Instant Cousins

Instant Cousins : archiving my ancestry

  • Francis (nee Wilcox)

    This week I describe some of the details of the records that I know of and have found regarding the three Wilcox siblings who left London for Wales. Two of them left under circumstances that cannot be proved and there is only one anecdotal story relating to it. The third joined them after her parents…

  • Aberdeenshire to Ayrshire

    After writing my short account of the book Akenfield last week it got me thinking about the occupations of many of my and my wife’s ancestors. Agricultural Labourer was a common occupation listed against many of our family members in the early Census returns. Whether it was in Sussex, Surrey, Wigtownshire and Aberdeenshire, working on…

  • Akenfield

    I have been reading this book after I read the author’s obituary earlier in the year. Ronald Blythe lived in Suffolk and created this oral history of the village that he lived close to. He kept the name of the village anonymous and the name Akenfield is invented from possibly two other village names. He…

  • Searching for Aunt Mabel

    A short posting this week about a Great Aunt who if I met I cannot remember because I would have been very young. My Father, Bill Carver, had two aunts on his Mother’s side. It was Mabel’s  absence in the 1901 Census return when the Spillett’s came to Oxted that led me on a short…

  • Every Picture Tells A Story…………..

    Or does it ? Most pictures from the past will raise questions that can be very difficult to answer. For instance, if I was to explain that the picture above of my Great Grandfather and his six sons has no women in it, yet there were a further six siblings, five girls and another boy,…

  • The Landed Proprietor’s Wife

    My title comes from an unusual find in the 1891 Census return when I was searching for one of my wife’s Great Uncles. Alexander McKie (1873 – 1951) was the younger brother of Andrew, my wife’s Grandfather. He was born in Kirkinner, Wigtownshire, as were all his siblings. In later life I tracked him down…

  • I need to write about the Walkers

    I have been getting carried away as many family history researchers do when they see an interesting thread to follow. I had every intention of writing about the Walkers from Rotherhithe, the family of my maternal Grandmother. Since the publication of the 1921 Census return I have checked names against the records to see what…

  • Bankrupt in Bognor

    I recently wrote about my Great Grandfather’s move from Bognor in Sussex  to Oxted in Surrey and pondered about what made him make this move. I had been researching his life in South Bersted, just outside of Bognor on the main Chichester Road. He had become what I had presumed to be a successful entrepreneur…

  • Feus, Sasines, Jus Mariti and Dispositions

    Medieval terminology dominates much of the house conveyancing language of the twentieth century in Scotland. Getting my head around some of it has been the result of research at the Glasgow Archives in the Mitchell Library and also examining the title deed of my house that I now have in my possession. I will try…

  • When the Railway came to Braehead

    This week I am writing about my wife’s Grandfather, Andrew McKie. The second born child of John McKie and Agnes McKean of Braehead, Kirkinner in Galloway, formerly Wigtownshire. I have previously described John McKie’s tragic death and Agnes McKies reliance on the Parish for Poor Law relief. Agnes had six children to care for and…


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