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Archive for March, 2012
The father of low-carb diets in our parish records
We’ve just spotted a bit of a character in the Westminster parish records that were published earlier this week and thought we’d share his story with you. The record below details the baptism of William Banting, son of Thomas and Ann, on 11 December 1796 at St Martin in the Fields.
William Banting's baptism record from the Westminster parish records
William Banting grew up to become the father of the low-carbohydrate diet when he published a pamphlet entitled A Letter on Corpulence, Addressed to the Public in 1863. The pamphlet detailed the diet that had helped Banting (an overweight undertaker – we said he was a character!) lose weight, namely by cutting out bread, butter, milk, sugar, beer, soup, potatoes and beans and replacing them with meat and fish.
Following the publication of his pamphlet, the term ‘banting’ or ‘to bant’ began to be used when people referred to diets and is still used today in some languages. Have you come across the phrase before? We’ve spotted it in Graham Greene’s novel Travels with my Aunt which was published in 1969 – over 100 years after Banting’s diet guide!
The Great Lafayette in the 1911 census
Calling all family history super sleuths! Can anybody tell us what is recorded in the infirmity column of this 1911 census return?
Ask the photo expert – mourning aunty?
Our photo expert, Jayne Shrimpton, analyses your family photos.
Tony Mullord sent us his photo and asked:
‘Attached is a photo believed to be of my mother (born 1905) with her mother, on the right, and a friend, my aunt, with her mother. I would say that that the girls are about nine or 10 years old: could you please confirm whether the costumes bear this out?’
Click to enlarge
Jayne says:
‘This is a lovely studio photograph dating from the early 20th century, its hazy painted backdrop suggesting a wooded landscape in the distance a popular artistic style during the late-Edwardian and WWI eras. The four females are fashionably dressed in clothing suited to their ages, their outfits all slightly different. Adult garments and accessories are easier to date closely than children’s styles and the ladies’ appearance here indicates that the photograph was taken between 1912 and 1915.
This timeframe fits in well with your mother’s 1905 birth date and so there is no reason at all to doubt your identification of the people in this scene. I agree that your mother looks to be aged around nine or 10 here, so most likely the photograph dates to 1914 or 1915. Her friend, who I presume from your description you called ‘aunty’, could be a year or so younger or perhaps she is just shorter in height. There seems to be a good likeness between mother and daughter in each case.
The most fashionably-dressed lady here is your grandmother, standing back right. Her tunic-style overdress caught around the waist with a sash and worn over a blouse and longer underskirt was an elegant arrangement in vogue during the early-mid 1910s, the V-shaped neckline and pronounced collar most typical of the years around 1913-15. Ornamental buttons were popular throughout the decade and her hat is one of several styles worn at the time.
The girls both wear smart coat-dresses, the low-belted version on the left and the broad-collared style with decorative trimmings on the right both fashionable during our period. They also wear formal outdoor accessories of hats and neat white gloves, their hair secured with the large white bows characteristic of the later Edwardian years and 1910s.
Most interesting perhaps is the seated lady (‘aunty’), who wears plainer black garments and a black hat, which contrast strikingly with the stylish pastel outfits worn by the others. In view of her sombre appearance, I suspect that she could be in mourning and wonder whether she had recently lost a child or, more likely perhaps, her husband. If so, perhaps he had died in one of the early military campaigns of WWI. Either way, all-female photographs are typical of the war years, when fathers and older sons were often absent and so this photograph is a great visual record of its time as well as a precious family heirloom.’
Jayne Shrimpton
If you’d like to send your photo to Jayne Shrimpton, please register or opt to receive newsletters in My Account. Jayne only has time to analyse two photos each month, but if yours wasn’t chosen this time, you could be lucky next month!
February newsletter competition winner
We’re very pleased to announce the winner of our February newsletter competition. We asked you ‘Which years do the new Thames watermen and lightermen records cover?’
Congratulations go to Tony Richards who correctly answered ’1688-2010′. Tony wins a copy of ‘Tracing Your London Ancestors’ by Jonathan Oates.
