Family history research stops me dead in my tracks

Family history research can sometimes stop you dead in your tracks. It is impossible not to empathise with your ancestors and family members, impossible not to put yourself in their shoes.

How did my mother feel, aged 14, to be told just a few days before Christmas that her dad had died and she was orphaned? How did Margaret’s great-grandmother feel leaving three children, including a baby, in the workhouse at Market Harborough? How did my grandfather feel about to go into battle at Loos in the First World War?

This morning I’d been on a bit of a side project. I’d picked up the laptop and was spending an hour in bed with Holly and Gravel (our two springer spaniels) snoozing peacefully and I thought I’d try to tie up some loose ends.

The family history project had started with me scanning some photos and loading them to Flickr for safe keeping. I’d asked Margaret her grandfather’s name and she didn’t know it. We now know so much ...

One of the pictures in the box was of Margaret’s Aunt Edna, the sister of her dad Norman, and a very stern-looking woman - not the sort you’d want to be on the wrong side of. Margaret didn’t know much about her except that she had a daughter named Delores and had married a Pole or “jam roll” (as he was unaffectionately called) after the Second World War. That match clearly hadn’t gone down well with the family.

Aunt Edna - quite stern looking

After the war, even when I was a boy, there were still refugee camps around Cheshire. Marbury Camp, on the site of old Marbury Hall was a collection of dozens of small brick bungalows with concrete roofs hastily put up to house people displaced from all over Europe. The Poles had been our allies and were generally fairly well thought of, but they weren’t English and there was a wariness (and dislike) of foreigners in those days that just doesn’t exist in the same way now.

There were also camps at Delamere and Oulton Park, where the race track is now. It’s funny because we are now having a second wave of Polish immigrants and there’s a certain tension about “Poles taking our jobs”. I guess it was the same back then, although the Poles of the late 1940s were fleeing for their lives first from Hitler and then from Stalin; they certainly weren’t economic migrants.

I thought I’d try to trace Aunt Edna’s history. I had a birth year, place of birth and her maiden name - Edna Burrows. Looking for a marriage record produced some possibilities. There was a marriage between an Edna Burrows and a Henry Carpendale in Northwich in 1941. Carpendale didn’t sound very Polish. I then found a Delores born to Edna and Henry Carpendale. So Edna had married Henry Carpendale, a serjeant in the 2nd Battalion, Staffordshire Regiment in 1941 and they had a daughter. Chances are that Henry had been killed and she’d remarried (the Pole) after the war.

It didn’t take long to confirm that. Henry Carpendale is buried in a war cemetery in Tunisia along with 2,000 others who died in the final battle to take Tunis in 1943. The Staffordshire regiment had been involved in some bitter fighting and had to hold a couple of strategic hills against fierce German counter-attacks.

The Germans had been driven out of north Africa, but less than two years after being married, aged 25 and with a daughter just a year old, Edna was a widow.

Furnished with Edna’s married name, I was able to search again and I soon came up with a second marriage, this time to Aleksander Mikalski in 1948, when Edna was 31. This was the marriage that had caused such controversy, so much that it was still talked of in resentful terms 30 years later. She was the one who married the Pole ...

What could I find out about Aleksander? He was born in 1922, five years younger than Edna and would have been just 17 when the Nazis invaded his country. Had he fought in the war? Perhaps he’d been a Spitfire pilot or in one of the fierce-fighting Polish battalions who hated the Germans with such a vengeance.

I did a quick search and the first match that was returned was entitled “Germany, Dachau Concentration Camp Records, 1945”. It was one of those moments when your blood runs cold.

Aleksander Mikalski - prisoner number 4460 - had arrived in Dachau by train on 19 April 1940 (the Germans kept excellent records) and he had managed to survive five years of forced labour, starvation, overcrowding and a typhus epidemic to be freed when the Americans liberated Dachau in 1945. The US soldiers were so appalled by what they saw in the camp that they started executing the German guards. The incident is now shrouded in mystery, some estimates say 500 guards were killed by American soldiers and freed camp prisoners. There was a court martial, but the US commander General Patton dismissed the charges and witness records were destroyed.

