A Hazard of Early Tinned Food

We have all heard many stories of the dangers faced by our ancestors coming to Australia on the early sailing ships, but this week I came across another danger faced by Francis Scammell, a bounty immigrant travelling to Port Phillip in 1841- contaminated tinned food! How could this happen? It got me researching the history of the tin can, something we take for granted today, with all of us having cans of food in our pantry.

The humble tin can is just over 200 years old and the idea of preserving food was encouraged by the French Government, in 1795, by offering a 12,000 franc prize to anyone who could preserve food to feed its far flung military. A French chef, Nicolas Appert experimented for many years, firstly with champagne bottles, something he had, sealed with cheese and lime , then wide necked glass containers which were too fragile and finally tin cans of meat which he soldered closed after heating. He watched the cans for months and those that didn't swell he deemed fit for consumption! After glowing reports about his canned food he was awarded the prize in 1809 on the condition he published his method, which he did the following year.

This tin can process was bought to England by another Frenchman, who used an agent to patent the idea, which was then sold onto Bryan Donkin who set up a business, Donkin, Hall & Gamble in Bermondsey. After successfully feeding his canned beef to nobles, who gave him glowing reports, his business took off.

An Early Tin Can

Early cans were made of tin-plated iron and very heavy. The process was labour intensive with cans made by hand. Food was heated in sealed cans for 6 hours, then opened slightly and re-soldered closed with lead solder. Preserving food in these cans was an expensive business. The main market was the British Army and the Royal Navy. By the 1820s, several expeditions to the Arctic had used canned food as well. Early cans weighed between 4 and 20lbs and as no can opener had been invented, a bayonet, hammer and chisel or a rock was advised to be used to open them!  By 1821, more manufacturers entered the field and Donkin dissolved his partnership.

As the early process of canning food was a hit and miss affair with no real understanding of the process, there were many cases of contaminated food. Louis Pasteur's development of pasteurization wasn't until 1864.

Francis Scammell left Bristol on 26 August 1841 aboard the Ward Chipman(sometimes also called Ward Chapman) and arrived at Port Phillip in mid December 1841. A shipping speculator, J P Hinton had purchased the ship and fitted it out for the voyage. He decided to use tin food, provided by John Gillon & Co, instead of the usual food loaded. The seals on the tin food were defective and much was spoilt. Even before rounding the Cape of Good Hope many of the passengers were ill and eight passengers were employed to help tend the large number of sick. By the time the ship reached Melbourne 19 children had died of food poisoning from defective cans. This was just another obstacle faced by those coming to Australia in the early days.

Numurkah 1884 - A Thriving Town

Numurkah in north east Victoria was proclaimed a town on 8 February 1875. Jeremiah McAuliffe, my great, great grandfather selected land at Katunga on the outskirts of Numurkah in January 1878. Alfred Leahy, the district's government surveyor surveyed both Jeremiah's selection and the township of Numurkah. The first sale of allotments in the town took place on 11 January 1878 and Alfred Leahy was among the first purchasers, securing five allotments at four pound each. The main street of Numurkah, Melville Street, was proclaimed a street in 1882.

Melville Street Numurkah  c1900-1910

(State Library of Victoria)

I had the basic facts about the town but I wanted to get a feel of what the area was like when Jeremiah was there and what better way than to read the local newspaper of the time. Unfortunately only a limited number of Numurkah newspapers are on Trove, so last week I made a trip to the State Library of Victoria to browse through the earliest newspaper I could find there on microfilm. I love reading the newspaper everyday, so it was far from a chore to spend the afternoon browsing through nine months worth of The Numurkah Guardian & Wunghu Observer from March to December 1884. This newspaper was the second printed in Numurkah and came out weekly, it contained advertisements, news, upcoming events and meetings, as well as a supplement containing short stories.

