Category Archives: Stories

Six Days, Six Stones – Part 5: Macclesfield Cemetery

This is the fifth of six blog posts, written and published over six consecutive days, looking at some of the family graves that my wife and I visited as part of a recent road trip to celebrate our 40th wedding … Continue reading

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Six Days, Six Stones – Part 4: Longnor, Staffordshire

This is the fourth of six blog posts written after a recent road trip during which my wife and I visited a number of ancestral burial places. You can read the earlier instalments here: Part 1, Part 2 and Part … Continue reading

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Six Days, Six Stones – Part 3: Key Hill Cemetery, Birmingham

The third of my six blogs posted in consecutive days, focussing on particular family gravestones, is a bit of a cheat. The other five are stones that my wife and I saw for the first time on our recent 40th … Continue reading

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Six Days, Six Stones – Part 2: Lacock, Wiltshire

This is the second of six blogs, written and published in six consecutive days, each one focussing on a particular family gravestone which my wife and I visited on our recent 40th Wedding Anniversary road trip. You can read Part … Continue reading

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Six Days, Six Stones – Part 1: Dorchester, Oxfordshire

To mark our 40th Wedding Anniversary, my wife and I arranged a six-day road trip, stopping off at various places connected with our families. Liz, my wife, is an enthusiastic family historian herself so she was very much a partner … Continue reading

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Sunday Morning, Farringdon Road

I’ve always been passionate about art, and a few years ago I stumbled upon a little-known group of early-20th century artists known collectively as the East London Group. I was instantly captivated and wanted to find out more about them. … Continue reading

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The Respectable Printer Of The Times

This is the second part of the story of John Joseph Lawson, printer of The Times. In the first part, A Gross And Scandalous Libel, I covered his ‘trial’ in the House of Lords in 1831. In Part 2, I’m … Continue reading

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A Gross And Scandalous Libel

I was watching some old episodes of Who Do You Think You Are the other day and I was particularly taken by the one featuring Ian McKellen; as engaging, enthusiastic and warm a subject as you could possibly hope to … Continue reading

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The Last of the Moultings

On 2 February 1974, a 72-year old woman called Gladys Elizabeth Moulting died in Canvey Island, Essex. I know very little about Gladys, except that she was the youngest of two children of George Henry and Harriet Amelia Moulting, that … Continue reading

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Incorrigible & Worthless

Researching the lives of our military ancestors can be difficult at the best of times but when it comes to retelling the stories of the seven million men and women who served in the British Army during the First World … Continue reading

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