Old Friends from Far Away

The Islay shore close to Kildalton

A few nights ago, I attended a presentation given by a local artist at PoCo Heritage's museum. It was a fascinating talk about making art with camera-less photography but it was one thing that she said during her presentation that really caught the attention of the audience. It was nothing to do with her art. She let slip where she had gone to high school. It seems that many in the small audience had gone there too. After the presentation they crowded around her swapping dates of when they had attended the same school. The inevitable cries of "did you know so and so" and "was Mrs X still teaching when you were there" emerged as the gang reminisced.

We do this. We seize upon common experiences and use them to walk down memory lane, to reach out and engage in a conversation which brings friends and strangers closer together. And this is in the modern world where there are so many ways to communicate. Maybe there's even a Facebook group for the former students of that same high school. How much more excitement would coming across someone from old neighbourhoods have caused among those from other countries who currently lived in the sparsely settled farms of New England or Ontario?

Some of my Ontario ancestors came from Kildalton in Islay, one of the islands of the Inner Hebrides of Scotland. In 1870, John Ramsay of Kildalton made a trip to Canada to seek out former tenants in Ontario to see how they had prospered after emigration. He travelled from farm to farm, seeking out Islay people and they were glad to see him and exchange news of their new places for word of people back home. John Ramsay embodied a link to the old country, was treated well and left a wonderful account of the Islay people he saw, as well as other Scots, because, with the benefit of distance they all came from the same vast neighbourhood. Finding commonality among people from disparate parts of the old country was also a benefit of distance, it seems.

It is interesting to think how or common need for social bonds connects us to people with a common link to a place or an event, like the audience at the art presentation. A better understanding of our ancestors comes if we remember that this was also a common experience that they shared.  

Time and Place

1857 cartoon from Harper's Weekly

Mention a decade in the 20th century and the chances are that just saying something like the '50s or '80s will bring to mind a picture of that decade's style; from clothes, to vehicles, to mood. Once a time has passed it is easy to distill its essence into a handful of images we can use as shorthand to invoke that time period. It has been that way through history.

But writing about the people of the time, of any time back in history, forces a closer look. Life was not as homogenous as our shorthand would make it seem. Different places changed at different times and went through different events that altered life's patterns.

Currently I am involved in several projects which have me skittering from one time period to another and from one place to another. I spend time in 1890s Ontario through diaries found at the University of Guelph diary project at https://ruraldiaries.lib.uoguelph.ca/search, then dredge up memories of Vancouver in the '70s and early '80s for something I am writing, and meanwhile I am working on a project about disasters in the early '20s in Port Coquitlam, BC. What on earth was I thinking when I brought home a library book about Suffolk history to look for background on my family roots there in the 18th century?

But I love history and each era has its own flavour, its own rules and codes for living. Finding them out is all part of the fun of digging into the past and pulling out the stories. 

Images:

By unknown 1857 artist - Ultimately from Harper's Weekly; scanned by H. Churchyard from The Wonderful World of Ladies' Fashion: 1850-1920, edited by Joseph J. Schroeder, Jr., Public Domain,   

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=550210

  

Following a Trail of Breadcrumbs

    Present day Tenter Street probably looks much different from when Thomas Arment's family lived there in the 1840s

Each family line seems to peter out into the unknown at a different time. Some go back for generations, others not nearly as far. In the case of my London ancestors, finding out where the first ancestor came from before they were drawn to the streets of the big city is a frustrating endeavour. One thing about our less honest ancestors, especially ones in a time when it is hard to find information about the average person; criminals leave records. In my search for my criminal Arments, both Thomas, father and son, I decided to check out what The National Archives could tell me. TNA have lots of research guides and I thought they must have one about researching criminals. 

There was a research guide on crime and criminals which had a clickable link to "Crime, prisons and punishment 1770-1935" which sounded promising and showed that the database was available on Find My Past so the records were available online. There were 43 results for Thomas Arm*nt, more than I had found by searching the Find My Past site directly and I had access to the records once I signed in to Find My Past through the TNA Discovery site. Among those records I found another clue. The birthplace of Thomas Arment senior!

 

At last I was on my way to finding out were the Arments had come from! There was only one problem. There is no such place as Great Bennell. Well, at least I knew the county was Suffolk.

To take my research back further, I turned to Family Search and did a search for Arment with the birthplace of Suffolk between the years of 1775 and 1810. This turned up a likely candidate for Thomas Arment senior baptized in 1787 whose parents' names were Samuel Armant and Alice. This couple had other children baptized as well: Samuel in 1784, John in 1790, James 1793 and Mary in 1799. But they were all baptized in Bramfield, Suffolk which really couldn't be mistaken for Great Bennell. This was one of the problems I took with me to Salt Lake City.

At the Family History Library, I found a book called How to find Suffolk Towns and Villages put out by the Suffolk Family History Society. There was no Great Bennell in the book but there was a place called Benhall which other sources told me was sometimes called Bennell Green. Aha! It didn't take any great leap of the imagination to see some clerk in Portsmouth taking that down as Great Bennell. Bramfield and Great Benhall weren't adjacent parishes but they weren't that far apart either. 

After that it felt much better to search the Bramfield records for the family. The baptism register entry for Thomas Arment felt much more likely to be that of my Thomas Arment senior. What's more it was proof of the advice to search the source of online records even if it is a transcript because it read: 1787 Feb. 11 Thomas s. of Samuel Armant and Alice his wife (late Puttock, spinster): born Feb. 2. This led me back to the marriage of Samuel Armant and Alice Puttock on August 3, 1783. Which would be good if they were part of my ancestral line. But were they?

I found what looked to be a tentative connection to Benhall. A search of Find My Past turned up entries for James Armond (Almond) and family who would be the right age for the James born in Bramfield in 1793 to Samuel and Alice Armant. So, it looks like at least one brother lived there around the 1850s. But why would Thomas Arment have given that as his birthplace? I am intrigued and need to follow the clues further. 

Remembering War and Sacrifice

Land Girls Lunching in the Harvest Fields

When remembering war and sacrifice thoughts often centre on those who were named on the cenotaphs proudly displayed in public squares. The men who went away to war and never came back are top of mind at this time of year as we remember and honour the fallen. But there were many more people whose lives were altered by wars. There were civilians who lost their lives and those who answered their countries' calls for assistance in the war effort. In Britain women were also called up for the services or to work on the land during the Second World War.

My mother was living in England at the outbreak of WWII and joined the Land Army at the age of 19, leaving the service at the age of 23. Did she stand out as a Canadian among all the English land girls? I never asked that or many other questions when I had the chance. From the information she let fall, I know those years left an indelible impression on her. 

Unfortunately, my mother was not honoured during her lifetime for the role she served in the war effort. The Land Girls were eventually honoured for their service in 2008, a significant length of time after their war service and the culmination of decades of lobbying for recognition. A badge commemorating their time in the Land Army was given to the surviving members - recognition at last, but only for the few who survived into their 80s and 90s. 

Sources:

“At last, Land Girls honoured”, International Express, Tuesday July 29, 2008, p 4. 

Ministry of Food: Women's Land Army: Index to Service Records of the Second World War, 1939-1945. The National Archives, Kew, MAF 421 microform

“The women of the Second World War”, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/the-women-of-the-second-world-war

  

Image:

By Mona Moore - http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/19465, Public Domain, 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33557245