Here are all my previous blogs, mostly covering our caravanning around New Zealand and Australia and some post-caravanning adventures. The first 3 have been transferred to a new Blog heading. So have some family history stories. If I can work out how to delete these I will do so!
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52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks – NEW Series for 2024.
Week 1 – Theme: Family Lore. Unsubstantiated family legend recorded by my Great Great Grandfather Thomas Hunt’s grandson Edwin Herbert Hunt 1866-1921 says that Thomas was a cousin to Lord and Lady Henry Somerset. Further, it was said that when the Earl of Somers died without heirs, Thomas’ eldest son Reuben 1824-? was forbidden to… Read more
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52 Ancestors … Week 52 for 2023
Topic: Me, Myself and I I was christened Nancy Vada Johnston – Nancy for my mother’s sister Nancy Elizabeth d’Archy (always known as Betty) and Vada for my mother Lillian Vada d’Archy (always known as Vada). Where did Auntie Bet as we all called her, get her names? Elizabeth for one of her own aunts,… Read more
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52 Ancestors …. Week 51
Topic: Cousins! Most people seem to have a number of first cousins and many seconds and thirds, but my father Warwick Johnston had a lone brother who died as a baby, and my mother Vada d’Archy had one sister who never married. Consequently I have no first cousins. My maternal grandmother Lily Hunt 1876-1946 came… Read more
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52 Ancestors …… Week 50.
Topic: “You Wouldn’t Believe it” Just once this year I’m writing about my husband’s family instead of my own. One of their surnames is Arkle, which always fascinated me. Christopher Arkle 1816-1896 and most of his family arrived in NZ from Northumberland in 1861 but nothing was known about his antecedents. One Christmas after dithering… Read more
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52 Ancestors …. Week 49.
Topic: Family Recipe I have in my possession a wonderful old cookery book, hand-written with hundreds of recipes and household hints and also knitting patterns. It has marbled end papers and would at one time have been a handsome book but is now falling to pieces. It belonged to my maternal grandmother. Edith Lillian “Lily”… Read more
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52 Ancestors …. Week 48.
Theme: Troublemaker. One definition of Troublemaker is ‘Someone who thrives on conflict’. That would be my Great grandfather Frederick Wentworth Wade, a barrister and solicitor. He was born in Dublin, Ireland on 23 September 1838 to schoolteacher Robert Wentworth Wade and his wife Annie Gibbons, who were married clandestinely (without parental approval) in Dublin by… Read more
Nancy's Families 