findmypast announces a new collaboration with Family Search. Historians and Linguists need your help

findmypast announces a new collaboration with Family Search that will give access to billions of records on-line and new technology to collaboratively research their family roots.

However, some are questioning why? Family Search is available fee on the Internet, you can search all records they have throughout the world.

findmypast intends to have access based on subscription even though you can continue to use Family Search free of charge..  

What’s in a name? Historians and Linguists need your help!

The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales, The National Library of Wales, University of Wales and the People’s Collection Wales have set up a collaborative project which they hope volunteers will help to record all the place-names of Wales as they appeared on Ordnance Survey maps at the end of the Victorian period.

Details can be found at Cymru1900Wales

Bexley Local Studies and Archive Centre concerns that it may be closed and moved to Bromley. North West Kent Family History Society has joined the First World War Centenary partnership

Live in Bexley and use the Local Studies and Archive Centre? Concerned that it may be closed and moved to Bromley?

Bexley Council announces it is proposing to move the Bexley Local Studies and Archive Centre from Bexleyheath to Central Library Bromley.

Bexley Council has also announced that there will be a public consultation which will run from 21 October 2013 to 16 December 2013. The Council will publish each proposed option on its website and seek feedback from residents. The final decision will be made in March 2014.

Bexley Council Website is  Bexley Council Information regarding consultations can be found at Bexley Consultation Page

North West Kent Family History Society has joined the First World War Centenary partnership.

A network of over 1,600 local, regional, national and international cultural and educational organisations from 27 countries around the world and led by the Imperial War Museum.

Details can be found at First World War Centenary-IWM and on the First world War Centenary Page on this Blog 

Dartford Branch, 25th Anniversary and Auction. Biographical Database of Australia has been launched.

Dartford Branch of the North West Kent Family History Society celebrated its 25th Anniversary on 5th October, 2013.

Over 100 members came along to join in the celebrations, take part in the Auction arranged by the Branch and the Society Library and hear David Cufley give a talk on 'Kevin Bacon Family History Laboratory' a talk with a difference that got everyone involved.

The auction was a first for the Society and raised over £250. Many thanks to all who helped arrange and took part in the day, including Lynn who made a lovely 25th Anniversary Cake to mark the event.

Auction held at Dartford Branch

All the items were donated by Society members, just over 20 lots were auctioned. 

Biographical Database of Australia has been launched.

The not-for-profit database is the result of many years of work by volunteer genealogists, historians and contractors. The first release contains over 500,000 entries and can be searched for free. A present it contains convict, muster, census, baptism, marriage and burial manuscript records and has plans to grow.  A subscription of $25 AUD is needed to access the details.

For more information see Biographical Database of Australia

North West Kent Family History Society - flickr. Knole House Winter Lectures. WWI Soldiers Wills

North West Kent Family History Society - flickr

NWKFHS is now on flickr. As a start to the build up of the anniversary of the start of  WWI there are photographs of many aspects of the war. There are six sets consisting of some 130 photographs: Women and WWI, Civilians in WWI, WWI Entertainment, Cinema, Music, Canadian Expeditionary Force, Military WWI, How WWI was portrayed in Children's Comics and as Cartoons in Magazines.

The photographs are on subjects from all over the Country, it is hoped to have a set on Kent in WWI soon. NWKFHS flickr
 

Knole House, Sevenoaks, Kent, Winter Lectures:

Knole House is hosting a series of winter lectures in the property’s Great Hall. 

Lady Anne Clifford: was she Cleopatra?

Saturday 9 November 2013, 5-7pm

£15.00

Find out whether one of the extraordinary mistresses of Knole, Lady Anne, played the part of Cleopatra in this discussion and recreation of a 400-year-old play in the Great Hall, where it was once performed.

Lord Sackville’s Christmas Lecture

Tuesday 3 December 2013, 11:30-2pm

£35.00 including 2-course buffet lunch

Lord Sackville delivers his annual Christmas lecture; ‘Living at Knole’.

Normal for Knole: our unbelievable architecture

Tuesday 10 December 2013, 11:00-12:30pm

£15.00

Archaeologist Nathalie Cohen reveals why all the 'unusual, baffling, uncommon and singular things' about Knole - the wonky roofs, voids, hidden stairs and a timber structure that defies the laws of physics by staying up' are all normal - at least for Knole.

The writing on the walls of Knole

Thursday 12 December 2013, 11am-12:30pm

£15.00

Archaeologist Matt Champion discusses hundreds of years of graffiti at Knole. Why did people write and draw on the walls? What does it tell us about life in a great house?

You need to book in advance. Further details can be found at National Trust Knole House

WWI Soldiers Wills:

Some 230,000 wills of soldiers who died on the front are available on line. They are part of huge on line archive is also a part project which aims to make all war wills from the Boer War to the Falklands publicly available. It is free to search but you will have to pay for copies of a wills. The charge is £6, which seems high for a copy of a Will. Find A Will 

The Bexley Times features NWKFHS. Kent County Council Libraries could be privatised. The Archives and Records Association and findmypast to publish school registers.

