Man about the Hows - May2021

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mardler
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Posts: 306
Joined: October 4th, 2009, 6:28 pm

Man about the Hows - May2021

Post by mardler »

Hello everyone. Happy new month. In the next few minutes, I'm going to update howesfamilies.com with the latest upload from our master file. The site will go offline for a while. If you want to use the website and get that message about maintenance in progress, you can try our mirror site at howes.one-name.net. The mirror site has all the same information, but without the images.

I hope the weather is warming up, for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, at least. I know I moaned about it last month but here in Norfolk, the temperature has rarely climbed up to 15C (=59F) for weeks now, as we have been subjected to a continuous weather pattern of Northerly and Easterly winds. For the last three days, we have had lovely blue skies and sunshine, but still chilly for anyone with no shelter from the wind. And, I've finally managed to get a day's competitive sailing in after 18 months of being hindered by Covid restrictions. It was fabulous, though a 45 mile return journey by water with an ambient temperature of 8C (=46F) was bitter! Anyway, that's enough about my life!

How have we done?
Because I was indoors for much of the month, we added over 900 people and finished the month on 183,900 people in reconstructed families. Actually, we were able to add even more than that. I purchased 36 certificates to try to connect up families. Almost all of them were fruitful and several enabled us to realize that we had the same person in our database twice! So there was quite a bit of merging too! The few certificates I purchased which weren't fruitful have left us with a further puzzle. So I'm going to ask for help below from you sleuths out there!

Newspapers.com
One thing that I have found would REALLY help us is a subscription to Newspapers.com, owned by Ancestry.com. It's becoming more and more frequent to find Ancestry sourcing to their colleagues at Newspapers, especially for events occurring in North America. The sources most often occur for marriages and obituaries. However, for me, I am already busy enough with worldwide subscriptions to both Ancestry and FindMyPast, which latter service has four separate newspaper databases already built in. There's enough data in those providers to keep me busy for years yet! If I spent more on Newspapers.com, I would then get less value from my existing subscriptions. So, my question: is there anyone among us with a subscription to Newspapers.com who would be prepared to do lookups for us?

Is your Howes family from Ireland? Or Stark County, Illinois?
I received a note last week from a gentlemen named Cam Clayton, who is descended from a Howes family from County Cork in Ireland who emigrated to Canada some time in the late 1830s/early 1840s. Cam is now a correspondent. He told me that he has recently written a book on his Howes ancestors and how the first generation spread across Ontario and into Northern parts of the US. The book ("The Howes Family of Frontenac, Lennox and Addington: The First Generation in Upper Canada") is available on Amazon.ca for the princely sum of C$5! Sad to relate, I just tried to buy a copy, but they won't deliver to the UK or US. If you are in Canada and might be interested, here is the link

Cam has some interesting theories. He believes that his family is related to a Howes family in Stark County, Illinois. He so strongly believes this that he is willing to fund a yDNA test for a Howes man from that area to see whether his theory is correct. Are you the lucky man? Do you know someone who would qualify for a free yDNA test? Let me know.

He also wonders whether his Irish Howes family ended up in Cork having emigrated from Germany. It's not impossible at all. Without really thinking about the possibilities too hard, I had just assumed that the Irish Howes families had simply been exported from Southern England by the government. For example, the government would post coastguards all over the British Isles, but never to an area where the individual had a family connection, for obvious reasons. So, here's a challenge for any Howes male whose family hails from Cork: would you take a yDNA test to test the two theories. You might match with an English family, or a German!

Howes in the news
We found two Howes people in news stories worthy of mention this month. One, a Canadian, was accused of murder and sent for trial. Out of respect for his family I will not name him until after a verdict, and maybe not even then. We will see what happens.
The other news story we spotted concerned two brothers who are still working a family farm in Cummington, Massachusetts in their late-60s, the farm having been in their family for close on 150 years. Here's a link to an interesting description of their daily life:
https://www.recorder.com/Howes-Farm-hg- ... 1-40510298

I feel it necessary every few months to apologize to our HOUSE cousins because I rarely publish anything to do with their name in the news. I simply cannot figure out a way to get news on your family name without having to sift through mounds of material from realtors/estate agents or companies with a fancy name for their HQ! It's not that I'm ignoring you, honest! If you know how to get around this problem, let me know.

MyHeritage improves again
Folks, last week I watched a pre-release demo from MyHeritage about their new picture tool. Remember, as I hae described before they already have a free colorizing service, and a digital animation tool, allowing you to see various expressions from animated facial features. Their new took is called Photo Repair. It can take scratched/bent photos and remove the flaws. Quite incredible how they can do all of that with software in a few seconds. Take a look at their blog post and see for yourself, then try it out. Start here:
https://blog.myheritage.com/2021/05/int ... ed-photos/
Have fun with this one!

