Wednesday, April 7, 2010

New Monumental Inscriptions Volume for Longformacus, Berwickshire

We’re delighted to announce the publication of our new Monumental Inscriptions volume for Longformacus, Berwickshire. Longformacus parish sits in the Lammermuir Hills in the north of Berwickshire and has some fine heather moorland and hill farms.  The village was recorded as Langeford Makhous, around 1340 and later in 1430, as Lochrymacus, from the Gaelic Lann Fathir Maccus, the church on the field or slope of Maccus. Ellem and Longformacus churches were dedicated in 1243. James IV met his commanders at Ellem church in 1496 and the Scots army mustered there before Flodden. The parish has grown since it was split from Mordington in 1666. Ellem was added early in the 18th Century, but in 1891, boundary changes moved Ellem to Cranshaws parish.

Like many other volumes in the series, the CD contains a hearth tax list, war memorial inscriptions, a list of kirk ministers and a militia list, as well as the full inscriptions from the 221 gravestones in the old churchyard and new burial ground.
Also included are 392 mortcloth records from 1716 to 1856, mostly with the name of the deceased; and an extract from the Longformacus Public School Admission Log from 1873 to 1913, listing 424 admissions to the school, showing names of pupils and parents, addresses, occupations and dates of pupils’ births. There are indexes to the surnames and places mentioned.

The surnames contained in the monumental inscriptions are Aikman, Allan, Allon, Anderson, Auld, Baillie, Ballantyne, Barrie, Bell, Berry, Bertram, Biggar, Black, Blackhall, Blakbell, Blake, Blong, Bonsema, Boyes, Bradford, Brockie, Broun, Brown, Buchan, Buckham, Burnet, Burns, Cairns, Calder, Cameron, Campbell, Carnegie, Chisholm, Christie, Clark, Cockburn, Collins, Colvin, Connell, Cook, Cowe, Craik, Craise, Creas, Currie, Dale, Dalgliesh, Davidson, Deans, Dickson, Dingwall, Dinwoodie, Dodd, Dodds, Dods, Donaldson, Douglas, Dun, Dunn, Dwdgen, Edgar, Elliot, Erskine, Fair, Fairbairn, Fergie, Ferguson, Flint, Flynn, Ford, Forrest, Fortune, Fouller, Fowler, Galbraith, Gardiner, Garvie, Gaylard, Gibb, Gibson, Graham, Grant, Gray, Grieve, Hall, Hardie, Harkness, Henderson, Henry, Herberson, Hill, Hodge, Hogg, Holme, Hood, Hop, Hope, Horsburgh, Hume, Hunter, Hutcheson, Hwem, Ingles, Ireland, Jaffray, Jeffrey, Johnston, Kay, Kemp, King, Kirk, Kirkpatrick, Kirkwood, Knox, Kyte, Laidlaw, Lamb, Landale, Lauder, Leitch, Liddell, Lindsay, Linton, Lisle, Litter, Luke, Lunn, Macdougall, Mack, Macvie, March, Marchant, Mason, Mccormick, Mcdonald, Mclaren, Mclean, Mcleish, Mcleod, Mickle, Miller, Milne, Moffat, Morrison, Morton, Moscrip, Murdie, Murray, Myln, Neal, Neil, Neish, Oliver, Ord, Ovens, Palmer, Pate, Paterson, Philips, Playfair, Porteous, Purves, Raitt, Rankin, Rankon, Rathie, Redpath, Renton, Richardson, Robertson, Rodger, Ross, Russell, Rutherford, Scott, Sergant, Shannon, Sharp, Sherlaw, Sherriff, Shirlm, Simpson, Sinclair, Smith, Stobie, Sturrock, Swan, Tait, Taylor, Tennent, Thomson, Todd, Trotter, Tunnah, Turnbull, Turner, Tweedie, Usher, Veatch, Veitch, Waldie, Walker, Walkinshaw, Waller, Wanless, Waters, Watson, Weatherly, Weatherston, Webb, Weir, Welsh, Whitehead, Whitlaw, Wight, Wightman, Wilson, Wood, Wtterson, Young.

The Longformacus Monumental Inscriptions CD (price £7.50 plus plus postage) can be obtained from us at 52 Overhaugh St, Galashiels, TD1 1DP, Scotland.

Sunday, March 28, 2010

Papers Past - Brilliant Online Archive of New Zealand Newspapers

Just found a brilliant resource, Papers Past, an online archive containing more than 14 million articles digitised from over 238,000 New Zealand newspapers and periodicals. The collection is from 1839 to 1932 and includes 52 publications from all over New Zealand.

Papers Past is part of the National Library of New Zealand and allows searching by a word or a phrase. The results can be sorted in different ways.
Alternatively, you can browse by date, region or title.

The articles are displayed as they appear in the newspaper, with highlighting, one can select an article and download it as a printable PDF or as a high resolution image, or even have it converted by Optical Character Recognition into a text document on the web page.

And, even better, it's free !

In the very first issue of the New Zealand Gazette and Wellington Spectator for 21 August 1839, I found ads for potential emigrants as well as 'Regulations for labourers wishing to emigrate to New Zealand'.

This article stated that free passage to the colony was available for agricultural labourers, shepherds, bakers, blacksmiths, braziers and tinmen, smiths, shipwrights, boat-builders, wheelwrights, sawyers, cabinet-makers, carpenters, coopers, curriers, farriers, millwrights, harness-makers, boot and shoemakers, tailors, tanners, brickmakers, lime-burners, and all persons engaged in. the erection of buildings, as well as their wives. Children under 1 or over 15 also went free, but the fare for other children was £3 each, a huge cost (about 4 months wages for a Borders farm labourer). The port of embarkation was London, and of course, there would be the cost of getting to London, too.

The advertised on-board diet for adults seems pretty generous and included daily: 1 lb of ship's biscuit (a hard biscuit often with extra protein in the form of weevils), half a pound of meat, 4 oz of flour, a quarter pint of peas, 2 oz of rice, 6 oz of potatoes, and 6 pints of water. The only fruit was raisins - 4 oz, twice a week. On Sundays, a quarter pint of pickled cabbage (presumably to prevent scurvy). Each adult was allowed to take up to half a ton or 20 cubic feet of baggage; but they also had to bring their own bedding.

Why is Borders Family History Society interested ?

Lots of Borderers emigrated to New Zealand, some just went for a visit; and there and a few modern-day Kiwis that came from New Zealand to see the places from which their ancestors came, fell in love with the Borders (very easy) and have decided to stay.

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Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Local and Family History Day, Berwick, England

There will be a Local and Family History Day on Saturday, 20th March from 10am to 4pm at the Guildhall, Berwick (upon Tweed), England, with exhibitions on local and family history in North Northumberland and the Borders.
It's free to get in, so you can afford to take the whole family.

The Programme comprises:
  • 11am Cross Border Family History records - Fred Kennington
  • 12 noon Maritime Berwick - Jim Walker
  • 1pm Bell Tower - Jim Herbert
  • 2pm Aspect of Berwick's History - Francis Cowe
  • 3pm Berwick's Forgotten Motor Industry - Fred Kennington
The aspect of Berwick's history to be covered at 2pm will only be revealed then, so come along and find out what it will be !

Last year's event was really interesting, and I'm sorry to miss this year's event.
Fred Kennington is our membership secretary, and a really good speaker with oodles of experience, so come along and listen to him.

We'll have a stand there, so do come and see us too.

Also, while you're in Berwick, take a wander around this historic city, so often in the midst of conflict between England and Scotland.

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