The brick wall is a bit shaky

Since I last added to this blog quite a bit has happened. Firstly I was made redundant in September which has given me a bit of time to do some tidying up of all the information I have.
Recently the Ancestry UK site has added more WW1 soldiers to the database. I have found an extra 11 pages of information about my grandfathers service that I didn't have. This is prior to his time in the Royal Guernsey Light Infantry.
From what I can gather from the papers he was one of the young men that lied about their age when they enlisted. He gave his age as 19 years and 3 months when he enlisted 2 Oct 1915 when in fact he wasn't born until 28 Oct 1898 which means he was only just 16.
I also think I may have found out what happened to my grandmothers father. It seems that nobody in the family ever spoke about him after he seperated ffom his wife whilst my grandmother was only a year or so old.
I have found a soldier in the records with the same name, birth year, birthplace and also with a brother of matching name and age and living in the same area. This, however, is not enough information to match them up and the papers offer no further details.
This man is listed as previously serving in the Grenadier Guards so they are my next avenue of research. The record of all their men are kept in the Regimental Archives, so I have sent an initial enquiry and am awaiting an answer.
Resarch in to the lunatic Mary Yale is continuing as I have now paid for some research to be done in London ( chancery records ) to find out when and how she was considered to be a lunatic.
I am now also available to carry out family history research in the Nottinghamshire area so if you have any that needs doing, especially if you live out of the country and doing it yourself isn't financially viable, please visit the "research" page on my website at www.theoldmeadows.site90.net or email me at nottsfamilies@talktalk.net with your details

Quandries

Found a few more ELLIS ancestors in London and Nottingham so I'll put them on Ancestry UK sometime today.
Not done any more on the Mary Yale story yet. Still looking at how to best add the family tree to the oldmeadows site. I want to make it easy for people to follow.

Holiday or will it be?

I have just finished work for the week and have one or two little projects that I want to get started and a few more that I want to finish.
I have heard from the researcher re- Mary Yale and intend to go ahead with that project as soon as possible.
Family history wise I intend to visit Flintham sometime this week to see if I can photograph the graves of the Cheethams in the churchyard there. These are the ancestors I am furthest back with at the moment.
I want to start an ebay page to buy and sell old documents and letters (another of my interests) which I might also incorporate into the oldmeadows web site. I might also include old photographs and albums etc.

Web site update

I have been working on the menu for the web site all weekend and think I have just about cracked it. Keep checking www.theoldmeadows.site90.net
to keep up with developments. Ive sent for an estimate for the research in to the papers of Mary Yale today so hopefully I'll get a favourable response some time in the week.

Tree on line

Hi all,
I've just put the family tree on the web at Ancestry uk so anyone interested can look it up on there, although I'm not sure if you have to be a paying member. Those of you who aren't will soon be able to view it on the website at www.theoldmeadows.co.uk.
I'm still working on it but the menus are a bit of a headache.
I've had one or two answers to my email queries about Mary Yale and her family but nothing thats taken me any further, but it's early days yet.

Brick Walls

Nearly everyone in family history circles come up to a brick wall every now and again. I have reached that point with my great grandfather, John Quarrell Chaplin. I have him on the 1901 census living in Nottingham but I can find no sign of his death in the BMD indexes. Similarly with his father, Thomas, I can find no record of his death.
On a brighter note I have found out a bit more about Mary Yale. The copy of the will of Isabella Fenton ties Mary in to that family as it mentions her as "my daughter, Mary Yale." I have to write off now to the archives in West Yorkshire to see if they have information that might help me.