Thanks to everyone who entered – look out for the next competition question in our March newsletter, winging its way to you very soon.
Ask the expert – military photograph
Our resident military expert Paul Nixon, pictured below, offers advice on how to solve your military family history mysteries.
From Martyn Newell:
‘James William Jeffs was born in 1884/86 in Hackney. He enlisted in the army in 1904 and served for seven years. In the 1911 census his occupation was ‘gas stoker’ and he lived at an address in East Ham. In 1914 he was recalled to the 2nd Battalion the Border Regiment as a reservist at the outbreak of the Great War.
He saw plenty of action before suffering with trench foot in the winter of 1914/15 and he was wounded – a gunshot wound to the arm – in the battle of Neuve Chapelle in 1915. He was sent home to recover before returning to join the 1st Border Regiment at the start of April 1916 on the Somme. He was killed on 6 April 1916 in a German bombardment that preceded a trench raid on the British front line. He was buried in the nearest location to where he fell and he lies with 12 other men of his unit in Auchnonvillers Communal Cemetery.
My question: the family have never found a photograph of James William Jeffs, although older family members said that one did exist. We wonder where we could look for a photo and how to go about it. We have made contact with people who have actually bought the house next to the cemetery where the soldiers are buried in France and they do battlefield tours – they would like to keep the memory of James and his unit alive and a photo would help them too. I have never found an entire military record for Private 7340 JW Jeffs to fill a few gaps that the family have, so any help would be fantastic.’
Paul says:
‘You have a great of information about this man already so you’re doing well! You may well have tried these potential sources but if you haven’t done so, now’s the time to tick these off:
- Post this self-same query on the Great War Forum and the Border Regiment forum
- Check the local newspaper/s for East Ham between 1914 and 1916. Newspapers are a greatly overlooked resource and while some are already online – and indeed brightsolid, findmypast.co.uk’s parent company, has a huge ongoing project with the British Library, the British Newspaper Archive – the majority are not. Check with Newham Archives to see if they hold copies on film, archiveslocalstudies@newham.gov.uk, and check with the British Newspaper Library
- Drop a line to the East of London Family History Society
- Find Living Relatives on findmypast.co.uk
- Consider looking at the photographic archive held by the Imperial War Museum in London and the Border Regiment Museum
Finally, start a blog and write about your relative; get some information online and let the search engines do the rest. You may be surprised at how many people contact you.’
If you’d like to send your question to our experts, please register or opt to receive newsletters in My Account. Unfortunately our experts only have time to answer a few queries each month. If yours wasn’t answered this time, you could be lucky next month!
Ask the photo expert – American ancestor
Our photo expert, Jayne Shrimpton, analyses your family photos.
Bev Berney sent us her photo and asked:
‘I would be very interested in your analysis of this photo. It is mounted on a card which reads “Photographed by H. Skinner, Oneida St., Fulton, N.Y.” The card carries a US 2 cent stamp, which my stamp-collector husband tells me dates to 1862-1871.’
Click to enlarge
Jayne says:
‘This will be a carte de visite photograph, the earliest type of card-mounted photographic print to be produced by commercial photographers and one which survives in large numbers today. Measuring a standard 2 ½ x 4ins (10 x 6.5cms), this neat visiting-sized photograph print originated in France in the mid-1850s, from where the format quickly spread to other countries. Cartes de visite were produced in the United States from late 1859 onwards and remained a popular style throughout the 19th century.
I am not as familiar with American cartes as with English examples and haven’t previously come across postage stamps on the reverse of any of the US mounts that I have worked on. Stamps, however, can offer useful dating clues and the dates provided by your husband for the use of 2 cent stamps – 1862-71 – broadly fits in with the other evidence here. In particular, the neat, plain style of the photographer’s printed details, centred in the middle of the mount, confirms that this is an early carte, most typical of the 1860s.
