Quarriers apologises for historic child migration policy

Quarriers (https://quarriers.org.uk) has apologised for its historic child migration policy to Australia and Canada.

Chief Executive Alice Harper said: "We apologise to children migrated through Quarriers and to children who suffered abuse following migration.  While people and organisations - including Quarriers - believed at the time that the UK government's international migration scheme offered the chance of a better life, it was misguided and wrong. Vulnerable children were sent away and we recognise that some also suffered physical and emotional abuse, including sexual abuse."

The apology has been issued as the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry continues to hear evidence in Edinburgh. For more on the story visit https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-50645316.

Library and Archives Canada hosts resources for Home Children who arrived in Canada between 1869 and 1932, with a dedicated page at www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/immigration/immigration-records/home-children-1869-1930/Pages/home-children.aspx. These were predominantly orphaned children sent by the British Government from the UK to new homes across its empire, although in some cases, parents and children were misled as to the fate of each other prior to their separation.

The British Home Children in Canada platform at https://canadianbritishhomechildren.weebly.com has additional resources which may help.

Sources for tracing Home Children sent to Australia can be determined from http://guides.naa.gov.au/good-british-stock/index.aspx.

Chris

Order Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed) at https://www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Tracing-Your-Irish-Family-History-on-the-Internet-Paperback/p/16483. and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records at https://www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Tracing-Your-Scottish-Ancestry-through-Church-and-State-Records-Paperback/p/16848. Further news published daily on The GENES Blog Facebook page, and on Twitter @genesblog.

Philadelphia Welsh Society records and Iceland censuses on Ancestry

Ancestry has a few new resources of interest. If some of family were Welsh migrants to Philadelphia, then the following collection may be of interest:

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Welsh Society of Philadelphia Charity to Immigrants, 1798-1883
http://search.ancestry.co.uk/search/db.aspx?dbid=60570
Source: The Welsh Society of Philadelphia Records, 1798–1978. Collection 1186. Haverford College, Haverford, Pennsylvania.

Many early settlers in and around Philadelphia were Welsh. The Welsh Society of Philadelphia met for the first time in 1798 with the goal of providing “for the relief of such emigrants as arrive in this country from Wales.”

This collection contains records from the Welsh Society of Philadelphia, including list of immigrants who received charity, cemetery registers, emigrant registers, receipts, minutes, attendance records, and membership lists.

Records vary, but you might find names, dates, birthplaces, places of origin, arrival dates, arrival vessels, age at burial, date and place of burials, and other details.


Also newly available are third party web interfaces for the 1870, 1880 and 1890 censuses of Iceland.

Web: Iceland Census, 1870
http://search.ancestry.co.uk/search/db.aspx?dbid=70783

Web: Iceland Census, 1880
http://search.ancestry.co.uk/search/db.aspx?dbid=70784

Web: Iceland Census, 1890
http://search.ancestry.co.uk/search/db.aspx?dbid=70785

The original data is held on the website of the National Archives of Iceland (http://manntal.is/Upplysingar/#)

Chris

For details on my range of genealogy guide books please visit http://britishgenes.blogspot.co.uk/p/my-books.html. To commission me for genealogical research, please visit my research site at www.scotlandsgreateststory.co.uk.

Wobbly Williams Wobbly Day Out

Yes, it's my blog, and I'll use or abuse it as I will...!

So, in a completely non-genealogy related story, I wanted to give a quick plug to something happening in Aberdeen soon. When I went to school in Carrickfergus, back in Northern Ireland, seated behind me in many of my classes was Bryndley Williams. Bryn was the class funny man, always good craic with his partner in crime Colin Logan.

Bryn now lives in Scotland. He has come to national prominence in recent years thanks to his work for a charitable group he has set up called Wobbly Williams (http://wobblywilliams.com). Bryn now has Parkinson's Disease, but has taken a bad lot to make some good from it, working hard to raise funds to help try to find a cure. He is also as mad as a box of frogs, and in his own style has done so much in recent years to raise awareness of the condition, with his usual humour, and to raise funds to help treat it and other neurological diseases. You may well have seen him on national TV not so long ago on one of John Barrowman' shows on the Beeb, being thanked for his efforts, but his work goes on. Before he passed away in 2001, my father-in-law developed Parkinsons, and the world needs a few more Bryns to help raise awareness about it, and money to fight it.

Now Bryn is bringing the cast of Emmerdale up to Aberdeen! The event, A Wobbly Day Out with The Cast of Emmerdale, is taking place on Saturday June 14th. In fact, there's wee bit more on the cards than that - A Big Night In With The Cast Of Emmerdale on Friday 13 June at Thainstone Centre; a daytime event on Saturday 14 June at Storybook Glen featuring Its A Wobbly Knockout, The Jellympics and The Third ITC World Haggis Hurling Championships; and then The Wobbly Banquet on the Saturday evening at Thainstone House. It's his biggest fundraising event yet, where he hopes to raise £200,000, to help his work reach its goal of raising its first £1 million.

If you are suffering from Parkinson, Bryn's website is there to offer help and support. If you are looking for a good day out, Aberdeen is about to be invaded! For more information on the programme, and to book, visit http://wobblywilliams.com/awobblydayout/.

