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26 Dec 2013

Clues from the cousins #2

It's very nice to get one's own detailed family tree back with a few amendments.  In the case of 87 year-old distant cousin Ted W, the additions were limited to a couple of pen strokes.

Next to Robert Boocock I'd optimistically put a ? in case there were any other siblings.  Ted just put a red line through that.  Nice and clear.

I nearly missed it but under his uncle William Young, he'd put something.  It was definitely his writing and not his young nephew's.  It was the three letters ADA in capitals.  Well that was something, didn't know about her.  Also the digits 23.6.  I guessed this was Ada's birthdate - the 23rd of June.  Not much to go on - but a whole new unexpected family group to add to the tree.

Sure enough I checked the birth records and censuses and found William - with a completely different age and a very different wife from the one I expected.  I put Ada on the backburner, happy to have at least found a record of her birth on the banks of the Tyne (Northumberland).

Then I thought - I can't just abandon this information.  Surely a record of Ada's later life can be found?  I teased out information concerning all the Ada Youngs who married on the Tyne and one fitted the best.  The next challenge came for her daughter, listed as Dollie J (name slightly changed).  I might have used Findmypast's excellent marriage finder, but in this case I employed an alternative tack.  Looking for all the children with the right mother's maiden name born near the Tyne, I found only candidate that fitted and this led me to the missing marriage.  Now I have Ada's two children to write to, living not far at all from where there grandfather William Young was in the 1911 census.

Sadly Ada has now long been deceased, but she was remembered I'm guessing affectionately by her elderly cousin Ted, and it's time now to see if her children would like to know something of her family background after such a long gap.

Postscript: No Tynesider will be surprised to hear that Dollie knows Ted W, and is in touch as I am with Ted's nephew Dave.

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