This year I attended the Who Do You Think You Are Live exhibition for the first time. It was a bit of a trek (and I went along for all three days), but very much worth it: I met a number of people (below) who were able to point me towards some really exciting new avenues of investigation, and I had a really great time. I’m aiming to follow up these leads over the next year, so keep an eye on Jenny’s Genealogy for the results!

The National Archives of Ireland

We spoke to a very helpful gentleman who explained that ‘Kil-‘ in place names means ‘church’ and thought that the names of the siblings Honorah and Jeremiah Coughlin suggest that the family may have come from Munster. He was even able to give me the reference number of the microfilm of the records from the most likely parish.

Jayne Shrimpton

Jayne Shrimpton presented a very interesting workshop on family portraits. I showed her copies of some of the family photos at her photo-dating stand the next day, and we think that Alice Chapman’s photo may well be a 21st birthday portrait – she has a ribbon on her dress, and apparently the style of the sleeves dates the photo to the early 1890s (Alice was born in November 1870). Jayne thinks that the picture of the unknown Newland man is an enlargement of a small photo which has been touched up with pencil, and probably dates from the 1850s or 1860s.

Science Museum Library and Archives

May be a source on information on my engineer ancestors like David Dear and Robert Fiveash.

Families in British India Society

The lady we spoke to mentioned secret families, which made us wonder exactly what Thomas Fitzgerald got up to during his army service before he married at the age of 42…