The same as today there were reports of road accidents and fatalities, but these involved horses, buggies and carts. An unfortunate, Mr Hanson had his leg amputated after it got caught in the wheel of the dray he was driving, when he attempted to control his bolting horse. The local state school teacher, Miss Barkley also suffered minor injuries to her knee and was severely shaken, when her horse bolted, knocked into a tree and she fell to the ground. Even the local doctor wasn't exempt from an accident:-

3 July 1884

This snippet also gives added insight into the weather at the time and the difficulties of travelling around on dirt tracks. Obviously the unpredictability of rainfall was a problem for this agricultural area as this piece shows:-

Much like today, controlling burning off was another topic of discussion. A well attended meeting of representatives from the agricultural societies of the north east region met in Murchison on 26 April to "to consider the best means to adopt for obtaining an alteration of the law relating to the use of fire or failing that, to urge the strict enforcement of the law as at present in force." This meeting had occurred because the whole district had suffered severely from fires in the previous summer. Suggestions made included not allowing burning off before the 1 March, increasing the cleared area around farms and banning farm labourers smoking in the fields. After much discussion several resolutions relating to times and notifications of burning and clearing around farms were agreed upon and were to be sent to all societies before appointing delegates to lobby the government. It came as a surprise then, when later in the year on 27 November, I found an article that the Numurkah Fire Brigade had just realized their hope of having an Engine, with the purchase of one from Benalla Brigade for 80 pound.

As expected in a new town, many new groups were formed. A popular meeting place was Gifford's Hotel, where on 21 April a meeting was held for those interested in the formation of the Numurkah Football Club with the encouragement "no more healthy or manly game can be indulged in by the young bloods of Numurkah." On 4 June, the Numurkah Rifle Club was formed with about 20 members enrolling and "it was decided to obtain a supply of Enfield rifles on loan from the government, each member to buy his own cartridges." Later in year shows a report of the Numurkah Brass Band, that had recently formed also met at Gifford's Hotel. One meeting, not held at the Hotel, was the first meeting of the The Blue Ribbon Army held at the Bible Christian Church where a good attendance was expected to hear what was to be said in favour of teetotalism! The Mutual Improvement Society debated on the subject of Bobbie Burns, the Scottish poet, the Numurkah Racing club discussed fencing in of the racecourse, the Mechanic Institute met to plan extensions to the recently built building and the annual meeting of the Agricultural and Pastoral Association was held 5 July. This Association only a few years old was ranked fourth in the State and was considered an important part of the rural community and still is today, as shown by this photo of the entrance gate taken last year.

Another reason for Numurkah's expansion was the coming of the railway in 1881. There were many articles throughout 1884 about the importance of the railway as it was where all the north-east wheat harvests were bought to be transported. However, there was much lobbying for the railway to be extended and finally on 2 October this was reported in the paper:-

Many were apprehensive that it might lead to a decline in business for Numurkah if the new Railway Bill was passed as fewer people would need to come there now. Some also wondered why improvements had been made to the station, as they might not have been necessary.

Reading the local paper certainly gives you an insight into what was happening and the concerns and interests of the inhabitants at the time. To finish on a lighter note this advertisement caught my eye and gives an insight into decorating tastes:-

A Mystery Solved

Back when I was in my last year of school, I remember asking my grandmother, Annie Walmsley, about her family and writing what she told me on a scrap of paper from a notepad she kept near her phone. My grandmother passed away a couple of years later. Today, 46 years later, I still have that scrap of paper, which has proved invaluable, with most of the information having been proved correct. I didn't do anything with it for quite a few years, but when I did, Henrietta Rodgers, Annie's mother was my stumbling block until recently.

When I think back to that day in my Grandma's lounge room, she was happy to talk about her grandmother and she knew a lot about her, especially her three marriages which intrigued me, so I probably didn't realize she had said very little about her mother, Henrietta. A few years back, I asked my Uncle Neil, my grandmother's only surviving child at the time about Henrietta and he had said his mother never spoke of her, so he assumed she had died before his mother married.  He too said she talked about her grandmother a lot when he was growing up but not her mother. I wanted to know more about Henrietta.

