Transcribing

         If you're anything like me and can't touch type, you hate having to transcribe notes with two fingers and the Spellchecker. You've played around with OCR software for sheets of stuff already typed out but you want it onto your own text file for whatever reason. Well, that's been me anyway.

        For some years I've been aware that Voice-To-Text is possible, but could never make it work with my older version of MS Word. I recently upgraded to Office 2019 (contains Word, Excel, and a couple of other bits I never use) and the other day was determined to crack it. And okay, I know that there's plenty out there that use it all the time and don't know what the big deal is, but I've never been in that fortunate group.

        So I Googled and I Microsoft Help-ed and I did the whole Tech-Forums things and I swore a good deal but nothing worked. Then I finally asked Google the right question and up it came. Turns out that all I had to do was...

1 - Plug in a microphone (in the right socket!)

2 - Put up a blank MS Word page (of my new-ish MS Office 2019)

3 - While holding down the Windows key, hit 'H'

....and up popped a little box with a microphone icon in the middle, which I left-clicked on, and got the message "I'm listening...", so I spoke four words, and stuff me, like magic they appeared on the page.

        Okay? - so if you're like I was till yesterday (ignorant) and you have a small microphone and MS Word 2019, and need to get a heap of scribbly notes onto your Family History files, give this a shot. I love it!

        Cheers...

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NEWS FLASH! - Jack's photos

         I've finally finished - well, finished enough for now - my father's collection of old black and white photos, from about 1925 to 1955. They can be found at....

THE BLACK AND WHITE YEARS

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Developing old B&W negatives

        My dad (John Hinton "Jack" Edmonds) bought his first camera when he was 16, back in 1926. He was an avid photographer from that moment on, and in the early days out on the farm he took heaps and developed them himself.

        When he died I inherited, along with his photo collection, a much much larger collection of negatives. It’s hard to fathom what those old ones are, but could be valuable for family history, so I put some through the flatbed scanner as best I could, but mostly they turned out pretty bad no matter what I did with the settings. And to have them commercially developed would cost a mint.

        But a while back I got serious, did some online research (bless you YouTube!), picked through their most promising experiments, built my own gadget, lots of trial and error, finally cracked it.

        So I’m now in the process of grinding through Dad’s endless boxes of black celluloid, and will put up any relevant family history ones here on “The Bones”, and also replace those fairly awful early attempts.

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If you’re in the same boat, or know someone else with old B+W negs they’d like to print, this is how I did it…

            Mine’s just a topless bottomless box (about 30cm x 20cm x 10cm) and lined inside with kitchen foil (shiniest side inwards), sitting on a sheet of ply also covered with foil, with a glass top (I used an old picture frame).

I put more foil UNDER the glass, and some white card on top, each with a photo-sized hole cut in it. I put a globe inside the box (I found a 14W energy-saver “fluoro” type best as it runs cool – DON’T use an old filament job! – and it has a nice soft diffused white light. But put it down one end, not directly under the hole in the top, instead put a piece of white paper on the bottom of the box under the hole, as the crinkles and texture of the foil may show on the photos.

Set up a tripod as shown and fix the camera to it. I tried my old Canon digital but it was hopeless, wouldn’t focus reliably, and moved when I pressed the shutter. I found that my digital video camera is far and away the best, using its PhotoShot function – great zoom, auto focus up close, set to hi-res, and click using the remote zapper. Make sure the negatives are shiny side up. And you’ll probably need a small pane of glass to lay on top as many of them tend to curl up over time. And turn off the room light.

Download the camera chip into your computer’s photo editor, select each image, hit “Negative” and convert that to Grayscale, then start fiddling with the Brightness, Contrast, all that stuff. Job done.

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The John Edmonds Mystery

 

John Edmonds of Buckinghamshire

 

     Most of us love a mystery, and this one has always had me intrigued. Maybe you can make some sense of it.

