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Topics - Gamone

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1
Scotland / Scottish students' songbook
« on: Thursday 13 October 05 13:43 BST (UK)  »
My ex-wife (who had an antiquarian bookshop in Brittany until she retired last year) has just given me a charming book:

My edition, 360 pages long and containing words and music of a couple of hundred songs, appears to date from the 1890s. The songs themselves are not particularly Scottish, but rather songs that would have been sung at that time by students in Scotland. For example, the collection starts with the inevitable Gaudeamus igitur, and it even contains the French Marseillaise.

I can't scan the entire contents, but maybe I could put at least the song titles in my webspace if there were nostalgic Scottish oldtimer students who wished to recall memories of musical evenings in Edinburgh pubs. And I would be happy to answer specific questions.

Nothing bawdy, of course. On the contrary, I was amused to find a 100% clean version of Abdul, the Bulbul Ameer.

My ex-wife seems to think that this is a rare edition. There's nothing Scottish in my genealogical preoccupations, but I once wrote a tourist guide book on Britain (in French, English and German editions) and, since then, friends have got into the habit of offering me old documents about Britain.

William

2
Antrim / Massereene/Skeffington story
« on: Monday 10 October 05 22:14 BST (UK)  »
I have researched families whose names are associated with Skeffington, and my notes on this subject (downloadable as Word files through my website) include elements of the history of the Massereene viscountcy. In a forthcoming version of these notes, I do not intend to pursue the Massereene/Skeffington story any further, because I have discovered recently that my own family sprung from an early branch of the Leicestershire patriarchs, prior to any connections with Ireland. So, I would be happy to hand over my Massereene/Skeffington results to a researcher who is focussed upon the Irish branches.

Massereene/Skeffington genealogy is a rich and fascinating story, but work could be done in at least three fields:

  • The Williamson study of the 2nd Earl (Proni 1972) could be re-edited to include, for example, essential prison records I obtained from the Parisian Police Museum. His lengthy detention in Parisian debtors' prisons constitutes an interesting chapter of pre-revolutionary French history (which deserves to be written).

  • Several direct descents from royalty could be presented in detail. As strange as it might appear, I'm not convinced that even the late 13th Viscount was fully aware of these descents, which he never mentioned to me in any of his letters.

  • The origins of present-day Skeffington folk could be investigated. For example, I was thrilled to find a celebrated Skeffington descendant: Lewis Carroll.

Since this subject is rather specialized, interested researchers might contact me by private messages... unless, of course, they consider that other RootsChatters might be concerned by these themes. In any case, there is no urgency in my proposition.

William Skyvington


3
Australia Lookups completed / Braidwood bushrangers
« on: Thursday 06 October 05 15:28 BST (UK)  »
I apologize for the volume of this message, but the subject is most important for me in the context of my maternal family-history activities.

After lengthy research in Australia, I recently learnt that my g-g-g-grandfather was a convict from Tipperary named Patrick Hickey, who didn't get his urge for cattle-stealing and house robbery knocked out of him by being transported. On the contrary, he even earned himself, through an additional crime committed in New South Wales, a taste of the hell of Norfolk Island. Patrick must have been a good talker, because he persuaded the authorities to send his wife and kids out to Braidwood. His daughter, Ann, married Charles Walker from Cork (steward on the Caroline, the vessel that had brought the Henty brothers to Western Australia), and they were my g-g-grandparents.

I am searching for information on one of Ann's brothers, William Hickey, born around 1823 in the Tipperary townland of Borris (now called Two Mile Borris). It was said in the following mysterious police document (about which I know little, except that it was apparently written just before the execution of the Clarke brothers in 1867) that this Billy Hickey was a Braidwood bushranger who rode with the Clarke gang:
 
WILLIAM HICKEY age about 45 years, farmer, residing at Reidsdale. Has been an associate of  the bushrangers and is still suspected of harbouring and assisting them. Was arrested in 1863 for highway robbery, acquitted by the Bench. His father, an Imperial Convict, was tried for house robbery about the year 1852 and sentenced to 14 years roads, which sentence was afterwards mitigated on memorial. William Hickey was present when the outlaw Clarke and William Berriman assaulted, with intent to rob, a number of Chinamen at Majors Creek in November 1864 and for which offence Clarke was under committal for trial when he effected his escape from Braidwood Gaol.
 
