February Challenges in Review

Well, I don't know about you, but what a February. It has been full on and very genealogical. Full of the photographs from the photo collage and posts from the writing challenge. It would like some feedback on how people think it went. Any suggestions that could make the next one better?.....next one I hear you ask...more of that later.

February Photo Collage Festival

This is my Photo Collage

To see my daily posts click this link - February Photo Collage Festival

To see my photo collage made easy post click HERE

Twitter - #fpcf13

To see who else took part in the festival - click HERE

Thanks to everyone who took part and made it such fun. I am still reading, looking and commenting on photographs, so if I have not stopped by or commented very much I am on my way! 

Family History Writing Challenge

To see my daily posts click this link - Family History Writing Challenge
Twitter - #familyhistorywritingchallenge

Next Challenge

Someone commented that they wish they had known about the photo collage festival, so I hereby I am giving notice!

In November here in the UK we celebrate Remembrance Day on 11th November. I thought that it might be quite nice to have a collage with a military theme. Instead of running the whole month, the challenge would run for 2 weeks from Monday 4th November until Sunday 17th November. 

The purpose is to share whatever military picture you have in your family, not exclusively the First World War. This way we can share earlier and later military folk, whose commitment to their Country and the cause can be, and should be recognised.

If you wish to play along that would be wonderful, please leave a comment and spread the word. I shall create a sign up page nearer the time. 

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 11

As I said yesterday, I had always known that one of the sisters remained in the UK, but nonetheless, I decided to revist the book written by Margaret Bellasis in 1952 to see if I had overlooked any further clues with regard to Ruth King.

In that respect I had not, although I was suitable reminded of a few details which I thought I might discuss today.

I have always pondered on what it was exactly that was the catalyst for the King daughters to be sent to India and Margaret Bellasis has perhaps provided a line of enquiry that I had overlooked. On page 133 of Honourable Company it reads

"....There was a family friend, a rich Mr. Holmes, retired from India, and whether from his introduction or not, the eldest of the sisters was early wedded to a Bengal civilian named Morris. The next eldest, Esther, was thereupon invited out to her; and so it was that she came to marry "the handsomest man in India......"

The handsomest man in India was George Bridges Bellasis, and more of his story later. I was intrigued what was the location for the marriage of Mary King and what exactly was Mr Morris doing in India and who was Mr Morris?

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 10

I have always known right from the start of this research over 20 years ago that one of Esther's sisters did not it would appear go to India. I could not help, but feel slightly troubled. Had I missed something?

The book written by Margaret Bellasis in 1952 devoted a whole chapter to the King sister's in which she mentions there were 7 sisters. One sister, Jane died in 1795, and one sister Ruth remained in England. The remaining 7 sisters were in India and the tenth sibling was a son.

Ruth King was born in Puttenham in 1773. She married William Trod (Trodd) on 2nd December 1800 in Guildford at Stoke Next Guildford church. From research it appears that Ruth was quite insuluar and resided in Guildford after her marriage.

Between 1801 and 1814 Ruth and William reared a family of 6 children, all baptised in the same church at Stoke next Guildford -

William baptised 25 Jan 1801
John baptised in 1804
Hannah baptised 3rd August 1806
Henry baptised 23rd July 1809
Mary baptised 27th October 1811
Dinah baptised 13 Feb 1814

There seemed to be a logical pattern to the names, although I do realise that all of them are quite common names, with the exception of Dinah. Presumably William was named after his father, John after his mother's brother and father and the same applied to Mary and Hannah, both named after her mother's sisters. Henry was the name of Ruth's Grandfather, the father of her mother, Mary and called Henry Budd.

William died in Stoke Next Guildford in October 1825.

I feel there is a storyline here and I am rather intrigued by the lack of an India connection. I am also rather curious of the marriage being held in Stoke Parish as both her parents were still alive and yet she broke with usual tradition of marrying in her parish.

Curious.

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 9

The biggest issue for me with the whole King family saga is how we made the journey from rural Surrey to not just India, but the whole peerage issue. There is so much more research that can be done on this family. Every thing discussed so far has been about the marriage of John King and Mary Budd and just one of their offspring. I had already discussed Esther King who went onto to marry George Bridges Bellasis.

A quick recap of the children of the children of John King and Mary Budd, who married in Puttenham in 1767, all the children were born in Puttenham and John joined Mary's parish and lived in Puttenham where he died in 1803 and Mary in 1817.

