Memory

The Revolution in Family History

Michael Noble

IWM Private_TickleRecent years have seen a revolution in family history and amateur genealogy. The possibilities created by broadband internet, the digitisation of official and parish records and the advent of crowdsourcing have created an unprecedented boom in the pursuit of private histories. The popularity of programmes such as Who Do You Think You Are? testifies to the the mainstream success of this once esoteric hobby. It has given more people a basic grounding in historical enquiry, and has encouraged the development of skills such as research, paleography and metadata tagging. It also has led to the creation of mini-archives, comprising collections of documents, photographs, artefacts and secondary material such as family trees and published (traditionally and online) material.

The Centenary of the First World War is the first major test of this ‘New Genealogy’. There are several reasons why. The war was such a landmark event, both in terms of national and international histories and for people’s family and personal lives. Generally people retain items that reflect landmark events in their lives –weddings, births of children and so on. The war was one such landmark event that happened to occur to millions of people at the same time.

In addition, the organisational demands of the two world wars form key nodes in personal history searches. Regimental records, war graves and the like provide ‘informational landmarks’ that amateur researchers use to navigate their way through the past. The mass mobilisation meant that for many people, lives that had hitherto been almost anonymous appear in aggregated records. Records that are often now accessible from the amateur researcher’s own home.

The centenary of the First World War is therefore operating as a ‘meta-informational landmark’. The enhanced focus that the centenary provides will create new interest and new opportunities. Projects such as the Imperial War Museum’s Lives of the First World War and the National Archives/IWM Operation: War Diary are not only giving people a chance to get involved in genealogical activities, they’re using some of the very techniques that have been developed during this revolution. The question remains, how can we make the revolution useful?

lives-of-the-first-world-war-300x300During the course of our project we have encountered people who have undertaken such research and who have gathered documents, photographs and other artefacts. They are often older members of the household who have embarked on their project in retirement and have been motivated to do so because they have a personal memory of some of the individuals concerned, assuming a combatant birth year range of c1868-1902. As this generation ages, we will encounter a ‘succession problem’ of what to do with such collections that are too small and/or esoteric to be absorbed into mainstream collections. A related issue is the atomised nature of these items. They reside in spare rooms, on living room walls and in attics and could be hiding information useful to professional historians. These archives, a combination of documentary information and material artefacts are of intense personal value to the people who have carefully curated them. But they have other value too. They are of use to professional historians who can use them in aggregate to build a picture of the social past.

Our aim is to develop activities that make use of the grassroots knowledge of community groups and individuals and the context-placing ability of professionals. For the amateur curators, the advantage would be in seeing their cherished material placed in its proper context. For the professionals, it would be access to the material that has been gathered. Furthermore, we work in partnership with local archives and record offices and national projects, such as the ones already named, to ensure that the material is also made available to the wider public.

We will shortly be launching our Family History Event, with the aim of seeking answers to some of these questions. Watch this space for details.

In the meantime, you may wish to look at Who Do You Think You Are Live, which runs until Saturday.

 

The Uses of Family History

Michael Noble

As the centenary of the First World War sees family history come of age Michael Noble asks, what opportunities does this offer?

Recent years have IWM Private_Tickle seen a revolution in family history and amateur genealogy. The possibilities created by broadband internet, the digitisation of official and parish records and the advent of crowdsourcing have created an unprecedented boom in the pursuit of private histories. The popularity of programmes such as Who Do You Think You Are? testifies to the the mainstream success of this once esoteric hobby.

During the course of our project we have encountered people who have undertaken family history research and who have gathered documents, photographs and other artefacts. They are often older members of the household who have embarked on their project in retirement and have been motivated to do so because they have a personal memory of some of the individuals concerned, assuming a combatant birth year range from the 1860s to the turn of the twentieth century. As this generation ages, we will encounter a ‘succession problem’ of what to do with such collections that are too small and/or esoteric to be absorbed into mainstream collections. A related issue is the atomised nature of these items. They reside in spare rooms, on living room walls and in attics and could be hiding information useful to professional historians.

Two key problems:
1. How do we ensure the preservation of historically valuable collections?
2. How do we give access to them to professional historians and other researchers?

These are questions for family history in general but the centenary of the war can bring it into focus. The world wars, like items such as the 1901 census, act as ‘informational nodes’ for family historians and many of their researches converge on this event. This, combined with media coverage of the centenary and crowdsourcing schemes such as Operation War Diary and Lives of the First World War, offer an opportunity to test the value of family history and a chance to make it useful to mainstream historians without, I hope, robbing it of its very real value to those individuals who have been doing so much work in this area in their free time.

LOFWW-Blog-624x411We are very keen to hear from people who have found or kept interesting First World War items and who are interesting in using them to foster a better understanding of the war, its effects and of the role of memory in family history and identity. We’re planning some events for 2015 that will help to ensure that these precious items continue to be of value as the war fades into history. If you have something to share, please get in touch.