Henrietta was born on 18 January 1877 in Nairne, South Australia to Edward John Rodgers and Ellen Tanner. It was Ellen's second marriage, her first husband had died in July 1875 leaving her with five young children aged between seven and eleven years. She married Edward in the February of 1876. This was also a short marriage! Less than a year after Henrietta was born, the  South Australian Police Gazette in December 1877, showed an unexecuted warrant for Edward John Rodgers for deserting his wife. Edward was arrested in January 1878 at Caltowie, South Australia, but died in 1879, again leaving Ellen on her own. Ellen went on to have two more children, Ethel Rodgers and Ernest Gallagher, but there is no record of a third marriage. Eight children in total.

Henrietta grew up with lots of siblings, in what I can only imagine was tough circumstances. At the age of seventeen and a half, in July 1894, Henrietta married William Joseph Walmsley, a man twelve years her senior, at the Adelaide Registry Office.  Her marriage certificate said she was eighteen. There was no occupation, no address, just Adelaide as the place of residence and she had misspelt her name as Heneritta when she signed it. Her older half sister and husband were witnesses. Within seven months, and only eleven days after she turned eighteen, she gave birth to my grandmother, Annie. Four years later, Annie's brother, John, arrived. Everything seemed normal, but that was where the information dried up!

So then I started searching newspapers for any snippet of information and came up with this notice in several South Australian newspapers:-

from the South Australian Register

Henrietta was 24 years old and it was only a couple of weeks before Christmas. Annie was nearly six and John just 20 months old. Henrietta hadn’t died young, she had left her family, but where had she gone? I could find no trace of her in South Australia. A few years ago I found a Queensland Funeral Record for a Henrietta Walmsley, alias Stokes born 1876 who had died in 1944. Maybe this was my great grandmother, but after searching for a death certificate under both Stokes and Walmsley, I found nothing. I then checked the Queensland newspapers and found a probate notice in The Telegraph (Brisbane) as follows:-

After some more searching I found that Wills in Queensland available online stopped in 1942. If I wanted to see Henrietta's Will I would have to visit Queensland in person or pay an exorbitant amount to have it copied. Last month while looking for something else, I noticed the Queensland Government had updated their site and you could now download historical records directly. It was worth checking again to see if I could find Henrietta's death certificate and bingo. There it was!

Henrietta's Queensland Death Certificate

There is enough on this certificate for me to conclude this is my great, grandmother Henrietta. It says she was born and married in South Australia. She married a Walmsley and she had a male and female child. It does, however, leave a lot of questions about the missing 43 years from the time she left Adelaide. Another interesting detail of this story is Ellen's death certificate in 1909 is in the name of Ellen Adams and only mentions her first marriage to Thomas Adams and the children from that marriage!

The Challenge of Welsh Ancestry

Trying to trace my Welsh ancestors has been a challenge. It required a lot of detective work and taught me a lot about Wales, a country I knew little about. My great, great grandparents were Harriet Jones and Thomas Powell, who were both born in Ruabon in the North of Wales. I have had little success with Harriet's family, but the Powell's have proved a little easier.

Jones is the most common surname in Wales and Powell is in the top twenty. Why are there so few different surnames in Wales? The Welsh traditionally used a system of patronymic naming, that is  derived from the name of the father. Thus Jones came from John the first name of the father.  In Celtic times "ab" or "ap" meaning "son of" was put in front of names. Eventually the "a" was dropped and lots of welsh names began with "P" or "B", so the original welsh name "ap Howell", son of Howell became shortened to Phowell and finally the welsh name we know today - Powell.

The next obstacle to overcome was place names, sometimes an ancestor would have different places of birth on different records. It would vary between Ruabon, Rhosymedre, Cefn Mawr and sometimes Wrexham.  Ruabon is both a town and a parish. The parish of Ruabon included the smaller villages of Rhosymedre and Cefn Mawr until 1844. In that year Rhosymedre became a parish itself and included Cefn Mawr within its boundaries. With compulsory registration in 1837, Wrexham was the town for registration in this area. I must admit it took a while to get this clear in my head.