Aleksander made Northwich his home; he married Edna Carpendale, a 31-year-old widow with a six-year-old child three years later and died in hospital in Manchester, in 1969, aged 49.

Polish prisoners celebrate their liberation at Dachau concentration camp

There are links here to previous blog postings concerning family history:

Richard Gibson Little

Family History Mysteries

Family History Medals

Could my ancestors vote?

Letter from Amarica

Would Zachariah have seen a banana?

Visiting the past ...

Welcome to the family

Pelsall Colliery follow-up

Relative killed in mining disaster

Sam and Lucy on the move

Last week, I helped Sam and Lucy move from their flat in Blackstock Road, Highgate to a new rented house in Priory Avenue, Walthamstow.

They had a nice, but rather expensive place in Highbury which was reached through a gated passageway with two bedrooms and a bathroom downstairs and an open plan lounge, dining area and kitchen upstairs. It was open and airy, but also lovely and warm and had a small balcony with just enough room for a barbecue, a couple of deck chairs and a score of pot plants.

They’d been planning to stay there until next December when they are off to live in France for six months for some intensive skiing, but actually got notice late last year that their tenancy was to terminate at the end of January.

I’m speculating here, but rents in London have been rising fast and perhaps the landlord realised he could get a step change in the rent, rather than an inflation rise with Sam and Lucy as existing tenants. They started looking for a new place around the same area, but there was nothing nice in their price range and to get what they had previously would have cost around £2,300 per month - a massive increase. To put that into perspective, a friend’s son is renting a very nice two-bedroomed flat close to Peterborough station and is getting around £750 per month. You can see why people commute!

Time was running a bit short and they decided to look for a place further afield to widen the choice and improve prices. Walthamstow village was their choice as it is at the end of the Victoria line, so Lucy can commute into Imperial fairly easily and it’s handy for the doctors’ surgery in Leyton where Sam is working.

They found a nice place, but lost it due to availability not matching with when they had to be out, but the estate agent kept their details and contacted Sam when this place in Priory Avenue became available - sometimes estate agents can be useful! The owners had put it up for sale, but then had decided to rent it instead. Perhaps, like Tom and Hannah, they hadn’t been able to find a buyer at the right price and didn’t want to leave it empty?

Sam and Lucy went round at lunchtime after getting the call in the morning and agreed to take it immediately. You have to move fast!

Unfortunately, the new house was not available to move in until one day after they had to be out of the old place. They were unable to get an extra day because the landlord had someone else moving in straight away, so Sam had rented a space in one of the self-store warehouses that have become so popular in order to store their possessions for a night.

The plan was to move everything out of Blackstock Road into the store one day and then move everything out of the store into Priory Avenue the next. It was like moving twice, but nothing could be done.

I’ve moved all my children at various times and Sam is by far the most organised. There was the famous time when Tom and Hannah moved from Peterborough to Bow and I arrived with the van at 9am to find Tom still in bed, quite drunk from his leaving do the night before and nothing packed. I think he’d been in the Met Lounge with Rucksack until about 3am. He’ll be grumpy that I’ve recounted that story, but it is true.

Sam had some help from Tom Ingham, an old  schoolfriend now living in London, earlier in the week, so had been able to move some boxes into store already; John, Lucy’s dad, had also taken down shelves and pictures and filled in the holes so Sam could paint over them. It was a really good job, you couldn’t tell where anything had been unless you knew and looked very closely.

