In this edition we pay special attention to researching ancestors from Wales. Research Corner explores the resources that the GSV Library holds on Welsh family history, while the latest in our ‘How to’ series provides extensive advice for research on Welsh ancestry. If this chimes with your research, you may also be interested in the GSV’s new England and Wales Discussion Circle.

Our feature articles are closer to home. Looking at early settlers in Moonee Ponds and West Brunswick, Margaret Fleming tells the story of a painting that has been in her family since the 1860s that has brought distant cousins together for a wealth of family history research. In ‘Lorimer family: deserted and destitute’, Lyn Mitchell writes of the circumstances that brought the children of a deserted wife and mother in contact with the child protection system, and of how the family adjusted to life outside the system in later life. John Hillard takes us on the journey of Andrew Ballantyne’s life from his early years as a Scottish drover, convicted for stealing a horse, being convicted to transportation in 1844, and experiencing the new reformed prisons in London. He arrived in Port Phillip as an exile, and had a successful rural life and marriage in Victoria.

A ‘eureka’ moment in family research might set us on a fresh trail, exploring new avenues and perhaps solving mysteries in the process. A chance find of a family surname on a commemorative monument in Ballarat set Jim Coghlan on a quest to discover whether the ‘E McGlyn’ who ‘fought and fell’ during the Eureka rebellion of 1854, had a connection with his own McGlinn family. ‘Ken’s happy day’, from Anne McRobert, is an engaging and sustained example of writing from a point of view: the story of a meeting in Europe, a courtship by mail, and a wedding in Australia, told from the viewpoint of the Ken, the happy bridegroom.

On a final note, the editorial team is saddened to farewell Barbara Beaumont. For 13 years Barbara has contributed her considerable editorial and organisation skills to Ancestor. She will now have more time to devote to her own family history, and we wish her every success in her future research and writing. 

Emma Hegarty
Editorial team