Lilian's Tree

 My last post for Women's History Month is about my maternal great-grandmothers, Isabella and Maryanne. Both of these ladies were native born and were widowed young. Isabella Mary Ann Vaughan was born on 18 September 1847 at Domain Terrace, Sydney. Today the State Library of New South Wales stand on the spot but in 1847 it was a row of terrace houses. Isabella was the fourth child and second daughter for Henry Vaughan and Charlotte Chasmar. In October 1866 she married William Henry Martin and together they had nine children. William dies sometime between 1878 and her re-marriage in 1884, to August Jasper. It is through this marriage that she becomes my great-grandmother. Isabella and August had four children but only their eldest, Evelyn Maude reaches adulthood. She doesn't appear in the newspapers, other than her first marriage and then her death, on 29 October 1922. Isabella's legacy from her second marriage was 4 children, with three dying very young, 10 grandchildren, 2...

For those Genealogists, reading this, you will know the excitement of having a brick wall finally fall and the other questions that this event brings. Nearly 30 years ago I started researching my family tree. Things were very different then, microfiche, microfilm, waiting for weeks for certificates or replies letters and endless questions waiting for answers. I knew my Mum's Dad, Grand pop, and with a bit of detective  work was able to find his birth and then his parents marriage, both in Victoria and his brother's birth, here in New South Wales. Mum's birth and her parent's marriage date were known, good, things were falling into place. Now all I had to do was find the deaths of Arthur and Maryanne Galbraith. How hard could that be there aren't that many Galbraith's on the microfiche, I should have this 'done' in a couple of weeks!  1560 weeks latter and I finally have the answers for both Arthur and Maryanne! Arthur Galbraith was born in Ayr, Sco...