Newsletter – 7th
December 2022
My Christmas gift to you – LostCousins is FREE for
the rest of this year!
Annual competition STARTS TODAY
Henry the Thirteenth BREAKING
NEWS
A gift for someone close to you
A gift for family historians OFFER EXTENDED
A gift for someone creative ENDS WEDNESDAY 14TH
Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard?
Were our ancestors more susceptible to airborne
diseases?
Lifetime savings at The Genealogist EXCLUSIVE PACKAGE
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
The LostCousins
newsletter is usually published 2 or 3 times a month. To access the previous issue
(dated 25th November) click here; to find earlier articles use the customised Google search between
this paragraph and the next (it searches ALL of the newsletters since February 2009,
so you don't need to keep copies):
To go to the main
LostCousins website click the logo at the top of this newsletter. If you're not
already a member, do join - it's FREE, and you'll get an email to alert you
whenever there's a new edition of this newsletter available!
My gift to you – LostCousins is FREE for the rest of this
year!
From
now until midnight on New Year’s Eve the LostCousins site will be completely
free, allowing you the opportunity to connect with as many new cousins as you can
– and unlike some other sites you won’t be asked to provide bank or
credit card details. Because this offer coincides with the start of my annual competition
(see below) the ancestors and cousins you add to your My Ancestors page will also count as entries - it's a really great
opportunity!
If
you're new to LostCousins, or have forgotten how easy it is to enter relatives,
see the Getting Started Guide on the Help
& Advice page - and remember, all of the key censuses we use are
available FREE online (see the Census Links
page for a list) , so you won’t need any subscriptions at all.
Tip: even if you don’t
add any new relatives you can take advantage of this offer to check for matches
with your existing entries (click the Search button on your My Ancestors page).
It
goes without saying that if you have friends or relatives who are researching
their family tree, but haven’t yet joined, this would be a great time to tell
them about LostCousins – no special codes are required! When the free period
ends they will still have access to all of their data, they will
still be able to correspond with the cousins they’ve found, and they will still
receive my newsletters, but they won’t be put under any pressure to pay
a subscription.
And,
of course, there will be more free periods in 2023 – as there have been every
year since LostCousins was founded!
Annual competition STARTS
TODAY
To
have a chance of winning my competition you only have to do what should come
naturally to any LostCousins member: search for your 'lost cousins', and tell
other family historians about the opportunities that LostCousins offers.
For
those of you who've yet to begin searching for cousins, this is a very good time
to put your excuses to one side and make a start, even if you can only spare 5
minutes a day.
Every direct ancestor
or blood relative you enter on your My
Ancestors page between 7th December 2022 and midnight (London time) on Tuesday
31st January 2023 represents an entry in the competition, and for each one you
enter from the 1881 Census you'll get a bonus entry.
Tip: a 'direct
ancestor' is someone from whom you are descended, such as a great-great
grandparent - many people just call them ancestors; a 'blood relative' is someone
who shares your ancestry, but isn’t a direct ancestor (eg your ancestors'
siblings and cousins, and their descendants).
Last
year there were more prizes and more winners than ever before, and it’s likely
to be same this year! And because I'll be giving away prizes during the
competition period, as well as at the end, the sooner you start adding
relatives, the more chances you'll have of winning. You can win more than one
prize – some entrants won several prizes last year!
Also
last year I introduced the My Prizes page at the LostCousins website:
this lists the prizes on offer and allows you to express your preferences – it doesn’t
guarantee that you'll get the prize that you want, but it does mean that you won’t
be offered a prize that you don't want (because you will only be considered for
prizes that you have rated positively).
Last year the competition moved into the 21st
century with several prizes that took advantage of Zoom to provide unique
experiences and opportunities – from one-to-one consultations with experts, to
exclusive presentations with a small audience so that everyone who wanted to was
able to ask a question. Some sessions were repeated at different times of the
day so that members could join in whichever part of the world they were in.
The
first batch of prizes will be added during the coming week and the My Prizes
page will be updated as prizes are added, so check now and again to see what is
'up for grabs'.
Henry the Thirteenth BREAKING NEWS
As
I was finalising the newsletter this morning I read about the plot to storm the
Reichstag and overthrow the German government. According to this BBC article, a Prince
Heinrich XIII, aged 71, is alleged to be a central character in the planned
coup. No doubt a lot will be revealed in the coming days, but as a genealogist
I was more intrigued by the name.
Searching
the Internet I discovered that Heinrich XIII Prinz Reuss zu Köstritz was born
in 1951, so could conceivably be the 71 year-old referred to (and a later BBC
article seems to confirm this). But whether he is or not, I thought you would
be interested to know about the naming system in his family. It appears that from
the 13th century onwards all male children of the House of Reuss, which
ruled over parts of Germany from medieval times until the aftermath of the
First World War, were named Heinrich (Henry) in honour of the Holy Roman
Emperor, Henry VI (1190-97).
