Genealogy trip to England

Wow.  Utterly exhausted after 4-1/2 days in England, but oh, was it worth it!

I visited the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich

National Maritime Museum in Greenwich

(visited the Royal Observatory and stood on the Prime Meridian, too), spent a full day at the National Archives in Kew, a day and a half in the London Society of Genealogist’s library, plus a quick trip to the Guildhall museum a few blocks away, all to search for my two Scots merchant captains.  Found what I was looking for on Alexander Chalmers – his mate’s certificate number (now I can send for the actual certificate and hope his application is attached), and the ships he’d been on,

Royal Observatory on hill in Greenwich Park

including one that was wrecked off the northeast coast of England.

Gave up on his father-in-law, James Murray, who was early enough (1840s & 1850s) to likely never have gotten a certificate.  And I have no ship’s name to go on, either.  I’ve recently linked him to Liverpool, though, and I’ll need to write/visit the Merseyside Maritime Museum to see if they have any tips.

One of my best days, tho, was Friday in Birmingham.  I’m so used to trying to find ancestors who were poor enough to have left virtually no records, that it was an awesome surprise to find my Nutting/Tabberner line with not only parish records, but partnership agreements and wills!  I found my grandfather’s great-grandfather’s will in 1894 – long, with lovely and very dense writing on a huge sheet of wax-coated paper.  I’m getting a scan done so I can read it properly – ran out of time in the Birmingham library!  My next step here is to access the B’ham newspapers online and see what I can find out.

All in all, I found plenty to flesh out several ancestors, and actually found some dates and a couple new generations that I didn’t have yet.  Took lots of pictures, copied stuff, will forward on as I sort it out.  (Anyone with Nutting/Chalmers interests, please let me know.)  But I’ve come home tired, glad to be in my own bed, but very happy.

Front of St. Martin's church where the Nuttings were baptized and married.

Charles Nutting's 1894 Will

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Home Again!

OK, between tonight and last night, I finally got all the blogs I wrote along the way posted with pictures.  I’m glad I wrote as we went, made it lots easier, but it still takes a while to go through the pictures, format them, and upload everything decently.  And as soon as we got home, I got hit by a few days of vertigo, an abscessed tooth, and problems with the boys’ work permits filling up the next week.  (Vertigo gone, solutions to the rest are in the works.)

Anyway, the ferry ride home was over rough seas, and was NOT delightful.  But we made it, and are very glad to be back and settling in.  If you want the England trip from the beginning, scroll down to the one about crossing to Wales in the ferry, and work your way up.  And if you don’t, check in again in a week or so – Tim’s mission call should be arriving soon.  Cheers!

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Village of Lacock – Scenes from Pride & Prejudice

Lacock Village

(Written 5/15/09)

Since we had been to Old Sarum the day before, I had browsed around for what to do in the afternoon.  We were all museum-ed out.  So we drove up to the Village of Lacock, a small medieval village with people living there, but traffic is diverted so it’s really quiet.  The whole village is a National Trust site, so there’s no modern architecture, streetlights, etc., coming in.  They use it for filming a lot of period pieces, including parts of BBC’s Pride & Prejudice and bits of Harry Potter.  It was the village of Meryton in P&P.

I took lots of pictures so I can watch movies and look for the places.  We had lunch at “King John’s Hunting Lodge,” one of the oldest building in the town.  Nice, crowded lunch/tearoom, food was so-so, the fun part were the photos of Harry, Ron & Hermione from filming in probably the first and fourth Harry Potter movies.  Don’t know what the room was used for, but we’ll keep an eye out for it when we watch.  Then dessert from a restaurant in the old stable – luscious baked treats to eat on the way.  The boys were a bored for the hour or two (it didn’t help that it was raining off and on), but it was a nice break and sort of on our way out.

Blaik liked the old tithe barn in Lacock Village.

