Monday evening

It's been a quiet few days.
Not a lot happening, I'm afraid.

I've sent some more family tree information down to Mary this morning.

I had to change from Julie's email to Brian's because the schools in the central belt are now on holiday so Mary isn't going to be over at Julie's quite so much.
Ian had Brian's email address so that was fine.

I've been investigating Granda Banaghan's side of the family. He was my mum's dad!
... and here he is , replendant in his kilt. All ready for the First World War.
He got shot in the arm during the war, according to my mum and the arm didn't really work all that well after that.

Anyway...

Very little coming out about his dad's side.
His dad was Joseph Banaghan, he was 24 in 1893 when he got married to Charlotte Evans nee Sutton - widow.
Nationality: Irish, he stoked furnaces on steam ships to make a living.

Ireland isn't easy to track since they didn't have the census which's been my main source of information.

The other side has been a bit easier. His mum!

That family came from the Wirral in Cheshire which is just across the Mersey from Liverpool and they moved to Liverpool early in the nineteenth century.

Daniel and Sushannah Owens with their daughter Sarah!
I found them in the 1841 census living in Greenland Street - no kidding - that's what it was called and it's still there! It's near the docks.

Daniel and Sushannah were in their 20s and Sarah was 5.

Little Sarah Owen is my great great Granny!

All that talk Uncle Frankie did about his mum coming from money isn't ringing true at the moment.
Uncle Frankie was my grandad's youngest brother and he used to tell this story about how he went down to liverpool with his mum when he was a wee boy and how he remembered going into this huge house down there with stairs inside it!

Well, the big house certainly didn't belong to his mum's family.

Daniel Owens was a labourer who was promoted to a carter.
In 1861, Daniel and Sushannah had our little Sarah now Mrs Sutton (husband at sea) and her two little boys living with them + the three children they still had at home!

Ten years later Sarah Sutton is nowhere to be found but Daniel and Sushannah Owens are still keeping the home fires burning!
Now they are looking after their daughter Anne (now Mrs Dowey - widow), her baby daughter Sarah, George their youngest child and three out of four of Sarah's children and our wee Charlotte ( my great granny) aged 3 is the youngest.

So where is mum?
Where is dad?
Where is Job?
- by the way he was the baby boy of Sarah's in the 1861 census?

D'you know what I think?

I think mum is dead. How about she died having Charlotte and Frederick Sutton, her husband, has taken the eleven year old Job on his first ship's voyage.

He obviously didn't get on too well because he turns up again in 1881 as a plasterer! And Charlotte is now living with him and his wife!

I remember my mother telling me that her grandfather took all his sons on board ship for a voyage when they were young to see if a life at sea would suit them but they all hated it.

Thought!: I must ask Mary if she still has the photo of Granda Banaghan on South Georgia.
That would be interesting to see again.

Friday night

I just read your blog, Gary!

YOU CAN'T GIVE UP...

I really enjoy your blog and I personally think the exageration makes it more enjoyable.
We all know you exagerate but ...hey, it's for effect! Right?


... and here's the wee bundle of joy himself! Aren't you just such a little cutie... :)

It's been a bad day; my nose won't stop running and my eyes are burning and just to top it off, typing this is excruciatingly painful (note the exageration) because I tripped and fell in Arbor Court on my way home from the shops today.

I've skinned my left knee, my right forearm and the palms of my hands!

I'm going to bed now to finish watching CSI Las Vegas with a glass of wine.
In fact I might even have two!

Tuesday evening

Today had the same feel as the day in the photo 32 years ago! Warm and sunny with a golden glow :)

This was our back garden down in Hertfordshire.
Happy days!

A pat on the back for the person who can name all the children in the photo!!

Saturday 20th June

I can't believe it's been so long since I last opened my blog and wrote anything!

I know I meant to post some pictures last Wednesday when I got home from Inverurie but I put it off and then put it off again!


Gary said to me this morning, "Do you realise your last entry in your blog was the 8th of June?"
"Blimey!" I thought.
I knew it had been a while but not almost two weeks!!

Why were Gary and I together this morning?
Well, it was Luca's first Sport's Day.

Yes, you read it right and believe me, he wasn't the youngest.
There was a toddler's race run just after we arrived.

The winner was the wee guy who made it to the finishing line...

One wee kid noticed his granda standing at the side.
Another stopped and sat down for a wee rest and a third decided he just didn't fancy going in that direction.
It was hilarious!

Now Luca's group were all up for the challenge.
Well, sort of.
If they'd had any idea what on earth was going on.


Their first race was a running race and Luca began with a false start.
"That's why he didn't win," explained his dad.
He'd obviously given his all in that first start :) His reserves were used up ...but even so he made a very respectable second and got a wee mrshmallow for his effort.


His second race was a potato and spoon race.
Within two or three steps from the starting line all competators had dropped their potatoes but being the troopers they were, they all picked them up and ran - a potato in one hand and a spoon in the other.

And lastly there was the jumping race.
You must be joking! Let's do a couple of jumps to keep the spirit of gamesmanship alive and then just run for it.