Mary born 1767 married Thomas Morris
Esther born 1770 married George Bridges Bellasis
Ruth born 1773 married William Trodd
Elizabeth born 1775 married William Kent and George Bridges Bellasis
Jane born 1777 and died in Puttenham 1795
Hannah born 1780 married William Stringer and Robert Gordon
Ann born 1782 married Joseph Dacre Watson
Amelia born 1785 and married George Waddell
John born 1788 and died in the Persian Gulf in 1812
Lucy born 1790 married Captain Robert William Eastwick.

For me it is important to get things into concept. All these children were born before Queen Victoria ascended the throne.  I want to explore what their lives were like, the foods, society in terms of what they did. Did they sing, play games, quilt and sew. Did they read books? What clothes did they wear?

This is Regency England.

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 8

I wanted to really get to grips with the King family in Farnham. I had various transcriptions and records from earlier research so I revisited that data. Much to my surprise (and annoyance) it would appear that I had already explored this data previous.

Having established that the John King, who married Mary Budd in Puttenham was born in Farnham in 1744 and was the son of John King and Jane Planner. What could I establish about John King senior?

Well, he was born in 1716 and was the son of Henry King and Anne Cooper. They had married on 26th November 1711 in Farnham and raised a family of 4 children -

Henry born 1714
John born 1716 and married Jane Planner 1740
James born 1719
William born 1723

In Farnham, it would appears that the trail of the King family goes cold in regard to the birth of Henry, who would have been born circa 1686 (1711 his year of marriage -25 years).

However, I have located a birth of a Henry in 1688 in Hampshire and is recorded as the son of Henry and Ruth King. The birth is recorded in the Dorset and Hampshire QM, which is the Quarterly Meetings of the Quakers.

I am going to follow the trail on this Henry as John King (born 1716) named one his children Ruth, and Esther King who married George Bridges Bellasis had a sister called Ruth. It's a tentative link, but the hunch factor feels that this is right to research this further. Furthermore, just up the road from Farnham is the town of Alton, which is actually over the border into Hampshire. Alton had a reasonable Quaker population, so guess where we research next?

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 7

Amelia Waddell the Grand Daughter of John King and Mary Budd married Sir Keith Jackson, 2nd Baronet. As I know very little about peerages I wanted to explore this more. I am still wondering how they met, although it was probably a grand 19th Century ball in India.

Keith Jackson, 2nd Baronet was the son of Sir John Jackson, 1st Baronet. He was born on 30th December 1763 in Kingston Jamaica to John Jackson and Hannah Coverley.

He married Charlotte Spry Gorham, herself a widow on 13th February 1797. Between 1797 and 1806, John and Charlotte had 6 children. Charlotte died on 30th June 1807 in Sidmouth Devon, which is about 30 miles from where I currently live.

John died on 17th May 1820 at Bellmoor House, Hampstead London. He was a director of the Honourable East India Company and held office as a Member of Parliament for Dover in Kent. He was also private secretary to Lord Keith. He was created 1st Baronet Jackson of Arsley Bedfordshire on 22nd May 1815.

There are many move avenues that I can research here -

• Why was he given a peerage?
• Details of his time as an MP for Dover 
• What was Charlotte doing in Devon in 1807?
• Presumably, he showed respect for his employer by naming his first son after him?
• His time in India - he was a contemporary of George Bridges Bellasis, who was the husband of Esther King who started off this whole piece of research.

The title of the book I have been working on involving the children of John King and Mary Budd I nicked named "Those King Girls" and I rather think I like the title, it seems to sum up the whole complex tale.

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 6

Given that Amelia Waddell and Keith Jackson had given their children some interesting names I thought I would see what data was "out there"

Mountstuart Goodrick born 1836
Amelia Georgina born 1837
Anna Madeline Hungerford born 1838
Julia Honoria Catherine born 1839
Keith George born 1842
Monimia Emily born 1844

As I said, with names like that it should be fairly easy....shouldn't it?

Well, to some degree it is fairly easy, as there is a peerage involved much of the details is freely available. Having started to look into the wider family, my initial thoughts were what a muddle!

I really should not spend too long on this branch of the family as they are not a direct line, but I hate lines that stop and do not provide further information. So, I persisted and realised that again the family ties are strongly entangled with India.

