GSV News

This week is National Volunteer Week and we would like to recognise, applaud and celebrate the great work our volunteers do at GSV.

There would be no GSV without our Volunteers.

Nearly 180 of our over 3000 members give their time and expertise to run our organisation. When you walk in the door with your first request for assistance - our rostered Volunteer Research Assistants are on hand to help you get started. As you progress and need in-depth help there is someone who knows. Behind the scenes they work on projects to augment and update our Collection and our databases. 

Many work from home (long before they were requested to isolate). And through these last months they have continued. Another team put together our journal Ancestor: writing, editing, commissioning articles, proofreading and even the creative layout is the work of a Volunteer (not naming anyone, but thanks Jay). Others manage our social media and all our Discussion Circles and Groups. Our specialist IT volunteers do a wonderful job maintaining our computers and our digital media, Facebook, Twitter and keep this blog going. How important this is can be seen in these lockdown times, as we can provide many services from home thanks to their efforts. The launch of our online Forum membershelpmembers is another testament to our Vols. But they also work in administration, library maintenance and planning and running all our Events, talks and classes. Even our two paid part-time Library staff generously volunteer in their own time.

And certainly not least, our President and Councillors volunteer to keep our Society flourishing. On behalf of all our members and everyone in the wider world of genealogy we take this time particularly to recognise your work and thank you

Vols, we miss you at the moment. THANK YOU for your contribution!

And here is some cake to celebrate your work!

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Photo and cake:

Jennifer Pallion jennifer@foodess.com

In the present COVID-19 emergency it has been interesting to see how we have reacted to new regulations and the evolution of social constraints. Very quickly we saw individuals prepared to fight over toilet rolls and to raid supermarkets in small towns.

Our responses have ranged from wealthy skiers who believed the laws didn't apply to them, to 'innocent' young women who had their brush with the law just by walking on the sand. And of course, politicians who demanded to see the 'science' so they could decide whether a rule about not playing golf should be followed.

Many of us in Australia are here because of our forebears' conviction under the onerous property laws of 19thC England. And poverty and economic depression often meant continued lawbreaking here. If our ancestors fell foul of the law we can often find out more about them in the extensive and detailed newspaper reports of their capture and trials than BDM records will tell us. Before the era of WW1 studio photos, the only photograph of an ancestor might be the one in the Criminal Registers, where from the 1870s photographs were included for those with sentences of 6 months or more. Presumably not their most flattering look! 

Their transgressions and bad luck are our good luck as social historians. Clive Luckman describes the rich source that the Police Gazettes offer. The GSV can help you find Police Gazettes and the many other sources of encounters with the legal system. [Ed.]

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Police Gazettes in the 1800s

We may not want to recognise it, but many of us with 19^thcentury Australian ancestors may well had one whose name appeared in a Police Gazette. Before you get upset let me hasten to add that these Gazetteshad names of many people who were not criminals or “of interest” to the Police.

There were, of course, names of criminals in the Gazettes. The main purpose of the Gazetteswas to promulgate news about crimes and criminals. Descriptions about the crimes themselves (from murder through to illegal sale of alcohol) were often included, as were reports about wife desertion, bigamy, drunkenness and abandoned children. Also there were notices about missing persons – not only people reported as missing but also people seeking lost friends.

There were notices about licences granted for the sale of alcoholic beverages, tobacco and other regulated products, and licences for the conduct of regulated activities such as auctions. All police and magistrate promotions, dismissals, appointments and retirements were published.

During the gold rushes skippers of visiting ships often had some of their crew desert, which must have left those ships sometimes in a perilous position for their return journey. Ship’s deserters were certainly amongst those sought by the Police. Sometimes a deserter changed his name to evade detection, thereby presenting an interesting challenge to genealogists.

Details about those being sought by the Police were often published in several States as well as in New Zealand. There was a great deal of traffic across "the pond" between Australia and New Zealand in the 1800s.

On a personal note, a convict allocated to one of my Tasmanian ancestors absconded and a notice reporting that appeared in the Victorian Police Gazette.

Later in the century photographs were sometimes published, as were details such as eye and hair colour, height and characteristics such as tattoos or scars that might aid the Police. 

These documents are a good source of family history as well as other facets of history. Genealogists can use them to see if they will reveal details of their ancestors’ life (at risk of repeating myself, whether your ancestor was a criminal or not). The Gazettesmay allow you to get your ancestors in perspective – details about how they lived, indications of their wealth, of their occupation, and where they resided. And details that help you understand how society in that century behaved.

Family history is much more than discovering the names, dates of births, marriages and deaths, and the names of wives and husbands. These things are critically important because they obviously must precede the thrills of the chase for the social, financial, demographic and other details of your ancestors. I find that these thrills are the best.

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This article was originally published in Fifty-Plus News in June 2007.  Clive Luckman contributed many articles Fifty-Plus News.

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Further reading

PROV Registers of Male and Female Prisoners (1855-1947)

https://prov.vic.gov.au/explore-collection/explore-topic/justice-crime-and-law/register-male-and-female-prisoners-1855-1947

Using the Victorian Police Gazettes to research your ancestors, SLV Blog Jan 19 2015

https://blogs.slv.vic.gov.au/family-matters/using-the-victorian-police-gazettes-to-research-your-ancestors/

Update from Jenny Redman, GSV President

On Monday March 23 it was decided that the GSV Centre, both the library and the office, would close from today Wed March 25 until further notice.