In 1841, the Ruabon parish had a population of 11,292 and owed its prosperity to the abundance of iron and coal in the area. About 1,500 men and boys were employed in associated industries, my ancestors amongst them. Thomas Powell was one of 8 boys and a girl born to John Powell and Sarah Rudge.  Sarah unfortunately died when her youngest child, Harriet was only 5 years old, leaving John to raise the family. John was a forgeman.  The 1871 census showed he was still working at that job at the age of 67. He died 4 years later. Being one of the main sources of employment in Ruabon, all 8 sons had little choice but to follow in their father's footsteps, working in the industry either as forgemen, puddlers, forge rollers or furnace heaters. Even Harriet, the only daughter married an iron moulder. However, they didn't all remain in Ruabon.

Four of the brothers, Thomas, Arthur, Henry and Isaac went to Thornaby-on-Tees in North Yorkshire and continued as iron workers. Only Isaac returned to Ruabon in his later years. John, Frederick and Harriett all remained in Ruabon and connected to the iron works. Peter, a mill furnace man, moved to Hanley in Staffordshire and William, as yet, I have been unable to track.

I was lucky in being able to track my Powell ancestors. Harriet, the youngest  and only girl proved the most difficult until I obtained her father's death certificate. It had been filled in by his son-in-law, Benjamin Butterton. As he only had one son-in-law, I knew who Harriet had married. Not only that, it opened up a bit of a can of worms, with many more people to add to the family tree. Harriet like her mother had 8 sons, but she also had 5 daughters, a total of 13 children in 21 years. Not a bad effort! Thomas Powell, my great, great grandfather had only one child, a daughter Emily, but he had 41 nieces and nephews that I have found so far, which shows how quickly a family can grow. There was also one adopted nephew, William Brillingford which might make a good story another time!

Helen Frances Edmonds (1934-2018)

It is with a sad heart, but with lots of wonderful memories that I write this post today. My Aunt, Helen, my Mum Val's sister passed away on Wednesday evening, leaving many family and friends to mourn her passing. Happy memories, however will live on forever.

Val & Helen

Helen Frances McAuliffe was born on 18 April 1934 in Balaclava, the second daughter to Thaddeus (Ted) McAuliffe and Catherine Myers. She grew up in what had previously been the old Balaclava Police Station in Blenheim Street. It had ceased being a Police Station in 1929, but still consisted of many outbuildings, so not only her immediate family, but extended family lived there as well. Many stories have been told over the years of the SP bookie operations her uncles ran and her grandmother throwing betting slips in the fire when she thought the police were coming. Helen also recounted the story of one uncle keeping eggs in a strange solution, which as an adult she realized he must've been selling the eggs on the black market. As well as her older sister, Val, Helen had a younger sister, Bev and a younger brother, Ted. Helen and Bev were both bridesmaids at my Mum and Dad's wedding in 1952 as can be seen below.

Bev, Helen & Val

On the 11 June 1960, Helen married Frank David Edmonds and that is where my recollections begin, as I was the flower girl at their wedding, as the picture below shows. After their marriage, Helen and Frank, lived with Frank's parents in a big old house in Tooronga Road Malvern. I remember it well with a passageway down the centre and all the rooms coming off it. I later learned it had been built in the late 1880's. I recall many visits to this house, the Dachshund or 'sausage' dog they had, as well as  my first trip on a tram. That tram trip, now I think about it, was probably to visit Mum at Francis Cabrini Hospital when my brother, Tony, was born exactly a year to the day after Frank and Helen's wedding.