I firstly had a look at Anna Madeline Hungerford who was born 1838. She married Elphinstone Jackson in 1859. My initial thoughts here were, a cousin, I might have known! I was right. He husband was the son of Welby Brown Jackson who was in turn the brother of Anna's father.

Together, Anna and Elphinstone Jackson had 6 children, which appears to be a popular number of issue with this side of the family!

Given that Anna and Elphinstone share the same Grandparents I wondered just how the issue with the peerage started, especially as Anna's father was the first Baronet.

More of that tomorrow!

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 5

As I said yesterday I had not done any research on the Jackson line mainly because of the peerage and the details would be freely available. For me, genealogy and family history is not about peerages and famous people, although I do have a few people who were well know in their day. It is all about understanding the wider picture. How did Amelia Waddell, grand daughter of Mary Budd and John King meet Sir Keith Jackson?

I did a little bit of tentative research with Mr Google. That search revealed another Amelia, as if 2 wasn't already enough and I am now having to use a bit of paper to ensure I get the generation and date correct as I am doing the ground work for my research.

This time the Amelia is Amelia Georgina Jackson who was born in 1837 in India the daughter of Amelia Lavy Waddell and Sir Keith Alexander Jackson. Amelia died in 1858 aged 21 years at Lucknow, India when she was killed in the Indian mutiny.

Now, things are getting even more interesting. It seems ironic, that the one daughter of John King and Mary Budd that did not appear to have lots of links to India is in fact the one that does. I also love the fact that the name of Amelia has carried on for 3 generations, even if it is a nightmare to get them in order!

Whereas my initial investigations had revealed that Amelia Waddel and Keith Jackson had only just two children, I then came across Amelia and then another 3 children. Each one with interesting names. Thus, those children are:

Mountstuart Goodrick born 1836
Amelia Georgina born 1837
Anna Madeline Hungerford born 1838
Julia Honoria Catherine born 1839
Keith George born 1842
Monimia Emily born 1844

With names like that researching should be relevantly straight forward, but somehow, I suspect not!

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 4

Amelia Waddell and Sir Keith Jackson had two children -

1. Mountstuart Goodricke Jackson (1836 - 1857)
2. Keith George Jackson (1842 - 1916)

Currently I have not investigated further, as this line will probably be well documented because of their peerage. One thing I did establish through the documentation I have read is that Keith George spent considerable time in Argentina, which does sound rather interesting.

Amelia's brother, George followed into his father's footsteps and spent sometime in India. He died in Bombay in 1838.

Amelia and George's father George Waddell was born in 1788 in Glasgow and was a surgeon with the East India Company.

In a very strange way, I feel that I have almost done a full circle. Having taken this branch forward two generations I am now going to head back to Amelia King, who was Esther's sister and the individual that started this whole project off. I also want to research a bit more into the parents of the King sisters.

Amelia and Esther, which were 2 of the 10 children, were born to Mary Budd and John King. Mary Budd was born in 1744 in Puttenham and was the sister of my direct ancestor. She was the daughter of Henry Budd and Martha Ottway who married in 1724. Mary married John King in Puttenham on 4th August 1767 and he died in June 1803 in Puttenham. Apart from that almost nothing is known of him.

However, a search of Family Search and my original notes from the parish records taken quite a few years ago shows a John King born in Farnham in 1744 to John King and Jane Planner. I have a hunch this is the details I have been seeking. Farnham is a market town about 6 miles from Puttenham so it is quite feasible that John and Mary met on market day. How romantic!

Further details show that John King and Jane Planner had a first son James who died as an infant. They then had a daughter Esther born in 1742, followed by two sons another James born 1743 and John in 1744 then another daughter Elizabeth in 1746. A son, William was born in 1748 and then the last two children, Ruth in 1751 and Henry in 1754. I am more convinced that this is the family as John (born 1744) had siblings by the name of Esther and Ruth both were used in his own offspring during his marriage with Mary King.

Of course, that simply gives rise to more questions; one of which is is this continual link to India.

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 3

Over the last few weeks I have systematically written a sheet of paper up reflecting what data I know about each of the sisters. I then turned to the sisters who do not appear very much in the various books. What happened to them?

Amelia King was almost the youngest of the siblings, born in 1785. It was known that she had married George Waddell, but beyond that nothing was known.

I turned to my trusty Google friend, just to see what the internet provided in terms of clues and perhaps other researchers. I received a wonderful surprise, which of course yielded more questions. In fact, many more questions.

