Long lost cousins - discovered at last?

My grandma is 90 next year and her sister turns 88 in January. Their mother, Bertha, died in 1925 and neither of them remember her face. They had no contact with their maternal family after their mother died and were raised by their father and stepmother.

My grandma has (or had) just one memory relating to her mother's family. She could recall walking along a street in Bolton, holding her father's hand and knowing she was off to see Aunt Martha.

That memory must date from when my grandma was no older than 4.5 years. Bertha died aged 31 in June 1925, leaving two daughters under the age of four, her parents were dead but she had sisters - at least one of whom, Martha, was alive. However, both Martha and her husband died in autumn 1926 - when Martha was only 43.

For years I couldn't trace Bertha and Martha's two sisters - Jane and Edith. Then I found in the 1911 census that Edith was actually called Ada. More years passed but no news of either sister.

Until today. And once more I owe it all to Probate records! I was browsing the Wills on Ancestry and found one for Martha - in the Admin note it named her son Robert and an Edward Holgarth. A new name! A neighbour, a friend - a relation of her dead husband? Or - pot of gold - a relation of one of her sisters?

A quick search for Edward Holgarth revealed he married my grandma's aunt Ada in 1916 and had one daughter - a cousin! - in the 1920s. She went on to have two daughters and died in 1943, aged 55.

So now the hunt continues for eldest sister Jane Elizabeth Chadwick...

Family tree research knowledge

After 24 years of family tree research, it seems my experience is worth something! Today I undertook a consumer workshop for a website design company employed by a history website, the aim of which was to iron out issues with a proposed redesign. It was fun and also interesting to hear my own answers to questions about my research methods, interests and needs.

Real life gets in the way

Real life gets in the way of my hobby, hence not having done much family tree since April or May. My excuse is that I spent quite a lot of the summer on the world's most remote inhabited island, Tristan da Cunha. A British Overseas Territory, there are 262 islanders - and only seven surnames. The musuem features and 'island family tree' on its wall, showing how all the islanders are related, right back to the founding father, William Glass, who settled there in 1815.

I certainly got my family tree fix on that trip!