Bev, Helen & myself

Helen and Frank lived in many houses over the years. As a child, their home at Warburton was one of the places I stayed, where they ran a pig and dairy farm on the banks of the Yarra opposite where Oscar's is today. It was my first real experience of farm life, milking cows, open space and even riding a horse. Although that last experience was laughed about for years, as I didn't loosen my foot in the stirrup when I dismounted and ended up on my back, foot in the air, in the mud. On one visit to their home in Kallista, I can remember us kids all going blackberrying in the paddocks around the house or on another occasion I was educated in how to kill a chicken! As a kid it was always fun to visit Helen and Frank's place.

Helen was also interested in family history like myself and we spent many hours together comparing notes and identifying photos. When my Mum died in 1986 I had lots of photos that had belonged to both my Nan and my Mum. Helen and I spent many hours writing on the back of those photos, the people she knew, so the memories wouldn't be lost. Recently sorting papers, I found a sheet Helen had typed up after a trip to Shepparton to chase up information on our McAuliffe ancestors. It was a list of all the relevant graves we had found in Shepparton Cemetery with the information she had copied down. What amused me most was the date, it was 1988 when we had made that trip. It just seemed like yesterday! Not only had we visited the cemetery, we had spent time in the library scrolling through newspapers on microfilm to find obituaries and went to the council to find out exactly where Jeremiah McAuliffe had selected his land and then drove out to the spot. We were kindred spirits as far a family history goes and only a few weeks ago she was worrying how she could share all her research to her three children equally after her death.

Bev, Helen & myself

Helen, in April 2017, decided it would be a special treat to return to The Gables in Malvern, where her wedding reception was held to enjoy high tea which is now run there. It was a memorable girls' day out for her, with her sister Bev (her bridesmaid) and her daughter, Catherine, myself (her flower girl) and daughter Kerri and granddaughter, Cassie. The photo above shows the three of  us standing in front of the same fireplace as the earlier wedding photo, with only the mirror having changed.

Very sad you are gone Helen, but you are now with your husband Frank and wonderful memories live on. Rest in Peace.

Helen (2014) in her favourite colour, red.

Moomba - Not just a Holiday

Recently I spent the day scanning old photos, writing names on and information about each photo before it would be too late. One particular photo, shown below, took my interest. Although not in great condition, it does give the feel of a special event. It was a photographer's photo mounted on card and written on the top was "Frank Scammell in 8 hour Procession". Frank is the taller man on the front cart. Because of who it is and the banners, I believe this procession took place in Oakleigh, Victoria where Frank lived and was possibly in the 1920's, although I cant be sure. However, I did discover other details on my search to find out more.

It never ceases to amaze me what gems of information you find when you start searching. The first 8 hour Procession was held on 12 May 1856 to celebrate the Stonemasons achieving a 48 hour week with Saturday afternoons off. This led to other workers pressing to gain the same rights. The three main arguments for an 8 hour day were that the Australian climate necessitated shorter hours, men needed time to develop their mind through education and tradesmen would be better husbands, fathers and citizens if they had leisure time. Workers wanted better working conditions as well as reduced hours. At this time workers worked up to 14 hours a day, six days a week, had no holiday or sick pay and could be sacked at any time without being given a reason.

The Procession was a major event in Melbourne for the next 95 years, with it becoming a paid holiday in 1879. The holiday at some stage was renamed Labour Day. However after WWII, the public lost interest in the Procession and the last one was held in 1951. For four years, Melbourne had no procession, until in 1955 the Melbourne Moomba Parade began on the Monday, Labour Day holiday. Moomba is not just a holiday as I have now learnt, a lot of history is represented by this day.

Exploring the stories behind old photos helps to bring the lives of our ancestors to life! An interesting article I came across while researching, was in The Age, about the Procession on its 30th Anniversary. It had a very detailed description of what Melbourne was like at the time, which if you are interested you can find here:- The Age, 22 April 1886 - The Procession

Do I have a Smuggler in the family?