Luca had obviously enjoyed whatever it was Dad and Gran had taken him to because as we got into the car, he asked if we could go to 'the North Sea' ??!!
A quick rerun in our heads gave us what he actually said... nursery!

And what was the highlight of the morning?
Was it the joy in wee Luca's face as he stormed down the track to the finishing line - just running for the joy of it?
Or was it the little plastic silver cup won by his daddy for being first in the parent's race?

Well I know which I chose but Gary? I'm not so sure.
He confided that half way through the race he cast his eyes to the side and thought, " I'd better run faster or I'm not going to win this race!"

And he did...

Here is the competition...I ask you?!!


Gary streaked past me.
I just couldn't react in time to catch him in the frame.

Talking of historical research

I was talking to Anne about researching family trees and she has found in her family that most of her ancesters were either coal or iron stone miners.
Most of my family are too!
And they both seem to be dominated by Irish economic migrants.

It's quite depressing really when you research what life was like for them.

Wee Sarah Quate for example - my dad's dad's mum.
She was born in Lanarkshire about 1865.
So was her wee brother-William but her dad - John Quate and her older brother-John and sister-Agnes were all recorded in the 1871 census as coming from Ireland.

Her mother wasn't recorded which probably means she was already dead. Not really surprising when you consider what Lanarkshire was like at that time.

The family were living in Rosehall (Coatbridge) in what was referred to as Front Row.

I did a bit of research on Rosehall - not a good place to live.
Diseases like TB, dysentry and even cholera were rife because of the crowded unsanitory living conditions.
The Miner's Rows were two rooms with no running water. At the end of each row was a 'wash house' and a couple of toilets for the use of the women in the row.
The open sewers from the rows and from the houses further up the road ran down in front and behind the houses.
Some cottages it was said had two families living in them.
One did the nightshift and the other did the day shift.
What is it you call this - hot bedding?

A bit like the slums of Mumbai?!

An observor at the time said that going into Rosehall was like descending into hell.
The mines and blast furnaces were worked 24 hours a day.

The people were exposed to the constant noise of machinery - so bad it was said that the very ground vibrated under your feet.

The air was constantly full of soot.
When the weather was dry the air was also full of stour but when it rained the road became a quagmire.

The blast furnaces added to the noise of the machinery but they also sent huge flares of bright orange fire into the sky - day and night.


Sarah was still living in Front Row ten years later. Her wee brother William was now down the pit too - aged 14.

What happened to Sarah?
Well at some point after the 1881 census, she left Rosehall to work as a 'domestic servant'.
She met Robert Aitchison who was about ten years older than her.
He was a fireman at the pit.
They got married in 1890 and had a son Archie in 1892.
He had a son - my dad who was registered as Robert Aitchison - and then there's me!

So that makes Sarah my great granny!

Archie Aitchison

I reckon he was in forties when this photo was taken but I have no idea where i came from. Maybe Mary will know. I'll ask.

Not sure yet what happened to him. He was a coalminer aged 27, when he got married to Frances Mary Sowerby aged 20, in 1921.
I wonder what became of him?
There are stories in the family but nothing definite.

Monday morning

Looks like rain again :(

The big fat moggy that was sitting on our back wall has given up and gone home - no basking in sunshine today.

I must apologise for not blogging for almost a week but I have been a bit preoccupied lately.

One reason being the hunt for the photos I took of Luca in his bath last Wednesday morning.
I can't find them!
I've hunted high and low but they're nowhere to be found.
For those of you who are very disappointed - here's one I took earlier...

This was taken a couple of weeks ago.

What else have I been getting up to?
Well, the ancestor hunt has been moving forward.
I discovered that my Granny Banaghan was called after her dad's granny on his mum's side.
Mary Mathie.
She was a wool winder living in Paisley, according to the census of 1861, and her husband, James Whiteford, was a woollen shawl weaver.

Their daughter Jeanie was my granny's Granny Fitzpatrick!

Tuesday June 2nd

Everything is covered in a fine yellow dust. It's been this way for a couple of weeks now. Even the windows have a yellow tint at the moment!

Look at Ross' car!

It's just the pollen from the trees so no need to worry and on a positive note, it gives me an excuse not to dust!! :)

I remember a few years ago. It wasn't pollen that landed on us it was sand! The story that went round at the time was that it had been carried up from the Sahara.
...and why not!?

Why not indeed!
We've all heard of accounts of frogs and even fish falling from the sky.
The wind scoops them up and they're carried along on thermals and then dumped somewhere else... or something like that! :)

Sunday, Ian and I looked after Luca while Gary, the beetroot, and Carole went to the Races.
He was as good as gold as usual, and even came to church with me and then to The Sheiling for coffee with the girls!

Here he is reading.

And here he is when he noticed what I was doing!
Forget the book, lets take photos...

So he did (changing all the settings in the camera at the same time)!

This is Luca's photo of his Grandad.

In Memory of Ryan

I discovered that I don't have many photos of Ryan!
He didn't seek the limelight, did he?!

Ian has a nice one in his record of Ross and Ryan... I'll try and find it!