Find My Past -Free Weekend

Michael Noble

Always wanted to investigate your family’s past? This weekend might be your chance to start…logo

One of the most desirable outcomes of the centenary period is that people will take the time to find out more about how the war affected their family, their community and the country as whole. A particularly affecting method for doing this is to trace the records of your ancestors using genealogical tools.

Genealogy was once considered a difficult or even impossible task, requiring intrepid hunters to spend hours in dusty archives on often fruitless searches. Recent years have seen a revolution in the hobby and, with the advent of online resources, it has become easier than ever to trace your personal heritage. If you have never attempted this sort of detective work yourself, this Remembrance weekend may be the perfect chance to start.

Find My Past is one of the country’s most popular genealogy resources that provides access to 1.6 billion searchable records. A paid membership is usually required to access this material but this weekend you can do so for free.

From midday, Friday to midday on Monday, Find My Past are giving everyone the opportunity to explore record sets that include:

  • Millions of birth, marriage and death records

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    Many First World War images and documents can be found online
  • Millions of census records from all over the world
  • International travel and migration records
  • Military records, including WW1 collections

By accessing the Findmypast record sets, you’ll be able to unlock brand new information about your ancestors, allowing you to bring your past to life.

Find out more and register by visiting the Find My Past website.

Then & Now -an interactive journey

Michael Noble

Modern tools can help to illuminate the impact of the war to twenty-first century eyes. Michael Noble is impressed by the latest effort

remember_scarborough
The raid on Scarborough was used for recruitment and propaganda purposes

Here’s a rather beautiful thing. Housing website Rightmove have created ‘Then & Now – An interactive journey around World War 1 Britain’
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Blending archive photos with images fro m Google Street View, the site lets users merge the past with the present and examine how our streets have evolved from the days of the Great War.

Users simply use their mouse to “swipe” across the chosen Street View and reveal an insight into the past, as provided by the Imperial War Museum and other image resources. Clicking on the information icon reveals more about where and when the photo was taken.

In total, 13 photos from the duration of the conflict are used to help tell the story of the First World War on the home front.

Images include a house on Lonsdale Road in Scarborough, severely damaged by German naval shelling in December 1914 and a line of recruits outside Deptford town hall, who fade in and out of historu with a simple swipe of your mouse.

There’s a real sense of the uncanny in the images, they seem to make the war years at once distant and familiar. It’s also interesting to note how effective the repair work was on the shelled buildings. A 21st century pedestrian walking along these streets could be forgiven for his ignorance of the damgage that had been wrought in days gone by.

Then & Now can be found on the Rightmove website. It’s well worth a visit.

The Deptford recruits
The Deptford recruits

History and Memory

Michael Noble
Harry Patch, the 'Last Fighting Tommy' 1898-2009
Harry Patch, the ‘Last Fighting Tommy’ 1898-2009

There are, according to some estimates, 11,000 people in Britain today who were already alive when war was declared in August 1914. They were, of course, very young back then. The eldest, Ethel Lancaster, was just fourteen at the time, meaning that, had she been male, it’s very likely that she would have been in uniform by the time that the Armistice was declared. As it was, the ‘Last Fighting Tommy’, Harry Patch, died in July 2009. We enter this centenary period highly conscious that it will probably be the last major anniversary at which any first hand memory of the Great War is available.

This is important and not merely because it gives historians tiny opportunities to glean information from living, breathing people, but also because it places the First World War within the range of accessible cultural memory. There are many more people who, while they were not themselves born before 1918, were the children, nephews and nieces of people who were. They grew up as cognisant of the war as many of us are of, say, the 1960s and 70s. Their recall of the war is obviously second hand, but their experience of its aftermath and of the impact that it continued to have on the lives of those involved is utterly direct. Material items such as medals, uniforms, flags, even weapons, have been handed down to children and grandchildren, but so too have memories and the impact of experience.

Ethel Lancaster, the Last Victorian in Britain
Ethel Lancaster, a teenager during the First World War, is the Last Victorian in Britain
John Tyler, the tenth President of the United States 1790-1862
John Tyler, the tenth President of the United States 1790-1862

These connections can survive a surprisingly long time. As recently as 2012, it was reported that the US government was still paying Civil War pensions to two (elderly) children of veterans, 147 years after the war ended. John Tyler (b. 1790), the tenth President of the United States, still had two surviving grandsons as of 2013. These facts can feel a little odd, as can the realisation that, having been born in May 1900, Ethel Lancaster is not only Britain’s oldest woman, but the last surviving Victorian. If they do, it may be because we’re accustomed to regarding most periods as belonging purely to history and disconnected from our present age. This disconnection can make it difficult to empathise with those concerned or make it tempting to regard much of the details of these eras as irrelevant to ordinary life in the twenty-first century.

The Great War is undoubtedly an historical event. It has been studied again and again and will deservedly continue to do so centuries from now. Questions can be asked of its origins, its progress and its impact. The images that we have of it, often unclear, usually in monochrome, give it a distancing quality that seem to confirm it as the event of another age. And yet, it is not history like the death of Julius Ceasar or the signing of Magna Carta or the Protestant Reformation is history, it is also, for now still memory and that gives it a resonant power that may strike a chord with people as they reflect on its centenary.