I remember watching old films with smugglers heaving goodies up the rocks on darkened beaches, hiding their loot in caves or scrambling through underground passages to elude authorities. Little did I know that my ancestors may have been involved in these activities. To be honest, I will probably never know if they were, but the fact that my great, great grandmother, Ellen Tanner, was born in 1840 at Pitts Deep, Hampshire a notorious smuggling area definitely opens up the possibility of a smuggler in the family.
It was on trying to locate where Pitt's Deep was that I stumbled onto the areas smuggling history, as shown here:

Safe landings on this coast are few and far between, but there was one at Pitt's Deep: a winding creek that cuts through the mud-flats. Here a jetty, Pitt's Deep Hard, provided a berth for even quite large ships. The deepest part of the trench cut by the brook flowing into the sea at this point was used for sinking tubs when danger loomed - and won the nickname Brandy Hole. Pylewell Home farm nearby was also used as a storage place by smugglers, and Tanner's Lane in the same area was a popular route inland. (1)

The fact that there is a Tanner's Lane also indicates the family have been associated with this area for a long time. Ellen's grandfather, William Tanner, owned a boat in this area in the early 1800's which led to his untimely death at the age of 33. Ellen's father, also William, was only 8 years old at the time. An Inquest was held into his death and a report appeared in The Hampshire Chronicle on 9 September 1816 as follows:

The 1851 England Census, shows William Tanner's occupation as a fisherman and the four children listed all born at Pitt's Deep. Ironically the 1841 Census shows them residing next to the Pitt's Deep Preventive Station (the name given to the Coast Guard Station at the time).

Whether any of the Tanner's were smugglers or not is unknown, but given the long association the family had with this well known smuggling region it provides a good talking point! It has also increased my curiosity to see the area later in the year.

(1) http://www.smuggling.co.uk/gazetteer_s_12.html, accessed 28 April 2018.

From Cemetery to Park

As family historians, we spend a lot of time wandering around cemeteries trying to find those extra details about our ancestors and to pay respect to people we never knew. Old cemeteries can be fascinating places and in my research I have found two that are used as parks today, both connected to the one family but on opposite sides of the world.

Bunhill Fields Burial Ground is located in Islington, London. It is grade 2 listed because of its historical significance and is maintained by the City of London as part of its Open Spaces program for the public to enjoy. The name Bunhill is thought come from "Bone Hill" as when it closed in 1854, it was thought to have been a burial site for over a thousand years.

Bunhill Fields Burial Ground

In Plot 59 at Bunhill Fields are buried Cornelia (nee Stites) Galbreath who died on 19 June 1800 at the very young age of 33yrs, also her son John Stites Galbreath, who died on the 26 March 1843, aged 52 yrs and six of John's children who died in infancy. This illustrated the high child mortality rate that existed in 19th century London. Of every 1000 children born, nearly half of them died before reaching the age of 2. Luckily some of John and his wife Ann's children did survive. One in particular Ann Jane, a dressmaker, came to Australia.

At St. Mark's in Collingwood on 16 December 1856, Ann Jane Galbreath married widower, Francis Scammell. Francis had been in Melbourne since 1842, a very early arrival. In the 1860's Francis continued that pioneer spirit by moving his family to Mulgrave. When Ann and Francis died they were buried at Oakleigh Cemetery.

Oakleigh Pioneer Memorial Park

Oakleigh Cemetery when first opened in 1859 was in bushland, one of the first public cemeteries in Victoria, now it sits in the centre of a residential and shopping precinct beside a major arterial road. Burials stopped in 1960 and it has been renamed the Oakleigh Pioneer Memorial Park as a testament to the early settlers of the area. It too is a park for the public with a picnic area and children's playground and winding paths amongst the trees.

It is great to see these cemeteries being re-purposed, but with great respect to the deceased and open for the public to enjoy.

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Another Story Unfolds

When I asked my uncle about his grandmother, Henrietta Rogers, he assumed she had died before his mother married because she never talked about her. However she did talk about her own grandmother a lot. For many years I have tried to unravel this mystery, unable to find anything about Henrietta, except her birth, marriage and the birth of her two children.