Regular DNA tests from Ancestry.com
Many people have used Ancestry's DNA tests (they aren't the same as yDNA tests, which only look at direct male ancestors). If you haven't, please be aware that they have a sale going on in some markets right now for Father's Day. The UK sale price is only £59, plus postage, until June 20.

IF you plan to buy one, please would you use one of the following links? The reason I ask is that if you do that, Ancestry will make a donation to the Guild of One-Name Studies, the British charity that promotes the study of surnames. You will not pay any more. Ancestry is rewarding the Guild for sending custom its way.
UK link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1101l4nxH
US link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1100l4o5T
Canadian link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1101l4nVz
Aussie link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1100l4o5S
I am told that these links apply to subscriptions too. So if you have a renewal coming up, please do consider using the relevant link.

Puzzle time
Here's what ought to be a relatively simple puzzle, but it's not.
This puzzle concerns George William Howse (i187753 - see https://howesfamilies.com/getperson.php ... ee=Onename) and Jane Jones (i187757).  I got into this family because I found daughter Sarah Jane's marriage to the unusually-named William Dumaresq. I wanted to build a family around them, but I rapidly became stumped. 
Basically, I cannot find George William before his marriage in 1849 or after, up to 1871, when he resurfaces in Kent, still in the same business of running hotels.  I can't find wife, Jane either.  The children were living with her mother, their grandmother, in 1851, 1861 & 1871.  So where were the parents? 
George William was widowed, in 1871, a hotel keeper (as recorded before) and about the right age.  I'm not at all sure he's from Brighton, though that's what the census says.  The man seems to have moved about quite a bit.
The only death that fits is for GW is the one I have added to his file and it looks to me like his Mrs died close by too, though I have nothing to go on to be sure it was her.  The relevant death record is in Walworth in 1870 age 46. Was it her? Where had she been? 
George William's father was named George. Also a hotel keeper, per his son's marriage record. There was a baptism in Marylebone in 1818 at about the right time to have been GW. Is it him? What happened to the father?
Do let me know if you have any inspiration!

All the best
Paul
mardler
Site Admin
Posts: 306
Joined: October 4th, 2009, 6:28 pm

Re: Man about the Hows - May2021

Post by mardler »

We are already on the road to a solution! Thanks to a note from correspondent Deb McCleery, pointing out that George William Howse had been a Mason in Plymouth (Occ'n: hotel keeper), I then found him in another Lodge in Fleet Street, transferring in from the Plymouth Lodge, then suspended for non-payment of dues ay year-end 1871.

I then found him mentioned in the London Gazette in 1877. He having died, his widow, an Ellen Sarah, was asking creditors to come forward with any claims against his estate, of which she was the administratrix.

Turns out he was in our database already! George William Howse/House married an Ellen Sarah Hearnden in 1875, in Settle, Yorkshire.

My word, the man moved about! Being a peripatetic hotel keeper doesn't seem to tally with anything . . . . unless perhaps he worked for a railway company and ran the company's hotels. Maybe there is more to be found in city directories.

More to be learned yet! Please do keep the emails coming. Together, we can do this!
Thanks for the stimulation, Deb.
Paul
PatrickCunningham
Posts: 4
Joined: December 31st, 2012, 6:15 pm

Re: Man about the Hows - May2021

Post by PatrickCunningham »

The links to the Ancestry DNA purchases are not showing up - maybe the software is stripping them out for some reason?
mardler
Site Admin
Posts: 306
Joined: October 4th, 2009, 6:28 pm

Re: Man about the Hows - May2021

Post by mardler »

Hello Patrick. Did you mean that you can't see the links in my newsletter? They are there for me, like this:
UK link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1101l4nxH
US link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1100l4o5T
Canadian link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1101l4nVz
Aussie link: https://prf.hn/click/camref:1100l4o5S

When you click on them, they take you to a normal Ancestry welcome screen, but note the length of the full URL. It's in the back end of that which tells Ancestry you've come via the Guild.

Hope that's what you meant!
Paul
mardler
Site Admin
Posts: 306
Joined: October 4th, 2009, 6:28 pm

Re: Man about the Hows - May2021

Post by mardler »

Further information about the puzzle over George William Howse: after a note from a correspondent late on Monday night, I spent a lot of time yesterday on his situation and was a able to find a LOT more. My theory about railway links to many his hotels seems to have been borne out (Folkestone, Lowestoft, Plymouth, Settle), though I haven't found him in a railway employment database.

Rather than take down the main website to upload my findings for just one person, I updated the mirror site. So if you want to see the current state of play for George, go to https://howes.one-name.net/getperson.ph ... tree=Howes

I'm still looking to find him in the 1861 census and wanting to know what happened to Sarah Ellen after George's death. And I'm curious why he gave his birthplace as Brighton, not once but twice! Over to you . . . .
Paul
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