Click to enlarge
I have been unable to establish complete operational dates for the photographer, H Skinner of Fulton, New York, but a general internet search yields further examples of his work on various random websites. His name also occurs in online histories of Fulton Village, which suggest that he was resident there by 1838, although he would not yet have been operating as a photographer at that date.
Turning to the visual image, we see a man seated in a photographer’s studio. In England, this close-up three-quarter length pose was becoming fashionable by c.1870, although slightly earlier examples do exist and the ornate chair and patterned carpet certainly suggest a date in the 1860s or early 1870s.
Men’s dress can be hard to date very precisely but this gentleman’s appearance is consistent with a date in the 1860s or early 1870s, albeit it a little outmoded by that time. His substantial, dark knee-length frock coat was becoming associated mainly with the business or upper classes and was a rather formal, conservative option. It is worn here with a matching waistcoat and trousers and a bow tie of broadly mid-century type.
His distinctive facial hair represents the early style of beard first worn during the 1850s and that involved the growth of bushy whiskers extending from the sideburns beneath the chin, but with no hair grown around the mouth. This ancestor looks to be aged in his 40s or thereabouts and we can be fairly certain that he lived or worked in Fulton Village, Oswego County, New York, since most people visited a photographer’s studio close to home. Hopefully these clues and the c.1862-71 time frame will enable you to positively identify him.’
Jayne Shrimpton
If you’d like to send your photo to Jayne Shrimpton, please register or opt to receive newsletters in My Account. Jayne only has time to analyse two photos each month, but if yours wasn’t chosen this time, you could be lucky next month!
We publish 1.3 million Westminster parish records
Today we have published more than 1.3 million parish records for Westminster on findmypast.co.uk
The records cover the vast period 1538-1945, making them a historical goldmine for those with London ancestors. We have made these records available online for the first time.
More than 50 Westminster churches will be included in the collection once it is complete, including St Anne, Soho, St Clement Danes, St George Hanover Square, St James Piccadilly, St Martin-in-the-Fields and 
St Mary-le-Strand.
Find out detailed information about the coverage of the records published today (PDF).
This exciting launch sees the first release of the parish records in findmypast.co.uk’s Westminster Collection. The remaining parish records will go live in the coming months, along with cemetery registers, wills, rate books, settlement examinations, workhouse admission and discharge books, bastardy, orphan and apprentice records, charity documents, and militia and watch records.
We are working in partnership with City of Westminster Archives Centre to bring you this fantastic collection of records.
Search Westminster parish records now
1851 census issue fixed
We wanted to let you know that we’ve fixed the outstanding issue with piece numbers 2225 and 2226 in the 1851 census.
The pieces got mixed up during the transcription phase – we’re really sorry for this confusion.
Thank you for your patience while we fixed the issue and happy searching!
WDYTYA? LIVE competition winners
Thank you to everyone who entered our competition at Who Do You Think You Are? LIVE at Kensington Olympia in February. We have now awarded the following prizes – congratulations to our lucky winners!
12 month Full subscriptions – David Applin, Jill Harvey and Terry Riley
6 month Full subscriptions – Joan Pitman, Pam Murdoch, Phyllis Davies, Sybil Lunn, Louise Adams and John Farrell
Search new Royal Artillery records
Search for your ancestors in two fantastic new sets of Royal Artillery records on findmypast.co.uk: Royal Artillery Military Medals 1916-1993 and Royal Artillery Honours & Awards 1939-1946.
Royal Artillery Military Medals 1916-1993
Search a nominal roll of more than 16,500 military medals, which were awarded to members of the Royal Regiment of Artillery from WWI to the Falklands War.
These records could provide you with fascinating information about your ancestors’ military service, including the unit they served in, the type of service and details of the award itself.
Search Royal Artillery military medals now
Royal Artillery Honours & Awards 1939-1946
Search 21,400 Royal Artillery honours and awards for the period 1939-1946. The awards were given to officers and men of the Royal Regiment of Artillery for their gallantry and dedication during WWII. These records are a nominal roll of those awards.
Discover crucial details about your military ancestors and the honours and awards they received while in service.
Search Royal Artillery honours and awards now