Over
time the Reuss family became divided into an elder line and a younger line: in
the elder line the numbering of the Heinrich’s increased until they reached
100, then started again from 1; in the younger line the number restarted from 1
at the beginning of each century. This explains how the father of Heinrich XIII,
Heinrich I (b1908), could have been the son of Heinrich XXXIV (b1887).
According
to thepeerage.com Heinrich
XXXIV was the son of Heinrich XXVIII (b1859), whose own father and grandfather were
Heinrich XII (b1829) and Heinrich LXIII (b1786) – note how the numbering
restarted at the beginning of the 19th century.
Readers
of my age will be familiar with the music hall song I'm Henery the Eighth, I
Am which was written in 1910 and recorded by Harry Champion in 1911. You
can hear his rendition on YouTube,
though you’re more likely to remember the much shorter Herman’s Hermits version which topped the
US charts in 1965.
As
far as I know there was never a German song called Ich bin Heinrich XXVIII,
ich bin…..
Note:
another Holy Roman Emperor was in the news recently – a coded letter sent by
Charles V in 1547 has been decoded for the first time. See this BBC article for more
details.
On
the last day of November the 1921 Census of Scotland launched at ScotlandsPeople – pages from the
census cost 6 credits (equivalent to £1.50). National Records of Scotland, which operates the
ScotlandsPeople site, was created following the merger of the General Register
Office for Scotland and the National Archives of Scotland.
For
many documents ScotlandsPeople is the only online source, so it’s unfortunate
that they don’t offer subscriptions – even the 19th century censuses
are only available on a pay-per-view basis (at the same 6 credits per page). However
the overall cost of family history research isn’t necessarily higher for
researchers with Scottish ancestry, because ScotlandsPeople offers instant online
access to historic birth, marriage, and death registers – and again, the price
is 6 credits, which represents a substantial saving compared to the cost of
PDFs and paper certificates for England & Wales.
The
good news for LostCousins members is that ScotlandsPeople offers free access to
the LDS transcription of the 1881 Census, the one that we use at LostCousins.
For more information about free Scottish records see this article
by Chris Paton on the website of Who Do You Think You Are? magazine.
A gift for someone close to you
Each
year I try to find something that I can give to members as an early Christmas
present. This year I’m going to give you the opportunity to purchase a Joint
subscription (covering two LostCousins accounts) for the price of a Single
subscription.
If
you have already linked your account to that of your spouse, partner, in-law, or
other close family member, all you need to do is enter the code TWOFORONE
in the Special Offers box at the bottom of the Subscribe page, then
click Apply.
Don’t
worry if you haven’t linked the accounts yet, it won’t take 2 minutes. Simply
enter the other person’s Membership number (shown on their My Summary
page, or in a password reminder email) in the relevant box on your My
Details page, and choose the appropriate relationship from the dropdown
menu.
Note:
if the other person isn’t a member yet they’ll need to register first. If you’re
going to be the one doing all the research you can use your own email address
for their account, just so long as the password is different.
This
offer isn’t just for Christmas – I’ll keep this offer running as long as I
possibly can, so that members who already have a subscription can benefit.
A gift for family historians OFFER EXTENDED
Although
Findmypast’s subscription sale ended at the beginning of last week there’s
still one way you can grab a bargain – purchase a Gift Subscription at a 25%
discount. Findmypast will send the gift on the date you specify (which can be
up to 90 days from the date of purchase), and the recipient will have up to 90
days to activate the subscription.
Gift
subscriptions don’t renew automatically – so you’re not entering into a commitment
for yourself or the recipient, though they do have the option of renewing if
they wish (at their cost, not yours!).
The
Gift Subscription offer is available at all of Findmypast’s sites – please use
the relevant link below to support LostCousins with your purchase.
Findmypast.co.uk
– SAVE 25% ON 3 & 12 MONTH PLUS & PRO GIFT SUBSCRIPTIONS
Findmypast.com.au
– SAVE 25% ON 3 & 12 MONTH PLUS & PRO GIFT SUBSCRIPTIONS
Findmypast.ie
– SAVE 25% ON 3 & 12 MONTH PLUS & PRO GIFT SUBSCRIPTIONS
Findmypast.com
– SAVE 25% ON 3 & 12 MONTH ULTIMATE GIFT SUBSCRIPTIONS
A gift for someone creative ENDS
WEDNESDAY 14TH
You’ve
got just a week to take advantage of the EXCLUSIVE 30% discount that I’ve arranged
with Poems by Post, the creative enterprise that helps up-and-coming poets and
artists by distributing copies of their work to subscribers.