One of the surprises revealed that a series of documents from the 18th Century had survived and were now in the care of the Royal Geographical Society. I read the on line details and then phoned the archivist. Could they describe the details to me? They did and at the point of writing this I need to invest at least 3 days in to visiting London and accessing the documents.

The documents include a journal of Amelia & George's daughter, also called Amelia. Included in this bundle was the additional journal of George Waddell with detailed references to his marriage to Amelia King.

Amelia King had married George Waddell  in Bombay India in 1802. They had two children:

• Amelia born 19th May 1809 and baptised in London in June 1809
• George born 16th Oct 1812 and baptised at Chobham in November 1812

Amelia the daughter grew up and in February 1834 married Sir Keith Alexander Jackson (1798 - 1843). It was as a result of this marriage that Amelia had the opportunity to travel, and it those journeys and experiences that she documented in her journals.

From the details, Amelia travelled through Frances, The Netherlands and Wales during 1822-1828. She also spent some time in Bath, East Malling and Taunton. She also includes the diary of her brother George who travelled through Wales during May to September 1828.

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 2

In the early days of researching the King family at Puttenham I was contacted by someone who resided in the village. The simply wrote me a lovely letter, which I still have which simply said did I know the story of the Bellasis family had been written in a book and in particular there was a whole chapter devoted to the King sisters.

I wrote back and thanked them for the details and immediately set about locating the book. I eventually sourced a copy and read the entire book cover to cover, twice. Through this book I was able to glean further details which confirmed some of what I already knew and other information that was new to me. Each fragment of information went into a notebook for further investigation.

Honourable Company
by Margaret Bellasis
Published 1952

The book also directed me to a book written by the husband of another of Esther’s sisters. In turn, that book directed me to further information, and as in the case of the first book some details were known and others were not. As that book was autobiographical it provided personal insights and information and I could read the details of for example the consequences of the George Bridges Bellasis dual from an observer at the time perspective.

I was then steered to back to the Bellasis line and to the brother of George Bridges Bellasis and his family who married into another well connected family who lived only a few miles away from my current address. Whilst not directly connected to me the Bowring family had to be researched. The details of them were right on my doorstep and such a prominent family surely had left papers, which might provide clues and information to the King sister’s, especially as the Bowring family were involved, like the Bellasis and King families in India.

Family History Writing Challenge 2013 - Day 1

Regular readers of this blog will have seen me make a reference to the family of John King and Mary Budd from Puttenham. John and Mary married on 4 August 1767 at Puttenham, a rural village in Surrey some four miles from my home town of Guildford.

It is this family that always makes me think of Mrs Bennett in Pride and Prejudice and her desire for her daughters to marry well. Mary and John had 10 children, one son and 9 daughters, so I am sure this caused some concern.

Early research revealed the second eldest daughter was called Esther who married George Bridges Bellasis and spent much of her life in India and a few years in Australia because George was sentenced to 14 years at Botany Bay. You can read the details in an early post HERE. I had always thought that perhaps this held some appeal to appear in a book and then added the idea to a job for the future on the back that there might not be sufficient information to warrant such a publication.

Then a few weeks ago, I looked again at the list of Esther’s siblings. I already had the briefest of details of spouses and dates gleaned from either journals or diaries written by family members at the time and earlier research. But what other data and research could I unravel?

I was delighted to spot something that I had been unaware of. I have therefore spent the last 4 weeks further exploring this and once again my initial thought has entered my mind, over many, many waking hours. To quote my husband, “oh Esther again” I am sure his eyebrows rose ever so slightly, but I could not be sure.

For some strange reason I have grown rather attached to a lady born 199 years before I was. She has a remarkable story, as does her siblings and I think it deserves to be told.

Family History Writing Challenge 2013

Well the news is just out, that The Armchair Genealogist is launching a repeat of the Family History Writing Challenge. Are you going to take part?

The link above gives the details for the challenge, including how to sign up. Personally I am signing up to 250 words a day, which means that I should get a minimum of 7,000 words for the month, although I usually achieve more.

I am planning to use the month to explore what I know and would like to know about certain ancestors. So I can build a set of 28 chapters for a project I want to explore. This is the third year I have taken part and the best advice I can offer any fellow genealogical blogger is to plan.

Image courtsey of
The Armchair Genealogist

  To sign up click HERE