We’re in Newport in Wales tonight, and felt so good to have a couple of fairly easy-going days.  I didn’t realize how much the day in Bath took out of me.  Tomorrow we’ll drive through a Welsh National Park on the way to the ferry, and then head home.  It’s been a really nice trip.

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Organ Music and the Magna Carta at Salisbury Cathedral

Salisbury Cathedral

We were at Salisbury Cathedral this morning (Friday the 15th), too early to have a tour or to climb the steps in the tower, but it was almost better.

We got there after the early morning service, but there’s another service for the students at the cathedral school at 9:00.  And the organist stays in between and practices.  So we wandered with our brochure guides, admiring the beauty and architecture, amazed at what they accomplished in the early 1200s, and matching up people buried there with what we know of English history, all while listening to magnificent music.  It just added to the atmosphere.

Salisbury Cathedral interior - gorgeous!

And then the kids started to come in, members of the girls’ choir first, blocking out movements for their next performance, and then all the others, including a group of absolutely cute 4-year-olds.  (The choir members come on full scholarships between 7 & 9 years old, but since there were such young kids, it must be a regular school, too.)  So we went on to the Chapter House to see the Magna Carta.

It’s magnificent.  I don’t think the boys realized how much of our human rights and freedoms began with this agreement.  The cathedral has one of the four originals left in existence, and they said this is the most legible.   It really is—it made me wish I could read Latin!  There were translations there, of course, but seeing the actual writing on the original velum was awesome.

Then Blaik and I went back into the cathedral, where the children were finishing their morning service.  They sat in the quire for it (gorgeous), sang with the also-gorgeous organ music, then had a benediction and filed out.  (Not as reverently as they filed in!)  But as they left, the organist let out all the stops with some magnificent Bach – can you imagine hearing that on a daily basis?  The kids were gone, the organist finally finished, and we left to take more pictures of the outside (cloudy, drippy day).  So like I said, no guided tour, but it was so much more than we anticipated.

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Stonehenge and Old Sarum

(Written Friday, 5/15)

It was rather gray, threatening rain on Thursday, with heavy showers expected Friday, so we flipped our days around and left the Cathedral for Friday to be inside when it was wet.  We started the morning at the Salisbury Museum and had a great overview of Stonehenge.  And it would be a pretty cool museum for kids, too – lots of hands on stuff like lifting the stones they used to sculpt the sarsens, and blocks and a pulley to see how many men and oxen it takes to raise one upright.  Lots of stuff about Romans and more recent stuff, but we mostly skipped that.  <g>

Hanging Out at Stonehenge

So we drove the half hour to Stonehenge, and the rain held off for us.  I listened to the audio guide for a while, but I’ve read enough and having just been at the museum, I felt like I was hearing the same thing over and over.  But the guys listened.  I’m in awe of the work it took and the incredible astronomical calculations you can make with it, but my favorite thing is still Mary Stewart’s version of Merlin building it.

The boys’ reactions? Tim is fascinated with how people were able to raise Stonehenge with the technology they had. Bryan says, “Stonehenge? Rocks – old, well-placed rocks.”  (His favorite parts of the trip were Glastonbury Abby and the Roman Baths.)

Part of Old Sarum ruins

Blaik in some building remnants at Old Sarum.

It didn’t take as long as I had figured, even with time just sitting there, so we headed over to Old Sarum.  The drizzle turned to light rain, but we wandered anyway.  There’s not much left, but that’s where the original settlement was for hundreds of years.  Then the church and the army had a falling out, and the bishop moved his headquarters a couple miles down the road to the current Salisbury and built the cathedral there.

Then we went to dinner at the Haunch and Venison, a cool old building (13th century?) that backs up against one of the old churches.  It had great food, but even better was the mummified hand of a card sharp who cheated and someone chopped it off a couple hundred years ago, and the story of the tunnel they built from the church in the days the building was a brothel – allowed visiting clergymen to commit indiscretions with discretion!  Tim wasn’t thrilled with the sloping floors, but the next room over from us (where we went to look out the window at the church) had huge nail heads in a very uneven, if somewhat more level floor.