I met Sam at King’s Cross at 9am on Thursday and we walked up Pentonville Road to the van hire place. On his last move, he’d hired a wreck of a van from some dodgy place near the Arsenal ground. It was old, battered and the engine sounded as if it might cough its last any minute. The doors didn’t shut or lock very well and on one run the side door flew open and the spare wheel (which was just loose in the back) flew out and went rolling along Stroud Green Road. Thank goodness it:

• Didn’t hit anyone/anything
• Didn’t happen when the van was full of furniture
• Didn’t happen when I was in the van

This van was pretty new and in very good condition. We drove up through Islington to Highbury and were lucky to find an empty slot just outside the front. John and Tibor (who is married to Lucy’s sister Natasha) were going to help with the move, but had not arrived when we got there. Lucy was hard at it with cleaning after the furniture was moved out.

Sam and I decided to try to get a van-load into store before John and Tibor came and we got busy filling the van. Everything was packed, so we were able to fill up quite quickly. The store was at Leyton, not far from the football ground or from Malta Road where Lucy’s mum and dad now live and where Sam and Lucy lived for a while. It’s basically a massive warehouse divided up inside into three storeys and multiple size lockable compartments which vary from post boxes (where people can have mail delivered) to stores the size of a shipping container. Sam had got a fair-sized space in the first floor and it was not too full, we’d get everything in quite easily. We piled boxes as high as we could and when we got back to Highbury, John and Tibor were there to guide Sam into a parking slot. Half and hour later, we could get cracking. We needed John as he had tools needed to dismantle various bits of furniture - Allen keys (or hex spanners, as the Americans call them) and screwdrivers. John had also come in his Fiat Scudo van, so we had two trucks available.

Tibor pitches in enthusiastically, John is good at unscrewing things, so we made a good team and got on pretty quickly. By 3pm, we were on the last two vans and decided to leave them loaded so that next day we could start unloading straight away. It would give us a flying start.

It was a slightly later start on Friday because Sam and Lucy had to sort out the contract and pick up the keys. I got off at Finsbury Park and took the Victoria line to the end - Walthamstow. I’d made the trip a few times before when I was going to see Sam in Malta Road. There was a cafe - the Coffee Lounge - just around the corner and I popped in there to wait for them. They were really friendly, much nicer than central London and much cheaper too.

The new house was really nice. It’s down a quiet road of terraced houses and they’re all nice an uniform - a proper terrace. The previous owners were clearly keen gardeners and they had lots of nice plants. There is a tree fern and two Japanese acers in the front garden, a tiled path to the house and at the back there’s a good-sized garden with a large bamboo, a decked area, a raised patio at the bottom and a shed. At the back of the house is a lean-to with washing machine, boiler and freezer; there’s a kitcken diner and a good-sized front room. Upstairs, there’s two good-sized bedrooms, a box room and a bathroom. It’s well kept with loads of shelf space. It’s also £300 a month cheaper, a bit more room and a nice garden.

Although it’s further out than Highbury, getting to central London is good because the Victoria line is so fast. I really, really liked the place.

So all we had to do was get moved in. Tibor had been held up by an accident and so was still having his breakfast at Malta Road when Lucy called, so Sam and I collected the van and unloaded it. Tibor and John arrived as we were leaving for the store and we left them to unload John’s van.

The store was much busier than it had been on Thursday. There were a number of vans parked up and quite a few traders were clearly using the place to store stock. There was a bloke loading a van with motorcycle gear - leathers, jackets and helmets - obviously off to a show or fair. There was a woman push around whole racks of clothes on Next hangars - I wonder how much of this stuff is knocked off?

The house soon filled up and I was able to help unpacking boxes during the afternoon while Sam and Tibor did the last run to the warehouse. I don’t think anything was broken, which was a success.

The only two issues were good old Virgin Media, which had quoted a time of 1pm to 6pm to set up broadband and just didn’t turn up. Sam spoke to three people in their Indian call centre before he found anyone to give an answer. They’d decided it was a two-man job, so hadn’t come, was the reason - what a shower! What’s more, now they had to come on a Saturday, it would take them three weeks. I’ll add Virgin to my list of blacklisted companies never to do business with.

