Deborah Harvey : The Red Dress of Poetry ...: Bristol Poetry Festival so far and a visit to Well...

Deborah Harvey : The Red Dress of Poetry ...: Bristol Poetry Festival so far and a visit to Well...: The Bristol Poetry Festival is galloping into its final week. The last seven days have seen fantastic sets from Tara Bergin, Liz Berry, Hele...

A Bristol man in the American Civil War

In the 1790's Stephen Bevan was born. More than that I cannot say about his origins. He is a brick wall ancestor.

Stephen was alive until 1850, he lived in Redcliff, Bristol with his wife Ann (also of unknown background). Stephen had 3 sons. The two youngest Edwin Verry Bevan and Henry Verry Bevan were both born in Bristol, but his eldest son John Bevan (born on April 4th 1823) was not. I have no place of birth for him either.  

John married Martha Lucas (b.1825) on 19 Jul 1843 at St Mary Redcliffe Church in Bristol. Their eldest son William Stephen Bevan was born a year later, followed by a daughter, Emma three years later and two more sons, John born in 1846 and Samuel Lucas born in 1851 shortly after the death of father Stephen Bevan.

The family then decided they would start a new life in America, so boarded a ship together. Sadly, the youngest of their children Samuel would die during the voyage.

William Stephen Bevan enlisted in the 127th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment in Statton Island in 1862 and fought under the command of Col. William Gurney until the cessation of the American Civil War.

The following detailed information about the 127th is taken from Wikipedia.
"Left New York for Washington, D.C., September 10, 1862. Duty in the defenses of Washington, D.C., until April 1863. Moved to Suffolk, Virginia, April 18. Siege of Suffolk, April 20 – May 4. Dix's Peninsula Campaign, June 24 – July 7. Ordered to Washington, D.C., July 10. Pursuit of Lee to Berlin, Maryland, July 13–22. Moved to Folly Island, South Carolina, August 1–8. Siege operations against Forts Wagner and Gregg on Morris Island and against Fort Sumter and Charleston, South Carolina, August 9 – September 7. Bombardment of Fort Sumter, August 17–23. Operations against Charleston and duty on Folly and Morris Islands, South Carolina, until October 1864. Assault on Fort Johnson and Battery Simpkins, James Island, South Carolina, July 3, 1864. Duty at Beaufort, South Carolina, until November 1864. Hatch's Expedition up Broad River, November 28–30. Battle of Honey Hill, November 30. Demonstration on Charleston & Savannah Railroad, December 6–9. Deveaux's Neck, Tullifinney River, December 6. Tullifinney River, December 9. Charleston & Savannah Railroad, December 19 and 29. Duty in the Northern District and at Charleston, South Carolina, Department of the South, until June 1865."

A tale of two siblings

This may strike you, as a far cry from my usual posts about villeins, vicars, heroes and other such family tree members, but it is just as interesting in its own way.
Eliza was born in 1820 and grew up in Lydeard St Lawrence, a village between the Quantocks and Exmoor. 18 years later her youngest brother Abraham was born.

Eliza in 1863 gave evidence at a petty sessions trial, where a baker was accused of selling bread without weights and measures being used, but it turned out the loafs he gave to her were a gift with no payment being asked.

A year later, Eliza is back in the paper, this time having won a shilling in a "Best ornamental devices in flowers and evergreens" cottagers contest.

When Abraham grew up he stayed with his sister. Through 3 census returns in 1871, 1881 and 1891 they are together and both still single, with Eliza as the head of the household and various lodgers, obviously to supplement Abraham's low income as an agricultural labourer.
In 1871, Eliza had two lodgers but no other income and Abraham was working as an ag lab.
In 1881, both Eliza and Abraham were described as annuitants, so may have had a small income after the death of their parents perhaps?
By 1901 sadly Abraham dies at 63 years of age. This was before the census of that year was taken. But we can find Eliza there, sadly, in the Taunton Workhouse. She lasted just a year following the death of her brother.
I need to follow up on this and do some research, I am really hoping that they were laid to rest together.
This is a beautiful tale, even though some may think it mundane. It makes a change from doom and gloom to see an every day life being lived, with a brother and sister who had a bond from birth to death.

You can chose your friends....

There is an old saying, "You can choose your friends, not your family" - Today that really didn't work for me, as one person I'd 'chosen' as a friend, turned out to be family (albeit, from a shared ancestor of many generations). This was discovered through the medium of DNA rather than through more traditional research.
I've read articles, debated and discussed the issue of inherited memory for a long time now, being fascinated by it, and the thought that we are attracted (or, indeed, repelled) by places and people because of something that happened to an ancestor. Sometimes on your journey, you run into an unexplained series of events that could be written off as coincidence if they were singular, but because there were so many, you feel they cannot be. This has been the case with my friend/cousin and I.
Also the other closer cousins I've connected with on the journey and I, have lots of interests and traits in common, and are friends now.