A
3 month subscription costs less than £20 (thanks to the discount), and for this
the lucky recipient will receive three hand-typed poems at monthly intervals,
each complemented by matching artwork. If you use this link
the LC30 discount code will appear automatically in your shopping basket.
Of
course, you can also buy 12 month subscriptions as gifts – and you can even buy
a subscription for yourself! Take a look round the website
– I think you’ll be impressed!
Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard?
14th
December is also the closing date for the poetry competition I wrote
about last month. LostCousins has teamed up with Poems
by Post to run a competition that anyone can take part in!
We
would like you to write a poem about, or addressed to, one of your ancestors –
or, alternatively, a poem about one of the ‘lost cousins’ you’ve found. It doesn’t
need to be a new poem, just so long as it meets the criteria, and hasn’t been
published.
The
length and style are entirely up to you – and despite what I was taught at
school, poems don’t need to rhyme. You’ll find some guidance on writing poetry here on
the Poems by Post website.
Send
your entries to hello@poemsbypost.org
to arrive no later than 14th December. No more than three poems per
entrant, please. The entries will be judged by Alex, the founder of Poems by
Post, who has donated a £50 voucher for the 1st prize as well as five £10
vouchers for the runners-up.
The
winning poem will also be featured on the Poems by Post website, and (provided it’s
not too long) in a forthcoming issue of this newsletter. Fame at last!
Were our ancestors more susceptible to airborne diseases?
For
more than 2000 years it was believed that many diseases were caused by miasma
(or ‘bad air’ – the term ‘malaria’ comes from the same root). It wasn’t until
the late 19th century that doctors and scientists generally accepted
that diseases were caused by germs,
organisms that were invisible to the naked eye.
Of
course, it’s hardly surprising that our ancestors associated disease with
noxious odours – unsanitary conditions are likely to lead to both. Even today
we regard fresh air as important to our health, something that has come to the
fore during the current pandemic.
A
scientific paper published
yesterday appears to explain why fresh air might not always be good for us – it
seems that our bodies are less able to fight off infection if the air we are
breathing is cold. This also explains why we’re more likely to succumb to colds
in winter, even though the viruses that are responsible are present the whole
year round.
The
paper is not free, but you will find a summary of the findings in this CNN article.
I was intrigued by the suggestion that wearing a mask helps to protect an
individual against infection by raising the temperature of the air – this accords
with earlier research which demonstrated that the warmer and moister air under
a mask reduces the chance of contracting COVID-19, and implies that wearing a
scarf around my mouth and nose, as I did in the early days of the pandemic (before
masks were readily available), was more effective than I thought.
We
didn’t have central heating at home until 1970 – none of my grandparents were
as cossetted as the modern generation – and earlier ancestors would have lived
and worked in even worse conditions. It’s no wonder that so many of them died
from airborne diseases like tuberculosis!
Note:
I’ve written in the past about scarlet fever, which I contracted at the age of
5 and was unable to shake off completely until my tonsils were removed at the
end of 1956. Sadly scarlet fever and other ailments caused by the Strep A
bacteria have been in the news recently, following the deaths of several young
children, however it’s worth reminding ourselves that older people can also
succumb, as this article
from 3 years ago explains.
I
suspect the last thing you’d expect to see when wandering round a south London
housing estate built in the 1960s is a church spire designed by Sir Christopher
Wren after the fire of London in 1666.
This
is just one of the in-spiring stories on the Living London History website,
run by a young man who acts as a guide for tourists and anyone else interested
in the history of London. Well done, Jack!
If
you’re interested in history you might like to attend a free online talk about the
origins of Lying-in-State in Westminster Hall on 15th December – you
can find out more details and book if you follow this link.
Note:
at 6pm this evening I’m attending another free online talk, this time about the
Elizabeth Tower (which houses Big Ben). If you read this in time you might be still
able to book here.
Lifetime savings at The Genealogist EXCLUSIVE
PACKAGE
As
I mentioned when launching this offer last month, because Ancestry and
Findmypast are in the news so much, it’s very easy to forget that there’s
another subscription site which offers online access to hundreds of millions of
(mostly) British records.
The
Genealogist has the most comprehensive collection of tithe maps and tithe
records – enabling me to pinpoint the cottage where my great-great-great-great
grandmother had moved to when she grew too old to run the Three Compasses
at Patchetts Green. An important ongoing project is the 1910 Land Valuation –
known to many as ‘the Lloyd George Domesday’; the focus on maps is also evident
when you search the censuses. This 3 minute video demonstrates how the Map Explorer
feature works – I’m still getting to grips with it, but the potential is
enormous.
