George and Jennie......

It's not often that I stop in the middle of my genealogical-huntings and go "aaah, that's sad" but it happened to me this morning.......

So there I was, probing the new Ancestry search-engine (not good for those of us with dodgy hands, there are far too many keystrokes required) for George Culpin.  The youngest of the five children of Henry Culpin and Caroline, nee Marriott, George was born in Ryhall, Rutland, in 1875.  He doesn't seem to trouble the record-keepers much; growing up in Ryhall he appeared in the census and by 1901 he was a platelayer on the railway.  

On 17th June 1907 he married Mary Jane (Jennie) Chantrey at the parish church, Deeping St James, and they next appeared on the 1911 census in Belmisthorpe.  George is now a foreman platelayer.

Nothing more until Jennie died on 7th March 1954 in the Stamford & Rutland hospital.  I was mildly curious at to why a Jack Culpin suddenly appears to deal with probate, but went back to my search for George.

The "aaah, that's sad" moment came when I discovered that George died just three weeks after Jennie.  Died suddenly, I'm guessing, because it appeared to have happened at someone's house and probate (sorted out by the mysterious Jack Culpin again) is done by Administration (with Will) so maybe George didn't even have enough time to rewrite his Will......

I know this kind of thing probably happened a lot but it just stopped me in my tracks for a few seconds....

More soon.

Worth a look....

If you do nothing else today, have a look at 'Family Tree Rhapsody' on YouTube.

More soon.

Where would we be without newspapers.....?

In the pursuit of my goal of joining my various Culpins in one family-file, I was furkling again through the British Newspaper Archives today (it was either that or watch the curling at the Winter Olympics).  And yet again I found tragedy in the family:-

THE STAMFORD MERCURY, 24th May 1895

Suicide of a Former Master of Stamford Union - An inquest was held at Holbrook, near Derby, on Monday, touching the death of Richard Markham Culpin, who was found hanging in an out-house in the village.  The body was identified by the deceased's widow, Selina Culpin, who said that her husband was 54 years of age.  He was at one time master of Stamford workhouse, and afterwards of Stow-on-the-Wold workhouse, Gloucestershire.  That was eight or 10 years ago, and since then he had kept a lodging-house at Skegness for about five years.  He had lately had no regular employment and, for the past two or three months, had been lodging in Regent-street, Derby,  He had lately been steady in his habits, but whilst at Stow-on-the-Wold he was somewhat addicted to drink and had become deranged.  Last Thursday witness and deceased went to Holbrook on a visit to her sister.  During the past ten days deceased had been very depressed, and had cried a good deal.  He also said he should die broken-hearted at having nothing to do.  Two or three years ago he threatened witness with violence and took up a knife to her, but as a rule he was very kind.  At Stamford, about 16 years ago, he attempted to take his life, and cut his throat seriously.  At Skegness, also, he attempted to commit suicide.  Last Thursday, whilst at Holbrook, he went in and out of the house several times, and seemed uneasy.  He went out again in the afternoon, saying he would not be long, but never returned.  She heard on Saturday that his dead body had been found.  Deceased told her that his grandmother had "walked into the river," and she understood his father was queer in the head.  Charlotte Godbye, sister of the last witness, gave corroborative evidence, and also testified to find the body in an out-house on Saturday afternoon.  A framework knitter, named Herbert Shaw, of Holbrook, having deposed to the cutting down of the body, the jury returned a verdict of "suicide whilst temporarily insane".

THE LEEDS MERCURY, 20th April 1895

FATAL INJURIES ON THE RAILWAY: A man named Henry Culpin, of Downham, Norfolk, died in Addenbrookes Hospital, Cambridge, yesterday, from injuries received on the railway between March and Ely on the previous evening.  He was found lying on the line by the driver of a goods train, with both legs cut off just below the knee, and afterwards conveyed to Cambridge by an express train from York, which stopped at the spot.  Dr A G Hebblethwaite, of Keighley, who was a passenger in the train, attended to the man's injuries.

Both these men appear on my website, if you want further information about them.

More soon.

It's daft, I know......

..... But I've just been looking at the WW2 Civilian Deaths Index on Ancestry and found a couple who died in the Blitz.

Nothing unusual in that, sadly, but I then discovered they had four daughters aged between fifteen and none, and now I'm wondering where they were at the time.

Charles Saunders, his wife Louisa (nee Culpin) and her sister Lillian, died at the Saunders home, Prospect Terrace, St Pancras in October 1940. No mention is made of their four daughters.

And, just to make it even more intriguing, Louisa died three days after the others. This, presumably,  is why the Probate Index shows her as a widow.

I shall keep looking for the girls.

More soon.

Connections.......?

To give myself a break from finding missing sources and other.....er...little problems, I've set myself another *small* task......

To find the link between my "family" Culpins, who started out in Woodnewton, in Northamptonshire, and those Culpins in Spalding in Lincolnshire.  Geographically, not far apart but who can tell.....????

More soon.

Trains and stuff.......

Well, what a fabulous day I had on Saturday!!

This was lunch with my "new" cousins, in Reading.  A simple journey, down to London, round to Paddington and then the train to Reading.  A good lunch with the cousins and my sister, laughs and discovering some surprising similarities.  Then home again, sister and I in opposite directions but still hit by the same mini-tornado which seemed to cross southern England late Saturday afternoon.  My train was stopped in driving rain and very strong winds, when the overhead power tripped out, and sister's train by the more prosaic "tree across the line".  Good ol' Mother Nature.  Didn't spoil the day, though, so that's fine.

Finding the new cousins was the result of ....well, sheer bloody-mindedness on my part really; which is what we all need as genealogists (although we dress it up as "persistence" to be polite!)  I'm still in "check, check, check" mode and am updating my database to my somewhat-more-exact standards; more exact, that is, than when I started this hobby/obsession about 20 years ago.  And, of course, the software is so much better and can record things in a much more useful way.

I'm lucky that one side of my family comes from my neck of the woods so I have access to local newspapers as well as the records office; therefore I have a number of funeral reports, and a couple of marriages too, which give some wonderful lists of names of the attendees.  All good stuff!

So, back to the checking.

More soon.

Sources and how to make a note of them........

So, here we are in the new year and I haven't written a post about my resolutions.  That's mainly because my resolution for 2014 was decided for me by an email from someone who'd seen one of my trees on Ancestry.    It showed me quite clearly the way forward.....

Which is to check, check and check again.  Back when I was a baby genealogist I didn't seem to bother with sources, being more interested in simply logging the information I was finding.  This is now coming back to bite me; apart from offending my reasonably tidy mind, it also caused much embarrassment when the aforementioned contact asked me where I'd found a set of christening dates.

The precision of them suggested that I'd got them from the parish register, rather than a compiled index..  The particular village is not on the IGI so I must've been to the Records Office for them.  But I didn't write it down so I have no idea.

So I'm off to Huntingdon again tomorrow in the hope of a seat in their archives searchroom so I can look again at the parish register and, this time, note that I have done!!

On the positive side, I'm looking to keep in touch with some new contacts I made last year and lunch has just been arranged with my sister & I and our "new" cousins.  Excellent.

Happy hunting in 2014.

More soon.