It will be very wobbly...!

(For additional Wobbly Williams events, keep an eye on Bryn's blog at  http://wobblywilliams.com/blog/category/bryns-blog/)

Chris

Time to find your inner Irish...! All the best online Irish genealogy resources can be found through my book Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet - in print and ebook formats. "Very useful, makes me wish I was Irish!" - Saint Patrick, patron saint.

A huge thank you!

British GENES readers and other genealogy colleagues from around the world helped to raise £550 of a grand total of £1027.44 for my wife's charity swim yesterday from the island of Cumbrae to the town of Largs in North Ayrshire on behalf of Gillian's Saltire Appeal (www.gillianssaltireappeal.org.uk), a local charity that seeks to provide respite care for cancer sufferers and their families in Scotland. Seventy seven swimmers set out, and a lot of money was raised for a great cause.

A big thanks from me for all your donations - and a wee word from Claire herself!

There's a lot more about how the day itself went on my other wee blog at http://walkingineternity.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/a-huge-thank-you.html, including photos and video. If you'd still like to donate, you can do so via https://www.justgiving.com/Claire-Paton1

Once again, many thanks - much appreciated!

Chris

My latest book, Discover Scottish Civil Registration Records, is now available from http://www.gould.com.au (print) and http://www.gen-ebooks.com/unlock-the-past.html (ebook), whilst Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet is available at http://www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Tracing-Your-Irish-History-on-the-Internet/p/3889/. My next Pharos Scottish course, Scotland 1750-1850: Beyond the OPRs, starts Nov 13th - see http://pharostutors.com.

Barnardos photos to be destroyed?

The British Photographic History forum has reported that the original images from Barnardo's photographic archive, housed in Barkingside, East London, are in danger of destruction following their digitisation in Manchester over the next few months - apparently it is taking up too much room.

For further details, including details of a petition to save it, can be found at http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blog/show?id=2680769:BlogPost:72775

Unbelievable...

Chris

My new book, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet, is now available from Pen and Sword. My Scottish land and church records ebooks are available at http://www.gen-ebooks.com/unlock-the-past.html, whilst my next Pharos Scottish course, Scottish Research Online, starts Sep 4th - see http://pharostutors.com/details.php?coursenumber=102. Time to smash a few brick walls...!

Patrick Stewart on domestic violence and PTSD

Many of you may remember watching the episode of Who Do You Think You Are not too long ago which featured the actor Patrick Stewart, star of Star Trek, the X-Men films and a great deal more. In Stewart's episode we got a real sense of just how important a person's family history can be to their own development - in Stewart's case, his mother had suffered horrendously from domestic violence when he was a child, an unforgivable situation which had led to a distance between himself and his father, to whom he had always apportioned full blame. The programme shed a new light on his background by revealing the 'shell shock' his father had suffered from in the Second World War - or rather, the as yet undiagnosed condition of post-traumatic stress disorder. It was news to Stewart, and was an emotional watch as he slowly uncovered the fact that despite the treatment of his mother being unforgivable, there was perhaps a new understanding as to what had led to the situation in the first place.

As a follow up to that, I've just watched something on my brother's Facebook page which I thought may be well worth passing on. It's a clip from YouTube featuring Patrick Stewart at a recent convention in Texas, where he discusses his background and his discoveries at the Imperial War Museum about his father, as well as the campaigning work he now does through a UK charity called Refuge (http://refuge.org.uk) to oppose violence towards women, and his role as a patron of another UK charity called Combat Stress (www.combatstress.org.uk).

Here's the clip:

You will find some of the original episode of WDYTYA featuring Patrick Stewart on YouTube, which I have also embedded here. The clip shows how Stewart discovered his father's story from the Second World War.

(With thanks to Robert Paton)

Chris

My new book, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet, is now available from Pen and Sword. My next Pharos Scottish course, Scotland 1750-1850: Beyond the Old Parish Registers, starts May 15th - see http://britishgenes.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/scotland-1750-1850-beyond-oprs-starts.html. Time to smash a few brick walls...!

TNA podcast - Charities records

The latest podcast from the National Archives (www.nationalarchives.gov.uk) in England is entitled Charities and their Records for Family Historians. It runs to just over half an hour, and is a talk given by Simon Fowler, military historian and former editor of the much missed Ancestors magazine. Here's some blurb:

Charities have been operating in many forms for nearly 800 years. They were at their most important in Victorian England where in some places they rivalled the poor law in providing for the unfortunate. This podcast explores the history of charities and the records you can use to research ancestors who either sought their aid or who helped to run them.

To access the podcast visit http://media.nationalarchives.gov.uk/index.php/charities-and-their-records-for-family-historians/ or download from iTunes. Note - the first few minutes of the talk are in fact missing, due to technical problems with the recording apparently.

Chris

Check out my Scotland's Greatest Story research service www.ScotlandsGreatestStory.co.uk
New book: It's Perthshire 1866 - there's been a murder... www.thehistorypress.co.uk/products/The-Mount-Stewart-Murder.aspx (from June 12th 2012)