Sharing genealogical research on the internet has been a major factor in the growth of the hobby in recent years. Data sites, message boards and personal websites abound and this is where the greatest caution is needed if we want if you use information found online in our research.
Can we ever be sure that what we see submitted is true? Terrible mistakes can creep into our research if we make a connection from a personal website without verifying the source against the original document.
Some websites such as www.ancestry.com actively encourage users to publish their research without any recourse to authentication. Fortunately, the submitter is often identified and we should make every effort to confirm the provenance of the information submitted. Similarly we should never take what we find for granted and always check information against the primary source. The IGI is known to be riddled with errors and yet researchers treat it as fact without recourse to the original registers.
When we can’t find what we are looking for on the web we go to the archives and do a manual search. We should use the visit as an opportunity to confirm what we have already found on the web.
The really interesting material is in the archives. Where on the web are we likely to find an ancestors handwriting?
The internet is a really convenient research tool but the information that we find there should always be corroborated and it remains only a fraction of the total resources available.
On Friday the 6th May a talk was given by Mr Reg. Goulding on Mining 1940 -1986. He brought along books, charts and many other items of memorabilia. One of the pieces of iron he had brought along was 125 year old from the Minnie pit. Anne James pointed out that Mr Goulding had made a stand for the Society's banner.
Mr Goulding said that his grandfather had farmed at the Minnie Farm, where his mother was born and worked in the pit together with two uncles, one of who died in the Minnie pit explosion. He pointed out a book on the disaster, which gave all the details. During his 46 years employment in the mines, 14 spent at Madeley colliery and 32 spent at Silverdale colliery, he only had 10 days off sick. He was eventually made foreman and his job was working on the machinery at the coalface.
With nationalisation in 1947, public money was poured into the mining industry and the machinery became mechanised. Mr Goulding described in great detail certain aspects of mining including shot firing, belt conveyors and hydraulics.
Mr Goulding devoted some of his talk to safety in the pit and demonstrated the methanometer, which measure the percentage of gas. He said that the Meteorological Office informed collieries when air pressure was up as this pushes gas out of the coal. The usual was 14.51b per sq. inch.
Every pit has a mobile winder so that when there was no power, the men could get out of the pit. Mr Goulding was responsible for the machinery and he described his work in making things safe. The coalfields eventually became self-contained with steam engines, cooling towers, etc.
He concluded his talk on the miner's strike in the `winter of discontent'. He and some colleagues went through the picket line to work and were subjected to intimidation and bullying.
(Thanks go to Joan Tomkinson for supplying this review)
THE WORLD OF WILLIAM WHICKHAM The Biography and the Photography of a Remarkable Victorian
When the three surviving daughters of William Arthur Wickham, who was born in 1849, contacted Kenneth Ward, the author of this fascinating book, with regard to their father's photographic work, he discovered that a part of England's social history had been recorded on sets of glass plates stored away for a century.
Wickham's father died when he was sixteen, and to help maintain the family, William went as tutor to good families. He became interested in both photography and church architecture at an early age - and used his years of tutoring to travel to many parts of the country to see churches, abbeys and various ecclesiastical remains, making notes and taking photographs.
Eventually, he went to Lichfield Theological College and, after ordination, as Curate-in-charge in the colliery parish of Talke-o'-the-Hill, in Staffordshire. In 1878 he was appointed Vicar to St Andrew's Parish in Wigan. Here were collieries, iron foundries, cotton mills and other industry. Services were held in a schoolroom, with the Rev. Wickham playing a double bass and the schoolmaster a fiddle, to provide the music for services. There were plans for a church, but the first appeal brought in just £72 of the £5,400 needed. Nothing daunted, Mr Wickham pressed on, appealing to sources all over the country, and eventually the church was built.
It is probable that his early photography was done with one of the 'View' cameras of the time; we do not know. From his daughters' recollections, he probably bought one of the new bellows-type cameras on a wooden tripod (around 1882 to judge from the earliest of the glass plates that can be dated). It would also fit in with the introduction of 'dry-plate' photography, which made life a lot easier for the photographer.
In 1916, aged 68, waning health took him to the hamlet of Ampton, in Suffolk, as Rector. There, he continued his devoted ministry, renewed his interests and stamped his personality and principles upon the diocese. He died in 1929, aged 80, leaving behind an inspiring story and many visible contributions to posterity of his remarkable and fruitful life.