     Quite a few years back I came across a batch of files in the Wiltshire CRO, designated “888 Series – The Edmonds’s of Bradford”. So I bought a copy, on a data CD. Full of wonderful stuff about my ancestors, which is incorporated in their stories here on “The Bones”.

     But amongst them was also a Will and a Marriage Settlement for a John Edmonds, of Princes Risborough in Buckinghamshire. I asked the CRO why this was in the Series, never got a reply, and I moved on with all the other data, forgot it.

     But then that “John Hinton Edmonds” bit (see below) turned up the other day and, wondering what might have become of him, I remembered these two files. But the Bucks guy is definitely NOT “my” John Edmonds, the eldest Edmonds-of-Bradford son that I missed.

     But the question remains - WHY is it in with the Bradford Edmonds stuff?? So here it is, and eventually it’ll go down into “The Strays”. See what you can make of it.

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     A Marriage Settlement was written dated 9/4/1829, between a John Edmonds a Jeweller of The Strand London, and a Cordelia Pitter Of Oxford St Westminster, the widow of John Pitter late of Covent Garden. It mentions her son John Robert Pitter.

A John Edmonds (a “Widower” of this parish - St Martins in the Field Westminster) married a Cordelia Pitter (a “Widow” of St Mary Paddington – about 3kms away) on 11/4/1829. (Her maiden name was apparently Elliott).

     In the 1841 Census of Bucks a John Edmonds and a Cordelia Edmonds were living in the High St of Princes Risborough. John was 70, [so born c1771], the Head, and “Born in this County”, and Cordelia [his wife] was 72. They had a bunch of others living with them, so presume they were running a boarding house.

     In 1851 he was 80, a Widower, born “England”, a retired Jeweller, living in the High St of Princes Risborough.

     A Cordelia Edmonds died in the Wycombe Berks Regn Dist (incs Princes Risb) in Sept ¼ 1845, and he died Dec ¼ 1852, also in the Wycombe RD.

     A “John Edmonds” of Princes Risborough made a Will on 14/10/1852, which was proven on 27/4/1853, the execs being John Robert Pitter esq, and James Stratton. The will mentions his “late wife Cordelia”, his daus Charlotte (Descrepgny??) and Cordelia (Boyd), and a “friend Thomas Clapham”.

     That’s about it. William Bennett Edmonds’ wife’s mother Ann Chapman came from the Haddenham area of Bucks, not far from Princes Risborough, but other than that, it’s hard to see any connection with this guy and the Bradford Edmonds’s.

     But WHY is his Marriage Settlement and Will in with the Bradford Edmonds’s stuff in the Wilts CRO?? No idea!

 

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John Hinton Edmonds

     My genealogist niece came across this previously unseen document the other day, clearly relating to the eldest son of John Edmonds and Ruth nee Hinton of Bradford on Avon in Wiltshire (see under “The Stories” – “The Cloth Dynasty That Went Nowhere”). This threw me a touch that, in all my research, I’d never run into it, or any mention of, this son. 

     So what we have is – he was born on 15/5/1804, the fact being attested to by Robt Hooper (Surgeon), Elizabeth Hale, and Ann Edmonds, and this was registered with Dr William’s Library in Cripplegate London on 19/12/1820. There are Hoopers and Hales mentioned at other times in the Bradford Edmonds’s story, and Anne Edmonds (nee Bennett) I’m assuming is the grandmother, wife of Elimelech Edmonds. 

     These “registrations” were largely of Non-Conformists (which the Edmonds and Hintons were) who needed to better “legitimise” their documentation, often as a result of being baptised in an Anglican church in later life, sometimes as a prelude to marriage to an Anglican. 

     A quick search also found a "John Hinton Edmonds", who had a child John Richard Edmonds in 1824, St Mary's Parish, Lambeth, with wife Elizabeth. This John's occupation was given as "coachman". 

