It could be said that most people take their surnames for granted. Perhaps those of us who spend time looking at our family history are more familiar with them than others, as we are often to be found scouring through records for particular names, paying close attention to spelling and cursing incorrect transcriptions! But how… Read more What’s in a name?
If you’ve been reading the account of Frederick Keynton, early twentieth century Landlord of the Black Dog at Broadmayne, you’ll remember that his father, George, was a Foreman with GWR’s locomotive division at Weymouth, but in 1892 George Keynton changed tack. He moved to become the Landlord of the Black Dog in Broadmayne – still… Read more The Black Dog and a Slew of Christmas Weddings [Part 2]
Christmas Day weddings were common in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as this was one of the few days off granted to working people, and on Christmas Day, 25 December 1863, George Edward Smith, engine fitter, married Sarah Lester at Swindon, Wiltshire. And so begins a story, threaded through with Christmases, which we uncovered because… Read more The Black Dog and a Slew of Christmas Weddings [Part 1]
This account appeared in the Dorset County Chronicle on 16th June 1842: Marshwood- Unlucky Accident- a young man of this parish had the misfortune, about a fortnight since, to cut off two of his fingers, with a hook, whilst engaged in chopping a stake to assist him to carry his box home from his late… Read more A Marshwood Accident and a Mysterious Family
Welcome to the sixth part of our series exploring the history of Icen Cottage, Fordington. In previous blogs, we have introduced you to the cottage, shown you some of the earliest documents relating to the cottage, discussed some of the problems when trying to identify the people who lived in the cottage, introduced George Cull as one… Read more Icen Cottage – Thomas Provis Wickham
Our volunteer David has been digging into his family history, and exploring the lives of his parents through the letters they sent. To celebrate Valentine’s Day, David has had a look at the love letters sent by his parents… — My parents met at a Christmas dance at the Rock Hotel in Weymouth on 23… Read more Love Letters and Family Tales
This is the third blog on the history of Icen Cottage in Fordington. In our previous blog concerning Icen Cottage we mentioned a bundle of documents concerning the transfer of the Copyhold of a cottage and garden in Fordington known as Dolls Hole and later as Icen Cottage. In that blog we wrote about Ambrose… Read more Icen Cottage – The Masters Family – Too Many John Masters!
For a recent visit to the searchroom, we produced this photograph of Mrs Waygood, postmistress of Glanvilles Wootton. The inscription on the back proudly proclaims her ‘The oldest postmistress in England, probably’. Colour us intrigued! As we took a closer look at her life in our records, a tangled knot began to reveal itself… Simple… Read more Detangling a family tree
At Dorset History Centre, we are keen to encourage guest blogs from our readers detailing the research and work they are undertaking. Michael Pitfield has written us this second post (you can read the first here if you missed it) explaining where fifty years of genealogical research have led him… — For some 50 years,… Read more The Pitfield Family of Fordington
At Dorset History Centre, we are keen to encourage guest blogs from our readers detailing the research and work they are undertaking. In this blog, Michael Pitfield explains where fifty years of genealogical research have led him… — For some 50 years, my distant cousin Hugh Pitfield and I have been researching our Pitfield genealogy.… Read more The Pitfield Family of Dorset
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