Henrietta was born on the 18 Jan 1877 in Nairne, South Australia. She was the only child of her mother Ellen's second marriage to Edward John Rogers, but she had five older half siblings. Sadly she didn't really get to know her father as he died 3 months short of her third birthday.

At the age of seventeen and half, despite the marriage certificate saying she was eighteen, Henrietta married William Walmsley who was twelve years her senior. She misspelt her name as Heneritta when she signed. Her older half sister Annie and her husband, Samuel Short were the witnesses to the marriage which took place in the Adelaide Registry Office. Eight months later and only eleven days after her eighteenth birthday, Henrietta gave birth to my grandmother, Annie Edith. It is possible she named her after her older half sister. Four years later she gave birth to a son, John Henry. Everything seemed rosy, but that was when the trail went cold.

A few years ago, I happened to stumble on this notice that appeared in the Evening Journal, Adelaide:

Annie was nearly seven and her brother John only 20 months old. Now I understand why my grandmother never mentioned her mother and was possibly brought up by her grandmother, Ellen, but what happened to Henrietta? I will probably never know the full story but at least today I finally found where she died.  I had a Queensland burial transcription for a Henrietta Walmsley alias Stokes and also a similar probate notice in the newspaper, but until today I had been unable to find a death certificate for either name. I thought I would check to see if Queensland Registry had updated their index and found you can now purchase an historical certificate as a PDF and finally I hit the jackpot with this:

Many questions still remain, but now I at least know where she died. 

Researching Ancestors is like doing a Jigsaw

I have always enjoyed doing jigsaws. As I was growing up, for a lot of years, their was a family present under the Christmas tree of 1000 piece jigsaw which was taken to our holiday house and set up on the bench between the kitchen and the lounge room. Anyone that visited over the holiday period was drawn to putting at least a few pieces in that puzzle, often a lot more! Two things happened this week that made me think how similar, in some respects, family history research is to doing a jigsaw. We are all searching for the many pieces to make our ancestors stories complete just like we put all those pieces together to make a picture with a jigsaw.

As a reply to a Facebook request for help in locating the ship an ancestor had arrived on, I suggested looking at baptism records in England and also the 1841 census as the death certificate indicated she hadn't left England by then and also gave a place of birth. This I thought would narrow down the time frame to look at as well as show parents she may have traveled with. Rather than a thanks for the suggestion the reply I received was - 'I only want to know the name of the ship'! It is often impossible to find the piece of the puzzle we want until we have all the surrounding pieces to help us.

Following on from that, I learnt myself the hard way how true this is. For many years I have had both the 1841 & 1851 census showing my 2x great grandmother, Ellen Tanner and her parents in Pitts Deep and then Boldre in Hampshire. I have the shipping record of them coming to Port Adelaide in 1855, Ellen's baptism, her death certificate and index records of 2 of her 3 marriages, but I have never been able to find anything further about her mother, except that she was born in Beaulieu, Hampshire. In order to have all the details I could for my trip to England, I decided to order a pdf of her birth certificate while the GRO are still doing their trial. Perhaps there would be a different address or some other detail I didn't have. Four days after my order the pdf was available to download.

At first I thought I had ordered the wrong certificate, as the surname for her mother was a name I had never seen 'Nutbeem' and an unusual one at that! As far as I knew Ellen's parents, William Tanner and Ann Etheridge, had married in Boldre in 1834. However after some more research I found that Ann Nutborn (don't you just love the variations in spelling) had married James Etheridge in Beaulieu 10 years earlier. They had one son, George before James died in 1830. Interestingly enough George appears on the 1841 census as William Tanner's son, George Tanner, so he obviously took on the role of father when he married Ann.

So it just goes to show you do need to gather as much information as possible to get the full story of your ancestors, just as you need every piece to make a complete jigsaw puzzle.