Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

Hey great, thanks sejintenej! Maybe now I can actually trace my Grandfather back in Ireland. Trouble is that I know virtually nothing about him, other than he left Cork at some point between 1900 and 1914 to join the RA serving in India. My father was born in Madras and tracing him is a real sod too. I have no living family members to get more information from so this could get hard.

sejintenej wrote:

Vonny wrote:

blondie95 wrote:parents have over theyears told me a through interesting bits like a famous smuggler shot on the beach on my mothers side!

I found out that one of my paternal relatives was jailed for 8 months for smuggling

and one of mine was a customs watchman!!!! (but that was 1610)

Only until 16:10. Why's that ?

Did he go off duty at a quarter past four ?

Perhaps that's when he went on duty?

My father used to bore us rigid doing the family tree to try to claim a ttitle and of course some land - he got back to the early C17th to Captain John Thompson who ran a ship over to America and back - he was in the rope trade and lived in Cut Throat Lane in Limehouse.

Isn't it funny how our parents will try to introduce us to genealogy or classical music or something like that and you are bored rigid. Then, years later you get into it yourself and think, why didn't I listen back then?

I agree about classical music but would have no time for genealogy

There's too much of now and the future to deal with

J.R. wrote:

sejintenej wrote:

Vonny wrote: I found out that one of my paternal relatives was jailed for 8 months for smuggling

and one of mine was a customs watchman!!!! (but that was 1610)

Only until 16:10. Why's that ?

Did he go off duty at a quarter past four ?

Then Sean's relative should have had more sense and waited until 1611 - this was in Ireland, mind you, and I suspect that not many of them had clocks

My Grandfather left Cork to join the army in serving India. It was that or starve I think, he was one of 18 kids. His daddy had a lot of fun!

Another useful resource: I've found that there are lots of incredibly generous people on http://www.rootschat.com/forum who help with advice and "look-up" requests .

sport! wrote:Another useful resource: I've found that there are lots of incredibly generous people on http://www.rootschat.com/forum who help with advice and "look-up" requests .

Nice one; thanks. To take the reference further, there is a major problem for Catholics but it is re[ported that the Mormons have come to an agreement which will put the RC records on the IGI: There is a final post which indicates that records may be on the web in the future.

http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.ph ... 992.0.html

sport! wrote:Another useful resource: I've found that there are lots of incredibly generous people on http://www.rootschat.com/forum who help with advice and "look-up" requests .

Thanks for that bit of info. I've been on there this afternoon. Some very helpful people on who respond very quickly. I've been juggling you lot and them all afternoon when I should have been making paper water lilies and lilypads.

soc wrote:Hey great, thanks sejintenej! Maybe now I can actually trace my Grandfather back in Ireland. Trouble is that I know virtually nothing about him, other than he left Cork at some point between 1900 and 1914 to join the RA serving in India. My father was born in Madras and tracing him is a real sod too. I have no living family members to get more information from so this could get hard.

The army have lots of records you can search if you have the name of the regiment, and better if you have his number. Even in India!

The army will only give out the info if you have a relavent birth certificate and that is one thing I don't have

Maybe if you explain that you are the next of kin/researching on behalf of your parents and you don't have a birth certificate, they may take pity on you! I don't remember having to produce a birth cert. to find out about my Grandad. Maybe some other forms of id would be acceptable - death cert, marriage cert, anything you may have.

To research my own grandfather's Army service I needed his death certificate though not his birth certificate, similarly this was the key document for researching my wife's grandfather's Army career. For my own grandfather I needed to complete a 'certificate of kinship' to confirm I was the bonafide next of kin and I was able to do the same for my wife's grandfather by getting the next of kin to sign an authorisation. Claiming was medals can be a bit more complex as they can only be issued to the next of kin themselves but ultimately this too proved successful (WWII medals only) in both cases. PM me if you want more info - I think I still have copies of all the paperwork.