And
whilst you might wonder if we really need another source for the England &
Wales censuses when we already have Ancestry, Findmypast, and FamilySearch it’s
important to remember that FamilySearch source their census transcriptions from
Findmypast – even, ironically, for the 1881 Census which (as most of you will
know) was originally transcribed in a volunteer project co-ordinated by
FamilySearch.
For
example, Diane in Canada told me how she managed to find her great-great
grandfather in the 1881 Census at The Genealogist – after failing to locate him
at either Ancestry or Findmypast. Like one of my great-great grandfathers he
was a coppersmith, and Diane discovered where her elusive ancestor was by searching
on his surname and occupation alone. It turned out that the forenames of the
members of that household were completely missing from the census, but to compound
the problem her great-great grandfather’s age was wrong in the Ancestry and
Findmypast transcriptions (to be fair, it was an understandable error).
The
special offer I’ve negotiated for LostCousins members includes:
- 1 year Diamond Subscription to
The Genealogist
- 1 Year Subscription to Discover
Your Ancestors Online Magazine (worth £24.95)
- Discover Your Ancestors'
Occupations
by Laura Berry, digital edition (worth £9.95)
- Researching and Locating Your
Ancestors
by Celia Heritage, digital edition (worth £9.95)
- Discover Your Ancestors Compendium
featuring 12 monthly editions from 2021, digital edition (worth £9.95)
- TreeView 2 discount
voucher offering £10 off the Windows or Mac software
You
get all this for just £94.95, a saving of almost £100 compared to the list
prices.
But
that’s not all: should you decide you want to continue your Diamond Subscription
you’ll pay just £94.95 for the second year, and the same in the third year – indeed
the price will never go up so long as there is no break in your subscription.
Think of it as a Lifetime discount!
To
take advantage of this offer please follow this link.
Tip:
you can find out more about The Genealogist in this presentation which
Mark Bayley gave to LostCousins members in March – it’s entitled ‘How The
Genealogist can knock down brick walls’.
Much
of the history I learned – or, rather, didn’t learn – at school was written by
men, taught by men, and focused almost exclusively on the lives and
achievements of men. Woman generally only got a mention when, through an accident
of birth, they succeeded to the throne.
A
new website, created
by a group of women who are passionate about history, focuses on a few of the many
women who history forgot – A Few Forgotten Women is well worth a look!
The
Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Last
week I read about a 53 year-old Texas woman who was reunited with her family after
51 years, having been abducted by a babysitter at the age of 22 months in 1971.
You can read all about this amazing story here.
That’s
a great example of how DNA works when it is used properly, but I also read a
story recently about a man who was wrongly charged with murder because the DNA
evidence that linked him to the victim was allowed to overshadow all the other
evidence. Nothing wrong with the DNA test, it was the way the evidence was
used.
Even
worse is when people spread scare stories, like this one.
As DNA expert Blaine Bettinger said on Twitter, “I don’t even know where to
begin with all the misconceptions and errors in this article!”.
DNA
has linked thousands of adopted children to their parents, solved countless
crimes, and led to the release of hundreds of innocent people. Used properly it’s
one of the greatest wonders of the modern world – and for genealogists it’s
often the only way they can overcome gaps in the written records.
Last
week the BBC journalist Angela Johnston reported the
story of a Newcastle man who returned from holiday to discover that all his
possessions, including his father’s ashes and other mementoes, had been disposed
of following a mix-up.
He’s
not the first person to lose all of his worldly possessions, but for it to
happen as the result of an administrative error is quite horrifying.
I started off by
telling you about the present that I’m giving to LostCousins members this Christmas
– so I thought I’d end by telling you about the present I’ve bought for myself,
a pasta making machine.
I’ve
always avoided making pasta in the past, reasoning that if most Italians are
happy to consume dried pasta there was little reason for me to go the effort of
making my own. However after starting to make my own pizza bases earlier this
year, and discovering how much better they are than the shop-bought variety, I
decided to splash out on this modestly-priced machine.
I’ve
also bought an attachment that I can use to make pici, my all-time
favourite pasta, which is hard to find even in Italy, and very expensive to buy
in the UK.
The Gift Subscription offer at Findmypast has been extended - it now runs until Friday 23rd December!
Peter Calver
Founder, LostCousins
© Copyright 2022 Peter Calver
Please do NOT copy or republish any part of this newsletter without permission - which is only granted in the most exceptional circumstances. However, you MAY link to this newsletter or any article in it without asking for permission - though why not invite other family historians to join LostCousins instead, since standard membership (which includes the newsletter), is FREE?
Many of
the links in this newsletter and elsewhere on the website are affiliate links –
if you make a purchase after clicking a link you may be supporting LostCousins
(though this depends on your choice of browser, the settings in your browser,
and any browser extensions that are installed). Thanks for your support!