A Hero in the family

On the afternoon of March 31st in the year 1876, a sleepy little village on the outskirts of Bristol was almost home to a tragedy on a large scale. Without the intervention of a local quarry worker, John Chiddy, The Flying Scotsman would have derailed causing the deaths of many passengers. John leaped into action when a large rock landed on the rails and using brute strength and great effort managed to dislodge it from the track, allowing the train to pass without any loss of life but his own. Sadly, he was unable to get out of the way in time and died immediately, leaving a widow and seven children.
The passengers had a whip round, and raised (even for those days) a paltry amount of money. Francis Richard Charteris, who was Lord Elcho and a Whig member of parliament was so angered by this that he brought the case of John's death up in the house. He was told there weren't funds available to stop John's dependants living in poverty, even though he perished in carrying out a heroic deed to save the lives of others.
Thankfully, the outrage didn't end there, and the public raised the sum of £400 which allowed for a cottage to be built at Hanham for the family. We certainly know John's eldest son James was living in Memorial Cottage in the 1911 census.
The cottage is still there today, the road it stands in, is named Memorial Road, and there is also a street named for John Chiddy, local hero.

John Chiddy is the fourth great uncle of my husband. We were so proud to have heard his story.

The Mirror Crack'd

"Out flew the web and floated wide-

The mirror crack'd from side to side;

"The curse is come upon me," cried

The Lady of Shalott"

(Alfred, Lord Tennyson, The Lady of Shalott) 

This verse sums up my day. I finally 'crack'd' the entire concept of the 'mirror' tree last night, and worked accordingly on the 'web' to further my DNA goal. I almost relaxed then, thinking that maybe I would reach my self-imposed deadline in August. 

Now for the 'curse'... In this case, the curse is that not enough people in the UK have taken a DNA test yet. All it would take now is one common ancestor hint for me to finally 'know my place'. 

The leafy green hint hasn't yet materialised on my DNA home page. All I can do is to try and practice patience now, and hold out for blind good luck. I wonder how the odds of the right person taking a DNA test would stack up against winning the lottery? 

One thing I've come to love on my journey through newly charted chromosomes is the support and care that others on the same journey extend. We celebrate good news and fantastic outcomes for each other when it happens, and we are there when it all comes crashing down, ready to commiserate with a stranger in pain. Even if some days you feel like you'll always be the bridesmaid and never the bride, it doesn't even occur to you to resent someone else's dream coming true.  

Posthumous Bush

From what I can glean, Posthumous Bush b. c 1676 in Bristol was my 8th great grandfather. He lived to be more than 90, which was a Methuselahlain task in the days before antibiotics.
Posthumous may have been named so, if he was born after the death of his father, but for at least 3 generations, the name was passed down through the family.
He married Elizabeth Speak, from Bath, at St Mary's in Bristol in 1696. Elizabeth and Posthumous set up home in Bradford on Avon and they had 8 children. Of those 8, at least 5 survived to adulthood, including my 7th great grandfather Francis.
Posthumous was a lanarius (woolworker),

One of his sons was non-conformist, and according to papers from Leicester University his son (another Posthumous) registered his home as a place of worship.
(The following text is taken from http://www.britishhistory.ac.uk/vch/wilts/vol7/pp4-51)
"Bearfield Congregational church, formerly the Countess of Huntingdon's Chapel, appears to have originated as an Independent society in or before 1787. In that year 'Bethel Chapel' was built at Bearfield and opened for worship by the Revd. Mr. Norman. Services were conducted according to the forms of the Church of England. Norman left the town a few years later. The chapel was supplied for a time by ministers from Bath, including a Mr. Bargest, but declined and was closed. The building was bought by Mr. Posthumous Bush of Bradford. Not long after, it was bought from Bush by the Revd. Thomas Watkins of Bath. Watkins, who had married a wealthy woman from the West Indies, settled in Bradford and built himself a house. He reopened the chapel for worship, built a new gallery, and gathered 'a good and respectable congregation'. He died in 1802, and was buried under the pulpit."

Both Posthumous and Francis owned land in Bradford on Avon, this can be seen in the Bradford land tax record of 1743.

The family still owned land in the area in 1841, this is show to be so in the tithe map of the area. (217/218 were owned by the Bush family)

(image from http://www.freshford.com/1841_tithe_map_list.htm)

Posthumous died in 1761, his will gave provision for his living children and a number of other beneficiaries, most bequests were for the sum of £30 or less. It seems that he wrote off a fair few debts owed to him by my 7th great grandfather, his son, Francis. This is shown in a section of the will. Francis was the executor.