Bexley Times. Read the interview with Society President David Cufley that appeared in the 19th September issue.

The Bexley Times featured the Society Library and some of the volunteers who help visitors and Members. Bexley Times Interview

Kent Libraries could be one of the front line services to be privatised or run by other organisations in shake-up by Kent County Council. 

Libraries could be among the first wave of services the Kent County Council intends include in a “market review” under a three-year plan which will get under way next month (October 2013). This could have huge implications for Libraries and Local Archives in Kent, affecting our Society, Members use of Library and of course other FHS in Kent.  See Kent Online for more details.

The Archives and Records Association (UK & Ireland)  - ARA -  has signed a deal with  brightsolid to publish on-line millions of school records from England and Wales.

A new National Digitisation Consortium of 120 some 120 English and Welsh archives and schools working together to  offer records for digitisation. The school registers are from 1870 - 1914 school registers. Once they have been scanned and transcribed by brightsolid, they will be available  on-line on findmypast.co.uk. ARA See also SOG News

The NWKFHS Newsletter for September 2013. NWKFHS meetings for October 2013

The NWKFHS Newsletter for September can now be downloaded/read (pdf file) at NWKFHS Newsletter. You can also download/read the latest Branch Newsletters at Branches

NWKFHS meetings for October 2013. Visitors are welcome to come along to any of the meetings.

Bromley Branch: The main hall, Bromley Methodist Church, College Road, Bromley BR1 3NS. The hall opens at 9.45am, the meeting proper starts at 10.30am, ending by 12.15pm.

19 October 2013: Ian Porter Women’s employment options in Victorian & Edwardian London.

Dartford Branch: Dartford Technology College, Heath Lane, Dartford DA1 2LY. Doors open from 9.45am.

5 October 2013: The 25th Anniversary meeting of Dartford Branch Includes an auction of family and local history lots. David Cufley, Kevin Bacon Family History Laboratory - an interactive experiment to make family history links between members and to verify if the 'six degrees of separation' has any relationship to Family History Research. An interactive experiment to explore links between members - Serendipity & Kismet!

Sevenoaks Branch: meetings are held on the second Thursday of the month at the Sevenoaks Community Centre, Otford Road, Sevenoaks, TN14 5DN. Doors open at 7.15pm, meetings start 8.00pm, ending by 9.30pm.

10 October 2013: Pat Mortlock Intrigue, Ambition & Respectability - The Owners of Ightham Mote.

Please check the NWKFHS Website to ensure that there are no last minute changes before travelling to a meeting.

North West Kent Family History Society Auction - Saturday 5th October, 2013 at Dartford Technology College, Heath Lane, Dartford DA1 2LY. Change of speaker at Dartford Branch Meeting for 1st February 2014

North West Kent Family History Society Auction - Saturday 5th October, 2013 (meeting starts at 10.00 am and finishes 2.30 pm) at Dartford Technology College, Heath Lane, Dartford DA1 2LY. The auction will take place on the same day as the Dartford Branch 25th Anniversary. 

All items are‘family or local history’ related and have been donated to North West Kent Family History Society. You can attend the Meeting on the day to bid on any item or Bid via the Society website. All proceeds go to the Society.

Details of all lots will be displayed on the Society’s website during September. If you wish to place a bid on any item please email Auction Bid  with the amount you are prepared to bid up to plus your name, membership number and telephone number. Successful bidders will be contacted after the auction by email so arrangements can be made to collect their item from the Society Library or one of the branches. The Society will not be contacting unsuccessful bidders. The Society will not be delivering or sending the item to the successful bidder.

Full terms plus a Catalogue  can be downloaded at NWKFHS Catalogue  The Catalogue gives full details of all 22 Lots.

Lots include:   

Indenture dated 1688 the year the Stuart King James II was deposed in the so called ‘Glorious Revolution’


Names mentioned in the document are Joyce SOULLEMONT of Eltham, Elizabeth SOULLEMONT also of Eltham, Thomas HILLIARD of St Leonards Shoreditch (carpenter) Solomom SOULLEMONT (Gent, deceased), Edward WILSON St Olaves, Southwark and Stephen RYDER of St Leonards Shoreditch (Gent).

Original antique engraved print of the ancient church of St Nicholas Chislehurst dating from around 1830. The picture was engraved by Henry Adlard (1799-1893) for ‘England’s Topographer’ published between 1828 and 1831.

Change of speaker at Dartford Branch Meeting for 1st February 2014. Andy Robertshaw of the Army Logistics Museum re WW1 - Finding the fallen and their Family History will now give this talk at the Society AGM in April 2014. In his place is John Meakins who will talk about the Kent Fire Brigade