The aim of the talk was to look at common problems on finding ancestors that appear to be missing, give tricks of the trade, looking for difficult surnames and warning that the information available is often found to be incorrect.
Reading Branch meeting 29th September 2022 Speaker: Sue Ellis Sue took us on a liberally illustrated look at wills, what they look like, what terminology they include and what information they can give a family historian. Wills were first recorded by the ancient Greeks mainly to explain how to dispose of a person's estate of there were no male heirs. Roman wrote wills too. 272-337AD saw the start of the church's involvement in wills. From the Middle Ages, there are two wills still in existence, those of King Alfred and his nephew. During this time wills were proved exclusively by ecclesiasts. Wills have been used to estimate that 60% of the country's population of 60,000 died in the black death. Wills cover land (real estate) which id 'devised' to beneficiaries, and personal estate (belongings, jewellery, clothes, furniture, etc.) which is 'bequeathed'. Prior to 1837, wills that included real estate only covered land that belonged to the testator up to the date of the…
The years immediately after the Great War saw the greatest impetus for erecting war memorials, but there was no co-ordinated programme, resulting in no national pattern or model; each community made its own decisons. Memorials served as a focus for bereaved families for whom there was no known grave.
Wills can reveal much about family relationships that had been hidden during a testator's life
From 1714 to 1837 women experienced significant disadvantages by comparison with men in legal status, education, employment and social life.
Susan Ellis described a number of search tricks which enabled her to find missing ancestors.
Evernote is an app which allows you to collate and store your family history research findings in a variety of formats, and access via a powerful search engine on several synched devices.
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Berkshire Family History Society works to meet the needs of those researching their ancestry across the UK and overseas – as well as those looking for former relatives in historic Berkshire. You do not need to be a member to benefit.
The society offers:
Research Zone in central Reading that is free to use and open to all
Free access at The Centre for Heritage and Family History to online resources like FindMyPast, the 1939 Register, The Genealogist, the British Newspaper Archive and Ancestry (the worldwide edition)
Regular free help and advice sessions
Meetings in Abingdon, Bracknell, Newbury, Reading and Windsor; and a virtual Computer Branch which meets online. All meetings are open to everyone
Community forum – informed answers to research queries and advice from experienced researchers
Members’ Area with data and other information not readily accessible elsewhere
Indexes and transcriptions of Berkshire’s historic records on CD — parish registers, probate documents, monumental inscriptions, maps, First World War history and more
Quarterly magazine, the Berkshire Family Historian, for members
a chance to join in project work, recording, transcribing and helping to preserve records
Links to the research experience, advice and support of members worldwide
