General Chat

Hi Sharron, they sound interesting, do put some up

Lizx

I don't know what the job was called but grandfather's brother,Uncle Kewer,was a bit of a horse whisperer and he was the man who took the shire stallion round to the mares.

He had a book of simples,cures for animal disordersincluding a particularly tasteful one for blows in sheep.I don't have the original book but one that his son made in 1912 in a little red excercise book.The ones that had the tables on the back telling you how many pecks in a bushel and chains in a furlong.

I might even post some of his cures on the board if anybody would like to see them.
WE

Actually, you could call my aunt,or at least her name, a sort of momento.
my grandfather was transported to france on the Queen Elizabeth ship in WW1.Soon after the ship saw heavy damage in battle.relieved to be alive,he actully called his daughter Queenie Elizabeth ! Unfortunately he didnt survive Flanders fields,but my aunts very name is a poignant reminder of those grim times

I have the Family Bible from my mother's side of the family but it doesn't have much written in, only one generation I think. My brother has it as his house at the moment but I want to get it back soon or he might hang on to it for always or give it to my other brother, and it was left to me by name.
I have some of the things my Mum was given for wedding gifts, some hand made wooden eggcups on a stand and a wooden fruit bowl, possibly made by my uncle who I hardly knew. I also have the slips that were put with the wedding gifts, written and typed out on scraps of cards relating to labour party information, lol but including a few proper gift cards from some relatives I remember. I also have a tatty copy of the Parish Magazine for the Church where my Mum got married, with the information in about Mum and Dad's marriage, it also has an ad in for a Funeral Director whose daughter I ended up living next door to, whose name was the same as my Mum and whose husband was an Arthur like my Dad. When I moved next door to them I discovered that she had lived near my aunt and uncle years before, I knew her daughter and that they were friends with my cousin and his family. There was also an ad for a shoe shop run by the parents of a girl I went to school with years after Mum's wedding. Small world.

I did have a Bible that my Mum was given as a Sunday School attendance prize when she was young, but I used it at school, left it in my locker and someone stole it. I often wonder what happened to it, it had my Mum's maiden name in so no one would know who to hand it to now if it is lying around somewhere in someone's loft.

I think I still have a shawl around that was used at my brother's Christening and I have several other little mementoes from family members now passed away.

Nice to have special things, oh and I do have the gold cross my Dad bought my Mum for their wedding too, as well as her rings and I have a ring from a great aunt that is sadly too small for me to use, it's beautiful with engraving round and three amethysts set in it.

Lizx

I have my Mum's ration books and also the passport she had in 1934 when she went to join my Dad who was in the RN and serving in Malta. Sadly I don't have the letter her Mum wrote to my Dad asking him (or rather telling him) to be sure and look after her baby so far from home. I saw it after my Mum died, but when my Dad went into a nursing home and we were clearing the bungalow it had disappeared. I can only assume he had destroyed it.

hi folks, I'm really enjoying reading about your treasures.
Have you noticed how often beloved bits and pieces have little monetary value,andseem like useless rubbish to outsiders?
When my mother died in 1984 I found her old rationbooks in a drawer and tossed them out as dirty old tatt!!
A quarter of a century later,researching the past I could kick myself!! i'd give my eyeteeth to have them back My aunt had my grandfather Joseph's medals from WW1,including his Military Medal for saving the life of a comrade in the battle of Arras,(1916?)
Unfortunately,in the 70's they had the decorators in ,and it was months later before it was noticed the medals were gone, and nothing could be proved.
What a sad result.
So folks,hang on carefully to your precious stuff

I have my Great Uncles letters from WW1, also have his mothers replies. Sadly he died (like so many poor unfortuante souls).......... so these are a memory of a very short life.

I have been very fortunate and have many items from my ancestors, my Grandfather and his fathers before him seemed to realise the importance of none monetary items, I think the greatest item is the Roll Call of the 27th Enniskillling Light Dragoons from 1813.. I shall get around to listing these on the records office soon.

Going back to the letters of my Great Uncle, I recently took them into my sons primary school, they were doing a topic on WW1, they were fascinated!!!! My one point was that in this day and age letter writting is becoming something of the past so I urged them to write a letter to a relative, I asked them to include in their letter a request for a letter back....... hoping that this maybe an item that could be passed down in their family.


Dee x

I have a lovely embroidered silk blouse of my grandmother's that she had on in a portrait,that I don't have as it was taken by another member of the family,but I have a photograph of her taken around 1900 with it on.
I wore it to an Olde Tyme Music Hall in the 80's.It's a bit yellowed now,but I wouldn't part.
I also have an ivory bodkin that was in a work box that my gran had.This work box belonged to Jennie Jerome(Winston Churchill's mother)The story goes that during the Boer War my gran's brother was a despatch rider and she went out to the front and carried this box and took some of the lining out and hid despatches underneath and stitched it back again.I saw the box when I was young but unfortunately don't have it,gran just gave me the bodkin.
I have loads of things of my mother's.Too many to mention,but wouldn't part for the world.
I have the memorial ribbon with lovely words on given to the family when Great Gran died.