We know a lot about the Clarke brothers, photographed here in Braidwood shortly before they were taken to Darlinghurst to be hung:

On the other hand, I know almost nothing about their Braidwood friend, my ancestor Billy Hickey. Any assistance in this domain would be greatly appreciated.

William




4
The Common Room / Approaches to publishing
« on: Thursday 15 September 05 17:23 BST (UK)  »
I'm using the term "publishing" in a broad sense: making public the results of genealogical research. I would be interested to hear what people have to say on this subject.

-- Are websites a good way to publish the results of family-history research? (How do you cater for readers who don't use computers?)

-- Are downloadable printable files a feasible solution? If so, what format?

-- Should research results include Gedcom files? How do you make them available?

-- How should graphic stuff (charts, photos, etc) be handled when publishing?

-- Should the researcher envisage a hybrid approach for the publication of his/her results, combining a mixture of websites, paper documents, computer disks, etc? It's a fact, for example, that the graphics you place in a website are generally technically different to images that you would print out on paper.

-- Where should genealogical publications be deposited ("for posterity", as they say)?

-- How should genealogical publications be publicized, so that other researchers and interested readers know what you're doing?

This is a big subject. Today, most family-history researchers would like to create something richer than a simple family tree drawn on a few sheets of paper. Technology enables us to envisage the creation, for our children and their descendants, of a family-history time-capsule that could incorporate several kinds of digital items, including multimedia stuff.

It would be good to put together (and publish!) a set of guidelines in this domain.

Final detail. Personally, I have a problem (maybe because I live in the wilderness in France) finding friends who are prepared to browse through stuff I've created, which I intend to publish, to tell me whether it contains faults, is hard to understand, could be improved, etc. In the same way that many kind folk offer to carry out lookups, maybe there are others who would be prepared to offer their assistance to researchers as readers.

5
London & Middlesex Completed Lookup Requests / 1891 census Skyvington/Mepham
« on: Friday 09 September 05 20:03 BST (UK)  »
I would like to discover 1891 census data on

-- William Jones SKYVINGTON (born in 1868),

-- his wife Eliza Jane SKYVINGTON, née MEPHAM (born in 1865)

-- and their son Ernest William SKYVINGTON (born in March 1891).

I have four possible London addresses for William and/or his wife, who may not have been living together at the date of the census:

-- 65 Evershot Rd, Islington

-- 42 Mt Pleasant Rd, Hornsey (or Crouch Hill)

-- 36 Theobold's Rd, Holborn

-- 16 Marriott Rd, Islington

Is it possible that these places were considered, at the time of the 1891 census, as being located in Middlesex rather than in the county of London? (Please forgive me for being ignorant.)

There is a vague possibility that William might have spelt his name as SKIVINGTON. There is also a vague possibility that Eliza, although married to William SKYVINGTON in 1889, might have retained her maiden name, MEPHAM.

6
London & Middlesex Completed Lookup Requests / 1901 Skyvington (3 individuals)
« on: Thursday 08 September 05 17:04 BST (UK)  »
I would be thankful if somebody were to provide me with three records from the 1901 census.

On the Archives service, there are 21 individuals named Skyvington. Strangely, only 18 names come up on the (currently free) Ancestry site. The three missing individuals happen to interest me greatly:

-- Ernest Skyvington (Hornsey)
-- Frank Skyvington (London)
-- Marie Skyvington (London)

The civil parish of the two Londoners has a curious lengthy name:

St Andrews Holborn Above the Bars with St George the Martyr.

7
One Name Studies: N to S / SKEFFINGTON
« on: Sunday 28 August 05 00:29 BST (UK)  »
I use the term "patronymic" to designate a class of surnames whose instances have trivial spelling variations. I am studying the Skeffington patronymic, which originated in the Leicestershire village of that name following the Conquest. It has given rise to surnames such as Skevington, Skiffington, Skivington, etc. The current version of my monograph on this subject can be downloaded (zipped PDF files) from the following website:

http://gamone.free.fr/skeffington/

A major Skeffington branch, which flourished in Ireland, is represented by the viscountcy of Massereene. Lewis Carroll was a descendant of this branch.

In a forthcoming version of the monograph, I shall be presenting details of links from Edward III to Skeffington descendants.

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