Hello,
I appreciate this thread is several years' old but, nevertheless, was really pleased to have found it and hope someone will pick my message up...
For a Chapter in a WW1 book:
I've been researching David Russell (Jamaican) who married his German wife, Anna, in 1911.
At the outbreak of war, she was repatriated to England (Hull) with 4 of their children. But, having no money/resources and unable to speak English they initially ended up in a workhouse in Hull.
Meanwhile, as a British subject, David Russell had been interned, experienced severe health complications at the camp, and was repatriated to England (Essex) in 1916, I believe.
As a courtesy, I'd be more than happy to share my research once it's completed, but am reaching out at this juncture to see if there are any family members who might be able to help me fill in a few gaps, in particular:
1. It has been virtually impossible to learn about their life in Germany before the war.
2. Records indicate that he tried in vain (for years, especially in the 1920s) to have the family reunited and return to Jamaica. So, I am trying to establish how and why they relocated to the Nottingham area and appear to have settled a couple of generations later.
3. I know his wife died in Nottingham in 1965, but I cannot trace what happened to David Russell.
While I cannot find him on the 1939 Register with his wife and several of their adult children, I have not been able to find him on passenger lists either. Having said that, I found a record of a death of a David Russell in 1949 in Jamaica (that more or less matches his birth date) and am trying to ascertain if it's right individual.
4. So far, I have not found any images of either of the couple/family; I know he worked at some point as a merchant seaman and was hoping to locate an image that way but, for the most part, the government decided to destroy those records in the 1920s...
Many thanks.
