General Chat

One of my Uncles "John Frank William Crane" died in February of this year, and during a search of his house a photo was found of someone we cannot identify. If I post a photo on this site is it possible someone may recognise the Lady in the Photo. Its a very old black & white photo

David, that would be a trillion to one chance.

I suspect we all have old photos of unknown people.

I have a sepia photo of an unknown lady from Mum's collection. I sent a copy to the Museum of costume in Bath to have it dated from the outfit she was wearing. From the suggested date I looked in my tree for a suitable lady, and from there made a deduction. I might be totally wrong of course, instead of my ggrandma in 1870 it might be the next door neighbour.

It's always worth a chance.... Go for it.!

Several years ago when browsing on the internet I found reference to a name of my Dad's childhood friend. Someone in New Zealand was searching for information.
The back up 'facts' were not quite accurate, but there were enough coincidences for me to decide to write to the poster.... and after exchanging e mails and researching details I was able to give her information and a photograph of her father. He had even attended our wedding.
As a child, I remembered seeing a photograph of the man holding the hand of a small child. It was taken in N.Z. I told her about this and described the photo and she sent me a copy of the same photo.... but with the man cut from the print hence her search and pleasure at finding out more about him

I would agree that we all have probably pondered over various 'unknowns' in family collections of photographs.
Recently, my cousin sent me a copy of a wedding group taken in 1950.
My children would probably recognise perhaps only one of the 16 people pictured, so very soon I wrote down the names of all of the guests, the occasion and location.

Are we too often guilty of adding to the questions in the future by not adding notes to our own photos.?

Also, talk to any distant relatives. By chance I was put in touch with a 2nd cousin. I knew her name and our family had a photo of her at about 4 years old, ( she's now in her 80s ) but her father, as a widower moved the family to the London area in 1940s and the family lost touch.
Meeting up after so many years was great and helping one another to identify unknown faces in long ago photos was a real bonus.

Sometimes even names on photos don't help, unless they're full names.

I have a photo of my grandmother, taken at some time in the 1920s, judging by the clothes.
She's with another woman of about the same age, labelled as "Cis".

I would like to think that Cis is my grandfather's sister Edith, who seems to disappear from records after the 1911 census, but who visited my grandparents frequently during the 1920s/1930s - or so I was told by my late aunt who had childhood memories of Edith.

Maybe "Cis" is a variation of "Sis" - grasping at straws.
I'll never know who Cis was - so frustrating!

David, I have a good number of photos of unidentified people from my paternal grandparents’ effects. I have, in the past, posted a few on here as my profile photo in case anyone recognises any ….

I had a photo of a youngish guy in military uniform so I rang and spoke with a nice guy at the Army Museum who asked me to email a copy to him. He gave me a lot of info from looking at the uniform (eg sharp shooters medal etc) but best of all he pinned the uniform down to one decade in the late 1880s. From that I was able to pin the young man down as my Grandfather’s cousin as he was the only member of my Essex lot in the army at that time …. So if you have anyone dressed similarly in forces’ uniforms it is worth a shot.

So true ArgyllGran !

The man in my post with the N.Z connection had a mother known as Dolly. His NZ marriage certificate was perhaps recorded by someone who wanted to 'correct' this to her full name, ( NZ certificates have long recorded bride and groom's mother and father )
She was shown as Dorothy...... er No..... she was Sarah Jane, but thankfully her fairly unusual maiden name and her correct husband's name on the certificate helped to verify the correct marriage.

Many years ago, I asked, on a website if anyone knew my (deceased) grandmother in her youth, and if they may have any idea of who my father's father may be.
My dad had asked gran who his father was, but she wouldn't say.

Although I knew dad's 'potential' father had a family, I put his name as a possible father. - he lived with gran and my dad a lot.
A lady contacted me.
She said yes - he was my dad's father, and she was so relieved that she could let someone know, before she died!
She even sent a photo of dad's 'father', to show the likeness.

We also had a ‘couldn’t tell you until you knew’ problem.

My O H ‘s mother was a problem ( she died young’. Eventually that county updated on freebmd. So we wrote again and this time got an answer from an elderly cousin. They sent us some photos and we copied some of OH’s mothers pictures. There were several he could identify and was thrilled to get one of his own father abroad on work, which answered some of his own questions.

Thanks everyone for your comments, and thought it was a long shot anyway

David, do as suggested above.
Put the photo as your avatar, then in the researching section put the name of your uncle and say that the lady is unknown.
Also change the title of this thread to include uncles name.
Anyone searching in future might come across this thread.

There's always that long shot.

Franny,
Thanks for your suggestion, but don't know how to do that, so hopefuly you can educate me.

Ermm, I'm not the most techy person, but I seem to have managed to do those things myself so it must be fairly simple.

If you click on the button 'account' on the very top line, that is where you can load the pic and fill in the researching box. My pic was in an online album.

To edit your title, click on your first post of this thread and it gives the chance to edit the title too.

Adding to what Grannyfranny said -

to add the uncle's name to the title of your thread, click on "Edit" at the top of any of your posts here.
Change the "Subject" line to include the uncle's name.
Click "Submit".

Franny & ArgyllGran, I'm having trouble on this, where you say click on "Account" on the top line do you mean the "Account Heading" on the main screen where you login and Out, where I need to load the photo ? Please let me know, thanks

I have uploaded a photo and its shown in my original post, so not sure if I have done this correctly ?

Yes and no. Yes it has uploaded but is too tiny to be of any use. It needs to be of th e face not the frame and background.

Thanks for the info, so I have cropped the photo and uploaded a new copy. My uncle John Crane was born in May 1924, and died in February this year. We think from looking at the original frame and photo it may have pre dated him, but we just don't know. It could be his Grandmother, or Aunt on the Crane side of the family, or his Mum's side, as his Mum was born, Mossie Rose Torble. We hope that someone can assist us in identifying her.

That's good David.
If you can edit the title too, as argyllgran has explained above, and put uncles name there as well, then anyone searching his name should see it easily.

Good luck!