The other, very annoying, thing was that Sam and Lucy’s TV was stolen. We don’t know how or where. It was in John’s van when he left Highbury and was taken either overnight or while it was parked in Priory Avenue the next morning. Sam’s car insurance has gone up and I noticed they had some stronger security on the doors and windows at the new place, so perhaps it’s a higher crime area.

Towards the end of the afternoon, Sam and I drove the van back to Pentonville Road along a pretty familiar route - Leyton to Clapton via Hackney Marshes, then through to Stoke Newington, Highbury, Islington and Pentonville Road. Annoyingly, neither of us remembered to fill it up and so we got to the depot only to have to head out down City Road to find a garage. We had a quick pint to make us feel better and I hopped on the 6.10pm train home - just like being at work.

It was pleasing to get a message from him at the weekend with a picture of his dining area and his Portmeirion plates put up on the wall. Hopefully, Margaret will be able to visit in the next week or so. It will be nice for me to see the place with all their stuff properly set out as well.

When poetry is little more than skin deep

I have to confess: I don’t really know what to make of tattoos.

I don’t have any myself and I guess I’m from an age when only soldiers and sailors were tattooed (generally when they were very drunk, like Margaret’s younger brother Norman).

Nowadays, it’s considered something of an art form - body art - and some clever and attractive people have it done when they are stone cold sober.

Indeed, my youngest son Max has a tattoo on his shoulder. He says it’s a tribal design , although I’ve no idea which tribe designed it!

I’ll be honest, nothing would induce me to let someone inject ink under my skin even in hospital conditions with a well-sterilised needle, let alone some scruffy scrote in a back room of a T-shirt shop.

But then people pierce holes in their ears and push studs through their tongue, so there we are.

I’m also surprised by the things people have inked into themselves. The daughter of the landlord of the village pub has a massive angel across her back, with wings extending to her shoulders and the body disappearing down the back of her T-shirt. A girl at work has a snake wrapped around her and carries a picture of it on her iPhone so she can show you without getting undressed.

A lot of tattoo artwork is quite sinister. Snakes figure fairly often, also many winged creatures, including eagles, angels and bat-like demons; skulls, daggers and hearts (often pierced or bleeding).

My brother-in-law Harvey had the name of his first grand-daughter tattooed on the back of his neck and names of loved ones is a recurring theme. I once saw a chap in the swimming pool at Butlins who had “Mild, Carol, Bitter” tattooed across his chest (the commas are mine, his tattoo was not punctuated). I’m guessing they were the three loves of his life - a dark, malty beer popular in the midlands and north of England; his wife (Carol); and a lighter, more heavily hopped beer popular just about everywhere. Or perhaps it was a deeper commentary on how mild Carol had become bitter after meeting him.

I came across this tattoo earlier today. It belongs to a Facebook friend of a Facebook friend. I don’t know her, Facebook thought I might like to befriend her, and she has this image as her profile picture, so it’s the image of herself that she wants to project to the world.

It’s a meaningful, profound poem, quite a long one - the sort that would go well printed on a T-shirt, but this woman has decided to have it tattooed on her back instead. I'm pleased by the generally correct use of apostrophes and also that the tattoo artist remembered the question mark. I don't care for the use of the word 'cause' instead of 'because'. 



This is what it says:

My best friend gave me the best advice
He said each day’s a gift and not a given right
Leave no stone unturned, leave your fears behind
and try to take the path less travelled by
That first step you take is the longest stride

Against the grain should be a way of life
What’s worth the prize is always worth the fight
Every second counts cause there’s no second try
So live like you’ll never live it twice
Don’t take the free ride in your own life

If today was your last day
Would you make your mark by mending a broken heart?
You know it’s never too late to shoot for the stars
regardless of who you are
So do whatever it takes
cos you can’t rewind a moment in this life
Let nothin’ stand in your way
cause the hands of time are never on your side