"Haunch of Venison" restaurant in Salisbury

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Glastonbury Abbey and Glastonbury Tor

(Written 5/14/09)

Glastonbury has so many legends wrapped around it it’s ridiculous.  And Glastonbury Tor is taller than it looks!

View from half-way up Glastonbury Tor. Cloudy day.

Long way up - the tower is actually higher than the front part of the Tor.

It was a steep climb up a long hill, with the remnants of a church on top.  I told Tim he ought to run to the top and he took off!  As my jaw dropped, Bryan said he’d wait 5 minutes, then go after him to pick up the pieces.  So we huffed and puffed and all made it.  Views were fabulous, lovely countryside.  The plains flood, which turns the tor into an island that comes and goes – Avalon.  Definitely brought Mists of Avalon to life.

Glastonbury Tor grows lopsided cows!

First fountain at Chalice Well. The Holy Thorn Tree is in the top right.

The Well and quiet place

We stopped at a place called The Chalice Well, a lovely garden and mediation place.  Legend has it that the Holy Thorn tree there is one brought by Joseph of Arimithea (we’ve been learning a lot of the other legends of the area, too).  The gardens and fountains are gorgeous, with lots of nooks and crannies to just sit, and we wandered quietly.  The boys drank from the healing well, and we just soaked in the peace after climbing the Tor and before touring the Abbey.

part of Glastonbury Abbey. Hard to show how big it really was.

Glastonbury Abbey-Lady Chapel

The Glastonbury Abbey is remnants, the treasures taken when Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries, and the walls torn down to use in building other things over the years.  The church was huge!  The Lady Chapel is still largely intact, and the remnants of the small chapel at the other end is s-o-o-o far away.  The round kitchen building is still there, all together, mostly because it didn’t have anything anyone could use.

Glastonbury Abbey Kitchen House

The Abbey is also supposed to be where Arthur and Guinevere are buried.  The monks needed money (maybe five centuries ago?) and people weren’t coming to visit anymore, so they decided to follow up the old legend that King Arthur’s grave was there.  They dug around and found two graves with bodies, which in modern times have been dated to  the 5th/6th century.  So who knows?  And more visitors did come.

Modern Glastonbury is an interesting place.  There’s a big music concert every year, but it’s also a draw for anything and everything New Age.  Shop after shop of alternative healing, magic, occult, crystals, dragons, etc., etc.  Even the bookstores were all “alternative.”  I was fascinated.

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Swinging Chains in Cardiff

Oops–posted out of order.

(Written 5/11/09)
We stopped in Cardiff tonight (Monday) after about 2 hours of lovely scenery that was very much like Ireland, with a  commission from a friend in Indiana.

Rita is Welsh, and grew up in Cardiff until she left as a teenager (or so I remember her telling me when she found out we were moving to Ireland).  In her childhood, there was a village green, or town square, or something along those lines, with a circle of posts and chains.  As children, she and her brother would run and get the chains all swinging at the same time.

One of Cardiff's government buildings.

So Rita asked if we ever got over to Wales, to swing the chains in Cardiff for her. Unfortunately, I never asked Rita enough specifics.  I was afraid things had changed in 60+ years, but my physiotherapist went to college in Cardiff and told me the town hall and government buildings were old and hadn’t changed. So we checked into the hotel and then went to find them.

Getting the last chain swinging!

Hmmm.  Not much luck.  There are some lovely buildings, and a beautiful park-type area in front and behind them, with some areas that might have had a circle of chains years ago, but not now.  So I took lots of pictures for Rita and then swung part of the long loop of chains around the whole park.  NOT all of them!

Besides that, I think the best part of Cardiff was seeing the red Welsh Dragon everywhere.  On flags, on signs, on sides of buildings.  Cool symbol of national pride.

