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Old Photographs, Recognition, Handwriting Deciphering => Handwriting Deciphering & Recognition => Topic started by: Kendra71 on Wednesday 09 January 19 23:36 GMT (UK)
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I'd be grateful for any help or advice on the following please. I've got a really lovely diary from 1824 documenting a trip to Italy, but can't make out the author's name. I can see the two uprights of the first names, although the first could be a Lt for Lieutenant. I think the first letter of the surname is a P although it could be a B or an F, but the other letters change every time I look at them. Something like Provost, or Parvlot or Prebus, although the author seems to be English and they sailed from Liverpool.
As this is an original document, are there any tips or tricks i can try? Would ultra-violet light help maybe? I can post further pictures if helpful, but know this is a difficult request! :(
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It reads like Diary of Journey Italy, to me. Ah...just noticed the signature ::)
Carol
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I think so too,can’t see a name ,where is that?
Oh a little above, very faint Pingle?
Viktoria.
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I'd suggest trying with a UV light, I understand that seemingly faded out writing, even if pretty well all gone, can become legible.
I've tried playing around with the image but there's too much fade on the name to be able to enhance it enough to read.
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I've tried playing with the image, but can't make it better.
Here it is a little darker & sharper:
(https://up.picr.de/34808983ml.jpg)
I can't decide whether there is possibly a "y" or a "g" at the end, or whether it's just a line in the paper. ???
And is that "ee" in the middle? ::)
I see different things every time, too! :o
Best regards,
Karen
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Not sure if this helps
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Hi Karen, Gadget, yes I think that does help. It now looks like "Lt J P_r_tin". I'll try taking some other photos in different light, and looking at in under a UV light (somehow). I'll also learn to resize my images before I post them here!
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I keep seeing the end of the name as i's, as in P_ _ _ _ i's. Does the content of the diary hint to the nationality of the author?
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I may be well off the mark here, but could it say Lord Portman?
PORTMAN, Edward Berkeley II (1799-1888), of Bryanston, Dorset.
"Portman, who took a first class degree at Oxford in 1821, witnessed the death of his father, Member for Dorset, in Rome in January 1823, but the poor health of other members of the family prevented his immediate return to England"
https://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1820-1832/member/portman-edward-1799-1888
There are lots of references to him and his family online.
http://www.mikeparsons.org.uk/genealogy/portman/index.html
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Here's a snip of his signature from his 1827 marriage record.
Deleted. Sorry - ignore this - it's a bishop's transcript, not an original signature ::)
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Hi Jool, Bbart
The author is almost certainly English and reasonably young. There are a lot of references to landmarks & buildings in Chester and that area. "Portman" looks like a possible surname (possibly a little long?), although the diary was written in October 1824 which may not fit with the dates for Lord Portman.
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My homemade UV light seemed to help somewhat (taping blue and purple coloured sellotape over my phone's flash). Karen's suggestion that there might be a "g" at the end looks correct. It almost certainly ends in "ing".
The name currently looks to me like a slightly long version of "Panting"?
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Could it be 'Previn'?
Wiggy
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Having said that the surname likely ends with "ing" I'm now thinking it might end with "y".
Perhaps P___try? Or P___tny?
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I'm quietly hopeful that I've found the right person, building on the writing analysis.
I think the author is John Dunting Pantry, written here as Jn D Pantry.
Pantry was a merchant seaman, who from 1838 captained coastal vessels around the UK. The diary is written by someone who knows about sailing but doesn't know the Mediterranean. The age is right. The author is a youngish man, who treats the trip as a kind of mini-Grand Tour.
The captain of the ship (John Monk) spends a lot of time with him and speaks to him as a social peer.
John Pantry lived in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire, not too far from Chester & Liverpool. The diary also makes reference to UK landmarks, mostly in the Liverpool area.
I'm going to look through the diary again and see if my flimsy theory still holds!
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I think, now you say it, it does look very like Pantry - I got as far as Pa*t* y but gave up.
Gadget
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Thanks Gadget. It's been a half an hour and I haven't changed my mind on "Pantry" which is encouraging!
I may have had the wrong one though. The one I had found with all the merchant navy experience would only have been 13 at the time and therefore not a candidate unfortunately. There is another John Pantry I'm focusing on now though, born 1805. He ran a company manufacturing linen in Sheffield, and there were lots of linen imports from Dublin so may have been a merchant client of the captain. I'll keep looking.