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Somerset & Dorset
Family History Society

The SDFHS Blog

Finding and dating unknown family photos

As anyone interested in family history will know when facts come to light that enable a name to be added to a family tree it is not long before starting to wonder what this person might have looked like Many of us will have photographs back to our grandparents and some are lucky to be able to go back to the great grandparents but beyond this it may well be much more difficult It is often tricky too to travel out sideways as great uncles and aunts and all the associated cousins are likely to...
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SDFHS events Autumn 2018

We have now started to arrange our Autumn events to be held in Yeovil or Sherborne, with the following already confirmed Full details can be found on our website Secure the Shadow: Somerset Photographers 1839-1939 Friday 28 September (200-400pm) Yeovil The official book launch in Yeovil Library of our latest publication about Somerset Photographers There will be a short talk by one of the authors and then the opportunity to buy copies of the book, which the authors will be happy to sign, and...
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The Greenwood Tree – September 2018

The September edition of The Greenwood Tree is a Special Edition focusing on World War One to mark the upcoming centenary of the Armistice  It contains eight extra pages and will be mailed to members early in September The Editor, Paul Radford, previews this Special Edition, which SDFHS members can already download from the Members' Area of the Society’s website To mark the centenary of the Armistice, we invited members to tell their stories of the ancestors who went to war, the families...
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Historic Migration from the West Country

I must preface this article by stating that I am no expert on migration – this post is merely a transcript of my notes on the recent seminar, held to mark the 20th anniversary of a similar event held in Lyme Regis in June 1998 I hope I have done the talks justice The seminar was a full-day seminar and gave an excellent over-view of migration from the West Country Examples from all West Country counties were mentioned, as were all the main destinations – America, Canada, Australia and New...
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Somerset Photographers 1839-1939

On 31 August 1844, an advertisement in the Warwick and Warwickshire Advertiser announced that, during the following week at the Bowling Green, Warwick “Master Augustus Gyngell, only eight years of age, the child with the iron nerve, will make his daring and astonishing flight across the Green, from an immense altitude, surrounded with fireworks, as the Spirit Ariel, travelling at the rate of 200 miles an hour” We’ve not found a report which might have verified the height or the speed of...
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