Debbie Kennett
Buckingham Suite
Sunday
1430-1530
Mother’s baby, father’s maybe: how DNA testing revealed a 100-year-old family secret
With the growth in the consumer DNA databases DNA testing is proving to be a useful tool for breaking through brick walls but can also reveal hidden family secrets.
Debbie describes her use of DNA testing to explore her mother’s complicated family tree. She was hoping to use DNA testing to find out the identity of her mother’s elusive paternal grandfather but instead uncovered a family secret in contradiction of the genealogical records which drastically rewrote her family history.
Judie McCourt
Buckingham Suite
Sunday
1145-1245
“With an Italian on the sofa” the short but scandalous life of Emma Costello
My 2xgreat grandmother, Emma Costello (1848-1890), born in respectable poverty, secretly married to Joseph, a wealthy man’s son, but had “other fish to fry”, living with her lover Henry and their 3 illegitimate children under Joseph’s name whilst he was off in Canada.
On his return, having tracked her down, Joseph divorced her – the case became the subject of sensationalised newspaper reports, her lover was sacked from his job, and that relationship ended. Emma died just 10 years later, aged 42, leaving an estate worth £4,000! Researching her left me with some answers, and even more questions!
Janet Few
Buckingham Suite
Sundayy
1015-1115
Fallen Women or Vulnerable Girls?
Victorian society frowned upon women who had stepped outside the strict moral expectations of the time. In an attempt both to reform the women who had ‘fallen’ from grace and to shield society from their perceived malign influence, a proliferation of refuges for fallen women were set up.
This presentation outlines the background history of these homes. With the aid of case studies, it examines the reasons why some women and girls found themselves in these institutions and the prevailing societal attitudes that put them there. Records that might reveal more about the lives of these women will be discussed.
Dr. Calista Williams
Buckingham Suite
Sunday
0900-1000
Shall I be Mother? The lives of ‘house parents’ in Poor Law Cottage Homes
Cottage Homes were established in Britain in the 1870s as an alternative to industrial schools. This new model housed a smaller number of pauper children together in a ‘family’ unit with a house ‘mother’ and/or ‘father’ to care for them.
This presentation explores the lives of the ‘house parents’, including their previous occupations, marital status and socio-economic standing. It investigates how they were recruited and identifies what credentials were considered important for these roles.
More broadly, this study questions the motivation behind constructing these artificial domestic settings and what this might tell us about Victorian ideals of home and family.
Sarah Wise
Thorpe Suite
Saturday
1615-1715
The Undesirables: why Britain locked away its troublesome youngsters for life
From 1913 to 1959, the British government put thousands of ordinary people into institutions, and forgot about them – a national scandal rivalling that of Ireland’s Magdalene Laundries.
By 1950, an estimated 50,000 people had been deemed ‘defective’ and detained under a notorious but now forgotten law: the 1913 Mental Deficiency Act.
Their ‘crimes’ were various: women with children born outside marriage; rebellious teenagers caught shoplifting; those with chronic illnesses who had struggled in school; and many who were simply ‘different’.
Sarah Wise shines a light on this shameful chapter and reveals the archives and resources that help piece together the lives of those impacted by the Act.
Karen de Bruyne
Burghley Suite
Saturday
1615-1715
Bigamist and ballonist
My 2nd cousin 3x removed, James Neil Campbell ( a Campbell from Duntroon) was born in India, lived in England, lived in Australia and then back in England. was married at least 4 times, 3 of them were bigamous! He had various occupations including balloonist, parachutist, saddler and apprentice merchant sailor.
Kate Keter
Thorpe Suite
Saturday
1445-1545
Jilted! Or what happened after the wedding was called off
One option an abandoned lover had was to sue for Breach of Promise of Marriage. In court, secrets of a romance that had gone wrong had to be opened to public scrutiny and proving a promise had been made often meant sharing the contents of love letters and calling family and friends as witnesses.
A win might result in a payment for damages, but many wanted justice with a court case offering a way to reclaim a bit of dignity. In this talk we’ll look at the records of these court cases and at the individuals involved.
Donna Rutherford
Burghley Suite
Saturday
1445-1545
Secrets in Code: Unlocking a Hidden Love Story
A simple postcard, purchased on eBay, concealed a remarkable mystery—a message written in code. Using genealogical research, newspaper archives, and a touch of code-cracking, I uncovered a hidden romance between a woman and her soon-to-be husband in early 20th-century Norwich, Norfolk. Their correspondence captured moments of their everyday life and local events.
My research led to reconstructing their family tree and even visiting their shared grave. This talk explores innovative methods—combining historical records, newspaper archives, and code-breaking—to reveal the untold stories of ordinary people and the secrets they left behind
Alan Moorhouse
Thorpe Suite
Saturday
1330-1430
Keeping It In The Family – A Police Sergeant Should Have Known Better?
The Church and the State have always controlled who you could marry and divorce was rare before 1914 and considered a scandal, confined by expense to the rich, and by legal restrictions that required proof of violence or adultery.
