions to ask which gave me the opportunity to reflect on the whole Tinned Variety Project. There are some more photos from my dad's war time collection on this page of our website. And you can get a flavour of the book if you click Preview below.

William Buckle 1813 – 1895 is my great, great grandfather’s older brother.
William’s parents were John and Hannah Buckle of Sinderby and Pickhill in North Yorkshire.
William was baptised in the parish church of Pickhill on 17 January 1813.

William is recorded on the 1841 census.
The record shows that William was married to Jane and had a son, Thomas, aged about one year old. William and his family lived in the village of Carlton Miniott where William was employed as an agricultural labourer. Carlton Miniott is about five miles from Pickhill.
William was married to Jane Armin on 2nd December 1837 at the parish church of St Columba’s in Topcliffe, North Yorkshire. (Topcliffe is about eight miles from Pickhill).

Jane’s parents were Thomas and Ann Armin. They lived in South Kilvington which is about ten miles from Pickhill. Thomas worked as a blacksmith.
When the marriage was registered, both William and Jane made their mark in the parish register.

Although William’s father was recorded on the marriage record he’d already died in 1836. William’s mother died a few years later in 1841.
And then something amazing happened!
Up to this point William and Jane’s lives had been experienced in a couple of villages in a radius of about ten miles. And their families and ancestors had lived in either the same villages or a few others situated within a few miles.
In 1842 William, Jane and son Thomas emigrated to Australia.
They sailed on a ship named The Royal Saxon and landed in Tasmania.

Cork Examiner – Monday 06 June 1842
Image © THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
A previous sailing of the “Royal Saxon” resulted in all the newly arrived emigrants finding work within twenty four hours. Which presumably happened for William Buckle judging by his subsequent success.

Cork Examiner – Friday 14 April 1843
Image © THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
And the standards of care for the passengers of the “Royal Saxon” seems to have been of the highest from both the captain and the surgeon on board. Even though they don’t appear to have been able to do anything for baby John Buckle who died during the voyage.

Southern Reporter and Cork Commercial Courier – Saturday 13 August 1842
Image © THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
The “Royal Saxon” was built in Liverpool in 1829. The ship carried cargo and passengers to India, Australia and the Far East.
In 1839 the “Royal Saxon” attempted to violate a Royal Navy blockade of Canton and inadvertently became the direct cause of the Battle of Chuenpi and consequently the First Opium War.

Miller [Public domain] Wikicommons
The ship escaped the blockade and continued to trade. Between 1841 and 1844 the “Royal Saxon” was used specifically to transport colonists to Australia.

Now you might think that this is a bit of a tall story but if you look at the Australian Find a Grave website you’ll see that William Buckle of North Yorkshire born in 1813 is buried in the Heywood Cemetery, Glenelg Shire, Victoria, Australia. And the memorial states that William first arrived in Tasmania in 1842 and then moved to Victoria around 1845. In 1851 he took up the pastoral run called “Rifle Ranges” in Digby and in 1857 opened the “Digby Hotel”.
The website for the Glenelg & Wannon Settlers & Settlement Portland Bay District, South-West Victoria, Australia has the full story which you can read here. It’s a fantastic account of what happened to William, Jane and Thomas. And there’s more information about the history of the “Digby Hotel here.
And an official history can be found here.
So it’s official!
My ancestors, William, Jane and Thomas Buckle emigrated to Australia in 1842.
The career of the "Royal Saxon" is believed to have ended in 1857 by which time, William Buckle owned the “Rifle Ranges Station” and had already opened the “Digby Hotel” near Digby in South West Victoria, Australia. William’s decision to take a free passage for himself and his family on the “Royal Saxon” in 1842 was certainly a good one.
William and Jane had three more surviving children after Thomas (who died in 1924).
Jane 1844 – 1918
Hannah 1846 – 1924
George 1850 – 1858.
Jane died in 1874 and her Find a Grave record is here.
It’s almost 11,000 miles from Pickhill in North Yorkshire to Tasmania.
It’s quite staggering to think that ancestors of mine were so brave as to undertake the long journey and start a new life on the other side of the world.
And fantastic to have found the story. ​

Thanks for reading my blog today. My ancestry connection to Australia continued in 1945 when my dad passed through Sidney on his Royal Navy journey to the Pacific (see I Think I Prefer the Tinned Variety) and in the 1960s when my mum's cousin Edith, a nurse, emigrated to Tasmania too.

You might also like:
A 1930s Lancashire wedding

Meet my 18th century Buckle ancestors

If you enjoy solving mysteries you might want to try "A Single To Filey" by Michael Murray.
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