Welsh is worse than Irish!

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Roman Baths & Bizarre Comedy

(Written Tuesday, 5/12/09)

We’re exhausted already.
Crossed the Severn River on a l-o-n-g bridge over the estuary area where the tide meets the freshwater and churns up the mud.  Nice drive, only an hour from Cardiff, and we drove through the lovely Georgian areas of town to get to a car park.  Bath is gorgeous.  Most of the buildings are cream and butterscotch colored, with lovely brickwork and windows and everything romantic.  Right out of Jane Austen—in fact, she lived here for 5 or 6 years.

We spent the morning at the Roman baths.  We only got through the inside museum part about the temple to Sulis/Minerva and a bit of time out at the main bath before I was “feeling unwell” and we got our tickets stamped to go out and get some lunch and rest.  Then back in, see the rest.  Tim was fascinated with how much the Romans could do—a pressurized system of water flow, etc.  And both boys were amazed that the system is still the same as the Romans had—the lead lining on the main bath, the drains and such, and it all still worked.

It’s a lot different than when Blaik and I were here nearly 25 years ago.  Some things are nice—the large open areas are walled off so they’re like they would have been 2000 years ago, instead of having to just imagine it.  But we had a tour guide back then instead of the handheld audio-tours, and I think there was less temple stuff and more bath stuff.  I know there was a large segment dedicated to the Georgian/Victorian era that isn’t here any more.

One of the new technology additions that was nice was a set of monitors in different areas that showed a picture of that room/area/temple remnant as it is now, and then segued to a CG recreation of the same thing, and then added components and then people until you could see it as it was.  That brought it to life, especially the temple part.  (I’ve read enough stories with Roman baths in them that I can picture that, but the Roman temple part is harder for my imagination).

We split up after that, Blaik and the boys touring the Bath Abbey while I walked up the hill (with aching feet already) to the Jane Austen center.  Then we met up for dinner and braved the cold wind for the Bizarre Bath Comedy Tour.  Crazy guy dressed in purple, lots of random thoughts and very little history (we knew that ahead of time), and tons of jokes about the places we stopped tied into the people in the group.  I think that will be the highpoint of the trip for Tim!

Hares were a popular theme, but I didn't expect these!

Our Bizarre Bath Tour guide!

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Ireland to England on the Ferry

(Written 5/11/09)
I think I’m going back to the old-fashioned way of travel.  At least when I’m not in a tearing hurry.

Our ferry in the harbor in Fishguard, Wales.

We planned a trip to southwest England with the boys before they start work this summer, and had the choice of flying into London and renting a car, or taking our car over on the ferry.  Cost was about the same, but we decided on the ferry mostly because the Prius is great on gas mileage and has plenty of leg room in the back.

It was wonderful!  Got to the ferry dock in Rosslare at about 7:30 a.m., after spending Sunday night in Wexford town.  Wait in line, drive the car on, and we had 45 minutes before we left.  So we went up several decks, found the “sun deck” (it was sun/clouds and windy), then went down to the restaurant.  Full breakfast next to a window looking aft, and very relaxing.

Tim and Blaik went up on deck to watch us leave, Bryan and I relaxed where it was warm and played rummy.  Then we played a long game of Phase 10 while we watched the waves and our wake outside, and just enjoyed the time together. Closed the game early to go up as we came into Fishguard in Wales and had fun watching/feeling them maneuver the ferry into place.

It was so different than the rush to the airport, stand in line, sit tight for the trip, wait to get overhead carry-ons and get off, get through a crowded airport and wait for baggage, and then find your way out.

Instead we got to wander as we liked, have a great view, fresh air, comfortable places to sit and enjoy each other’s company, and no rush.  I’m looking forward to the return trip as a transition between a busy 5 days and the get-back-to-real-life time at home.

We watched them raise the Welsh flag as we got close to port.

It was really windy on the ferry!

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