This talk will include a brief history of marriage and divorce laws over time and will use case studies to demonstrate what happened when marriages broke down and divorce was not an option for most people, of a 19th century divorce, and an “illegal” marriage involving a police sergeant in the Welsh valleys widowed with 4 young children to look after.
Sarah Wise
Burghley Suite
Saturday
1330-1430
Streets coloured black and blue: Charles Booth’s notebooks and the revelation of London poverty
The notebooks that late-Victorian sociologist Charles Booth and his assistants kept of their explorations of late-Victorian London poverty are unparalleled in the detail and colour they provide for the modern researcher and for family historians too.
His inquiry led to the creation of the famous ‘Poverty Map’ – a colour-coded chart of socio-economic London lives.
Historian Sarah Wise undertook a close examination of the Booth Archive held at the London School of Economics, and in this illustrated talk, she reveals how the notebooks enabled her to piece together a complex picture of life in ‘outcast London’.
Margaret Roberts
Thorpe Suite
Saturday
1100-1200
Oh Dear, What can the matter be? Auntie Joe’s lost in the Family Tree
Representing women equally in our research is challenging because they are not equally represented in the historical records, which are compiled and presented mostly by men.
This presentation will help you think creatively and expand your perspectives in order to enable you to put your female ancestors into their spatial and temporal context.
The case studies used here present examples of the difficulties that can confront the historian of women’s lives and illustrate how the hidden histories of women can be uncovered by going beyond the normal research processes.
Gwyneth Wilkie
Burghley Suite
Saturday
1100-1200
Amersham Workhouse Officials
This talk is the result of two years’ work in archives and on newspapers and published sources. It looks at the people who staffed Amersham Workhouse (Masters, Matrons, Schoolmasters and Schoolmistresses, Porters, Nurses) and what happened while they were in post.
As much data as possible has been gathered on their working lives before and after they served at Amersham. This is an area which has not yet received much attention from historians.
It includes unexpected finds connected with assisted emigration as well as the social niceties of life in Amersham which had to be observed in order to continue a successful medical career.
Maggie Gaffney
Thorpe Suite
Saturday
0930-1030
The man on the war memorial
Who was W.H. Archer, and what was his connection to the city of Wellington? Starting from a name etched on a New Zealand war memorial, the search for a WW1 soldier’s identity crossed the seas to England and uncovered scandal, bigamy, and tragedy.
Janet Few
Burghley Suite
Saturday
0930-1030
Doxies, Dolly-mops and Dressmakers: the history of prostitution 1780-1930
Although the ‘great social evil’, as prostitution was labelled in the nineteenth century, is mentioned in contemporary writings, such as newspapers, pamphlets and sermons, finding information about individual, named prostitutes is more difficult. This presentation looks at the history of prostitution in Britain from 1780-1930, including society’s attitudes to those who sold sexual favours, the legislation that impacted upon them and the work of those who tried to reform ‘fallen women’.
Using a case study, that sets the women’s life within the attitudes of her time, this session investigates the records that might reveal a woman’s lifestyle as a prostitute.
Else Churchill
Buckingham Suite
Friday
2045-2145
“Dunce ass blockheads and bould, impudent, clamourous woman” – unlocking secrets and stories from the bawdy church courts
The records of the Church of England’s ecclesiastical courts can illuminate our ancestors’ lives from the Reformation to the 18th century. This talk will encourage and help you to look for cases of defamation involving outspoken “scolding” women or cases of “criminous” conversation when a couple (or more!!) got up to what they shouldn’t!!
I hope you won’t be offended by what your ancestors did.
Stuart Stevenson
Buckingham Suite
Friday
1730-1830
Bigamy, Adultery and Murder – Using Scotland’s Adulterine Birth Records
As part of his MSc research at the University of Strathclyde, Stuart has read over 36,000 Scottish Birth records to find 170 births which resulted from adulterous relationships. These records have never previously been systematically extracted and researched. Only Scotland seems to have records directly showing adultery.
In many respects they are better data than are used in other papers on adultery and contradict, in some key respects, the conclusions of such heavyweights as the Kinsey reports of 1948 and 1953.
Fascinating stories emerge, including a brutal murder in 1907, and many bigamous “marriages”.
Maggie Gaffney
Buckingham Suite
Friday
1445-1545
Criminal intent: from Kent to the colonies
James Florey, a labourer from Kent, seemingly disappeared from his family’s life before 1841. Where did he go, and what happened to those he left behind? This presentation looks at the transportation and criminal records that helped piece together some of the puzzle.
Paul Blake
Buckingham Suite
Friday
1615-1715
The Visual Record – Fact or Fiction
Finding, understanding and interpreting photographs and other visual sources is not as straightforward as it may seem. For centuries, artists and photographers, particularly portraitists, have bent the truth to please their sitters. Governments and others have manipulated or faked images for their own often nefarious purposes. Now, with advances in AI, researchers are being tempted to create total fictitious images to illustrate their research. The camera can lie, and always could, and everything may not have been as it appears to us now, or, possibly, as our prejudiced views might wish it to be.
