Tall Tales from the Trees

When we were growing up, the only family “heritage” of which my father spoke was the line of his great grandmother, the staunch non-conformi...

Louisa Salter, a first cousin of my great grandfather’s, spent her life surrounded by new editions of the Bible, or rather by men driven to ...

Michael Castle, my 4x great uncle, was part of a powerful merchant family in 18 th century Bristol. He was a whisky distiller in partnersh...

Mary Castle, a first cousin of my great grandfather, got married in 1865, the same year her new husband Edmund Daubeny began a living as re...

Most of my paternal ancestors are elsewhere – if not actually overseas, then certainly in corners of the United Kingdom not immediately ac...

Walter S Masterman, whose grandfather Thomas Gurney was my great great grandmother’s brother, is best known as a prolific author of the 1920...

A dahabeeah on the Nile at Cairo A news item from the Suez Mail, relayed in New Zealand’s Southland Times on 25 th February 1...

Austin Cooper, Austin the Settler , my 8x great grandfather who came to Ireland in 1661, laid out the parkland of Blessington House for the ...

I’ve been sifting through another bundle of letters from the writing desk of my 3x great uncle Charles Castle. This lot are from his niece M...