Helen's Genealogy Journeys - Tracing My Ancestors Around the Globe

I am writing this blog from the small seaside community of Oban on the West coast of Scotland. It is here that we are starting our family history research while on vacation in Scotland.  My husband, Dave, is researching his dad's time in Oban during WW2 when he served with the RAF Costal Command unit. I, myself, am planning to spend some time in archives, museums, and libraries in East Lothian, Edinburgh, and the Scottish border.  And hopefully collecting family photos and documents that may be stored at my sister's home in East Linton and my aunt's home in Gullane. One of the interesting parts of this research is the fact that both my dad and my husband's dad trained for the Royal Canadian Air Force through the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan in Canada.  And when they were shipped out to Britain in December 1941 they were shipped out on the same troop ship.  At this point, their paths diverged and Dave's dad eventually ended up in an RAF Costal Command u...

The Felting Sisters In an earlier blog, I talked about how my sisters and I, "The Felting Sisters", using the opportunity of an annual visit to talk about memories of our childhood. While the main focus of our time together was to enjoy some time experimenting with felt art, we took some time to talk about our memories from our childhood.  This year, we also decided to sort through some of the old childhood photos that our dad kept in a Rubbermaid bin.  We lived in many different places during our childhood so we decided to sort the photos by location.  We spent time trying to determine dates and location of each photo but eventually we were able to assign all of the photos to the correct zip-lock bag. Childhood photos sorted into location We ended up with about 13 packages starting with photos from Belize (1946-1954), to our first move to San Fernando, Trinidad (1954-1956).  Next we moved to Georgetown, Guyana (1956-1964), then back to San Fe...

Flying Officer Charles Anderson During the weeks leading up to this year's remembrance of the 75th anniversary of D-Day on June 6th, 1944, I was drawn into the drama, tragedy, and pivotal importance of this day for the allied forces in Europe. I knew however that I wanted to research what was happening on the India/Burma front at that time.  The reason for that is that my dad,  Charles Anderson, with the 11th Squadron of the Royal Air Force, was stationed in India at that time. He was a pilot flying a Hawker Hurricane ll C.    The Battles of Kohima and Imphal, which my dad took part in,  took place between April 4 and June 22, 1944.   It is interesting to me that, while the allies were landing on the beaches of Normandy on June 6, 1944 (eventually pushing Hitler's troops back over the territories that they had recently captured), so too allied forces in India were also fighting to stop the Japanese advance into India and eventually to push th...

One of the joys of growing older is connecting with siblings and sharing family memories.  My two sisters and I meet annually to re-connect, have fun creating works of felt art (at least we think that they are works of art 🙂), and talking about memories of our childhood. One of my works of felt art created at our felting get-together In fact, this is an integral part of our 'felting sisters' week together every year.  This is a fairly new tradition but one that I thoroughly enjoy as the designated family genealogist.  I have spent years working on family trees and trying to find out as much as I can about the lives of our ancestors but I never really thought about recording my and my siblings memories.  After all, I think I remember what happened and, besides, who would be interested anyway?  But I am finally following all of the advice given in genealogy magazines, webinars and blogs about collecting family stories from immediate family.  Last ...

Well, I was going to spend this week, the week of the 75th anniversary of D-Day (June 6, 1944), researching what my relatives experienced on and around D-Day.  It was a lofty goal for just a week of research restricted to evenings after work (while putting in a fairly large vegetable garden!).  So, it didn't go quite as I expected - instead, I got pulled into the compelling story of D-Day.  I did some research into established facts about D-day, looked at timelines and picture, getting a more and more detailed picture of what happened and decisions that were made.  These can and have filled books and scholarly papers about just every aspect of D-Day.  Then I read an article in the Globe and Mail that talked about the 5 best books/films about D-Day.  Top of the list was the movie "The Longest Day".  I found that my local library had Blue Ray copies so went out over my lunch break to pick up a copy.  Not only is this a movie about "The Longest D...

June 6th marks the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landing on the beaches of Normandy, France during WW2.  This upcoming 75th anniversary of D-Day got me wondering what my family who experienced the war, either in fighting or supporting roles, or 'on the home front' experienced that day. I will start with a (very) brief background of this event. The war had been raging in Europe for nearly five years, when the Allied forces embarked on an invasion of the continent that would turn the tide of the war.  This event resulted from years of preparation by the Allied nations to breach the Atlantic front in Europe.  Hitler's forces had advanced rapidly across Europe and the allies were at their lowest period. However, the defeat of the Germans by the Russians on the Eastern Front, and the defeat of Mussolini in Italy, gave renewed hope that the fortunes of the allies could turn.  It was recognised, though, that a coordinated and well thought out effort would be needed to...

The average September temperature in Belize is a balmy 29 C with lows dipping to 23 C. Temperatures never varied more than a few degrees during the year.  As her entire war service was in Canada, Nena, for the first time, experienced four distinct seasonal temperatures typical of Canadian weather. She arrived in Toronto in early September to a warm fall, with daytime highs a hot 32 C and lows a refreshing 18 C.  However, by the time she took her oath for the WD-RCAF on October, 20, 1943, fall was well established and the high that day was a cooler 14 C with the nightime low dipping to a chilly 1.7 C.  This trend continued as the season progressed and, by the time she arrived in Paulson, Manitoba, in early December, the temperature never went above freezing with a maximum -2.9 C and minimum -14.8 C that month.  However, Nena reported that she never really felt cold, unlike a friend of hers, also from the Caribbean, who complained of cold hands.  Nena said that ...

Well, I thought that I would check to see how Aunt Nena got up to Canada from Belize to enlist in the Canadian Armed Forces in order 'to serve the empire'.  I thought it was the same way that dad did but, being a good genealogist, I wanted to confirm her travel dates and modes of transport. Dad received his Transfer Certificate (visa) to enter the United States in Belize on Jan 13, 1941.  On Feb 9 th  1941, he left Belize on the ship the S. S. Toloa, a United Fruit Company ship, sailing from Guatemala to New Orleans, arriving on February 13th 1941. He spent about a week with his aunt Mrs. A. White (his mother’s sister) at 6655 General Diaz for about a week.  Then his aunt put him on the Greyhound bus to Canada probably similar to the one in the picture below which was in operation in 1941. The bus took 2 days to reach Canada, stopping along the way in order for the passengers to have a meal.  They entered Canada through the port of entry of Detroit an...

Juanita Anderson WD-RCAF Aunt Nena was a firecracker.  She always had an enthusiasm for travel and adventure.  Her full name was Juanita Maria Anderson but we knew her as Aunt Nena. Before the war broke out, she was a teenager attending high school in New Orleans.  She was 15 years old  when she arrived in New Orleans on August 18, 1939 to start the fall term.  When Britain declared war on Germany on September 3rd, 1939, her  mother (my grandmother Henrietta Maria Orio) brought her back to Belize because she did not know if the estate money that she was receiving from England would be able to reach her in Belize due to the war, money that she would need to pay for Nena's education in New Orleans. Henrietta was a widow at that time with 5 children, one of whom was my father,  Charles "Buster" Anderson.  Although Nena continued her high school education in Belize, she never graduated and was eager to join her older brother (my father) in t...