     So, what’s the story of this “original” John Hinton Edmonds? (There’s been two more in the direct family line since, my Dad, and his grandfather). When did he leave Bradford (and why)? Why isn’t there any mention of him in any family records? Who is his wife? Were there any more kids? Where is he, and his wife, buried? 

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Stray EDMONDS photo

 

        I came across this photo amongst my Dad's (Jack Edmonds) files, realised I hadn't included it in previous uploads.  Notes with it say...

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"Arbor Day at Yaninee School

    The students at Yaninee School, pictured outside the weatherboard building on Arbor Day, 8 August 1919. The teacher is Miss Wakefield, the students are identified as (back row, left to right) Ray Parker, Frank Hawthorn, Stella Opitz, Ethel Parker, Hilda Parker, Ted Watson, Dorothy Parker, Bill Opitz, (front row, left to right) Ted Opitz, Eric Mildren, Fred Watson, Tom Opitz."

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    These are all local Central Eyre Peninsula kids who Dad grew up with. Other notes of Dad's read “I started school here but left to go to Pinbong”, but presumably that was just before this photo was taken, as another old photo of Jack’s, of “Peace Day Pygery” (later called Pinbong) School, and dated 19/9/1919, clearly shows him there.

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Names Website

         I found this website the other day, gives quite interesting concentrations of family surnames over England and Wales, as at each of the Census Returns. You may have already fallen over it, but just in case....

NAME CONCENTRATION

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A couple of pix...

 

        Fell over an envelope of photos that were amongst my Mum's stuff (Ella nee Osborn), and found that these three I've never scanned. May be of value to someone...

Grandma Osborn (Margaret nee Gray)
with her daughter Cora (Redden) and
her daughter Cora

The original "Netball Team" of the seven Osborn
girls in mid-latter days, L-R Vera, Mavis, Ella,
Elsie, Una, Cora, Marj

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Fairly certain this is Edward
John Edwards of Stockport SA

        This photo has had me stumped for quite a while, couldn't come up with a reason for it to be among my Mum's keepsakes. It's on a post card, and a closer look at the pencil writing on the back found - "Best wishes & fondest love, Andy" (can't shed light on that) but another note says - "Block for Miss Stevens" and "Oval", presuming these are photographer's notes for later presentation. Then I remembered that the first husband of my aunt Elsie (Maddox nee Osborn) was George H Edwards (KIA Tobruk), who came from Stockport in SA's mid north, and had brothers in the district, and were close friends of the Stevens family up there, one of them being engaged to one of the Stevens girls.

        The Stockport War Memorial to local men who died in both wars, has two Edwards' on it - GH and EJ. I checked the Aust War Memorial Honour Roll website (Edward John Edwards was KIA in New Guinea in Aug 1942) and found a photo of a soldier outside a tent, and he looks a lot like the above. Also checked the Trove newspaper archive and found an obit for Edward John ("Jack" or "Digger") Edwards, confirming all of the above. Another of our soldiers who gave everything he had. And a mother who lost not one, but two sons.

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Into Ancient Stuff?

 

        If you're into really early history, of the people who made you (I'm assuming here that if you get to this site you're probably from the same tribal pools as us), here is a couple of of sites you may have missed....

IRISH TRIBAL ORIGINS

EARLY BRITON TRIBES

....each one worth digging around in if you have a cold wet Sunday afternoon and you've finished reading the papers!

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Quick Note

  

        There's a new top tab titled "Needing Answers", for the string of queries that we never got around to but deserve some attention. From time to time we'll doubtlessly say - "Hey, what about that...? We never did find a decent answer for it." - and so add to it as we go along. And for all of you many West Cork descendants who have been foraging through this stuff, and want to know more, we can only say - good luck!

        Cheers....

        Update 23/4/22 - Three more old UK WW1 servicemen have been added over there under "Those Who Served". This is the end of this batch, but in time the Australians of WW1 and WW2 will be added, but as tags to them on the RSL's Virtual War Memorial.

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