Brenda x

My Grandfather was killed during WW1 when my Dad was only eight months old. Grandad never saw his son.
Not long before she died my Gran gave me Grandad's Brass tobacco tin, a home-made brass cigarette lighter and a set of Crown & Anchor dice that were returned to her. I have now given them to my son and he will pass them on to his son.
No great monetary value, but they are priceless to my son, grandson and I.

I have the wedding Muff and fan that my GGgrandmother used at her wedding in 1886!! it has been handed down the female line. the Muff is in excellent condition but the fan has become a little bit battered and discoloured over the years.

I have a single envelope addressed to 4 Middle Street, Shackelwell (sic), no contents, which was sent in the 1880's.
The significance is that I can't find a birth or baptism record for my grandmother, Hannah Jane Harris, as she was known, but the envelope links in with a birth certificate issued in 1935 for a Jane Macey born 1872 at 4 Middle Street and with a family named Harris who lived there for many years in the mid/late 1800s.
Jane's mother was Elizabeth Crawley and Charles Harris's wife was Jane Crawley, so I am 99% certain that young Jane was brought up by the Harrises with the first name Hannah added.
Strangely, I have found no trace of Charles Macey and his wife before or after the birth.

My lovely Dad gave me a diary which his eldest brother had kept during the first world war - at the time I could find none of his brothers' many children as I thought they should have it. However, I copied it and asked the Imperial War Museum if they would like it. They said they would and it is now in their possession along with a potted history of his life and a photograph of him in his uniform. Then the year before last I eventually found, through GR, the last remaining child of his, my first cousin Betty, and we have met and had good times together and she now has a copy of the diary

I have a lovely blue glass dish in a silver casing which was the first present my Dad ever bought for my Mum.

I have a box of my first curls which were cut off!!! little platinum blond rings of hair with no beginning or end - circa 1939.

I have a poignant letter which I wrote to my Mum when I was seven years old - I had been sent awy to stay with an uncle and aunt while my mother gave birth to my sister - something in hindsight my parents should never have done - of course I returned home to find I had been usurped by this child and to be frank never ever really got on with her - hardly surprising but I canlt blame them, they thought they were doing their best at the time I suppose

I have a postcard sent from my father's brother Jack to his mother - he was on holiday not far away - the sad thing is he was killed in WW1 when he was only 19

I have a little leather bound book of Shakespear sonnets in which it seems most of my Dad's late family had written their names and addresses in along with dates

My Dad used to carve beautiful sticks and I have one of those

I have two embroidered Belgian postcards sent from the front in WW1 from the diary brother to my Dad's sister

A prayer book was found in my mum's home some 20 years ago with a handwritten inscription inside saying:- 'To dear Lizzie, with affection & wishing you a healthy & happy new year - 1st January 1879'.

Nobody knows who Lizzie was & there is no indication of the well-wisher. I still have it in my possession & can only ponder about the circumstances of the gift 130 years later.

I have a letter written to my Gtx3 Grandmother from her employer in 1832.

I also have the family bible that my Gt grandfather wrote all family details in.
I have some glasses (a tumbler and two old type champagne glasses and a small tot glass) with gold rims that were golden wedding gifts to my grandparents. I have a large table that holds a canteen of cutlery (bone handled) that belonged to my Mother's sister, was a wedding present to her early thirties but which I suspect belonged to the person wwho gave it to her the gift card is inside.

Ann
glos

I have the letters my grand parents wrote to each other when they were courting in 1924.
My grandad (who died 6 weeks before I was born) wasn't the most romantic of men - but I see my grandmother (died 1993 aged 99) in a different light!!! (How many 'false alarms' can one person have in a year LOL)
I also have a fox fur, mink cape, part of an astrakan collar and some other animal designed to go aroud the neck - (looks like a polecat) that used to belong to gran. Not quite my taste - but they're part of history, so I hung on to them. Gran probably got them second hand.

Isn't it sad Maureen that the item's out live the person, but what a wonderful treasure.I have my Grandmother's hair brush she was born in 1889, it's Ebony with her initials in Silver done in a Filagree pattern, dont know if it was from when she was single or from her 2nd Marriage to my Grandfather, has both sets of initials were the same.

Pam

Amazing to think what that prayer book must have seen, Maureen.

I've got a sort of autograph book of my gran's that goes right back to about 1929 (when she'd have been 13/14) with little poems and riddles and drawings in it that her friends must have added and she obviously kept it for years because there are much later drawings done by my cousins in there too!

One fascinating thing I've got is a tiny prayer book, a Spirit of Benediction, printed in 1867 (about three inches long and maybe two wide at the most - so a good size for a lady to own, I suspect) which is signed "A. Woodcock". (Anne Woodcock was my great-great grandma.) But the really telling thing is, in the back is one scribble reading "Annie" and underneath the words "A. Hurst" dated 12th Sept 1869 - except she didn't marry great-great grandad and become Anne Hurst until the following January. I think she was trying out her new name!

I would love to know about any family history momentos other GR members have.I have a really tatty old prayer book given to my grandfather by his sister Xmas 1915.He was killed April 1917,aged 31, leavinga widow with 3 small children. The covers have long ago disintergrated,but inside there is an actual muddy bootprint,and a cigarette burnhas made a hole in one of the Psalms.
How poignant that it still survives,and he is long gone!!