All member queries to the GSV are to be directed to the email: gsv@gsv.org.au 

Staff will continue to work from home.

Subscriptions can be paid by usual methods excepting via telephone

Research Requests including quick lookups will be processed where possible.

We will endeavour to maintain regular contact with our members and provide them with updates and information to help with doing their family history research at home. We are currently working on supplying more online content for members, so keep an eye on the website for updates.

Please keep safe and enjoy the time at home doing your family history

Jenny Redman

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Family Historian told to stay home indefinitely and work on family history!

There are such a lot of family history projects that I have on my to-do list that this current edict sounds like an unbelievable opportunity - if it wasn't also tinged with great concern for our community. Many of us did not directly experience life during  WW2 but, from our parents, we knew about the family deaths, hardships, rationing cards and the long recovery that followed. Helping each other was then, and will be now, the only way forward. 

It is amazing how much we have moved online. Today the Ancestor Edit Team has been working collectively on the articles for the next Ancestor journal. This means our copy has to be finalised by the end of March. The members of the GSV Writers Circle have received one of the writing pieces scheduled for review at the now-cancelled April meeting. Our online forum membershelpmembers is available for any queries and members can check our catalogue and databases from home. I am spending too long on my computer with the MyHeritage Library edition, now also made available for GSV Members to use from home. 

So lots to do - STAY HOME!

The logo for the President Updates shows a laptop computer balanced on a Sands & McDougall Directory. For many years this amalgam of old and new-world technology was a feature of the meeting room back in our Collins Street offices.

If you would like to publish a family history story on this blog just email me at blog@gsv.org.au. [Ed.]

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My mother often wished her brother would self-isolate. Later in life she would often complain that her brother had rung again, but all he ever talked about was yet another distant cousin he had discovered in the family history. We all know the feeling. Our research is often not interesting to other family members.

Self-isolation is what family history writers - and all writers - are good at. It is a necessary and sought-after precondition for our research and our writing. 

In a new development, if GSV members are stuck at home they can now access the GSV's Library edition of MyHeritage database from home. Simply sign on to our website as a Member, go to the Members Area and select MyHeritage.

GSV Members can also use the new online forum membershelpmembersto link with others who may be able to answer questions or give advice, and they can use our online catalogue and unique databases. 

You can see our Presidents notice to members on Covid 19 on our website here https://dev.gsv.org.au/article/gsv-responding-covid-19

Many of us, or even most of us will have documented sad stories from our own families of Spanish Influenza epidemic of the 1918/19. In Australia 40% of the population fell ill and 15,000 died. In 1921 there was a peak in diphtheria cases and over the following decade 4,000 died. In the 19th C this infectious disease occurred often and many children died. In 1872 the Victorian Government held a Royal Commission into its nature and treatment. In my family young John died in Molong in 1886 aged 11, only two years after its cause had been identified in Germany. By the mid 1890s an anti-toxin was available. Too late though for him. Later vaccination programs have almost eliminated this death from our family histories.

We sincerely hope you are all well and treating yourself and others with kindness and reason. 

Discounted certificates for the month of March

Vic BDM has announced that they are offering downloadable uncertified historical certificates for $20 each for the entire month of March to say 'thank you' to valued family historians. This is a saving of $4.50 per certificate. Click below:

GET THEM HERE AT BDM

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Are you stuck in England in a time warp?

Alan Fincher - our expert in early English records is giving a talk on 19 March that could help you.

English Research, Eighteenth Century

This talk is intended for those who are stuck in their English research in the 1700s. Most English researchers can get back to the early 1800s or late 1700s, but the 1700s can be really challenging, as there are fewer records available than in the 1800s or 1600s. In fact there is a real incentive to get back to the late 1600s as many more records then become available; records that either cease to exist in the 1700s or are quite uncommon then.

Note this talk has been previously advertised as '19&20c to 18th c English Research'

March 19 - 10.30 am-12.30 pm

$10 GSV members. $40 non-members. FHC, RHSV and CAV members should contact the GSV for a 25% discount. GO HERE  https://dev.gsv.org.au/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=1439

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Update on producing a flipbook version of our 'Ancestor' journal

In December 2019 we posted news about our investigation of flipbook options for this journal. We included a demonstration flipbook and invited members to try it out and send comments. We were amazed at the response we have had.  By mid January we had over 70 responses - with roughly 2/3 in favour of this option and many giving constructive feedback. 

If you are a GSV member you can already read PDF editions of our current journal and past issues on our website in the Members Area. And its articles are indexed in our catalogue. So if you have recycled your past paper copy, you can check back-issues from the comfort of your hard-worn home research chair.

CHECK out this service if you haven't tried it.

We will continue to look into a digital form of Ancestor, taking into account all comments. We thank all who took the time to respond.

... And GSV Writers meet next week... And March could be a good month to volunteer! AND did you remember to book for Richard Broome's talk coming in May? See last post for details.

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A coming talk at the RHSV dovetails neatly with my last post about 'Family Secrets' - the new research project looking at interactions between settlers and indigenous Australians (see note 1).

On March 17 at the Royal Historical Society Victoria, Prof Lynette Russell will talk about family secrets and her journey to discover her aboriginal history.

What the little bird didn't tell me

17 MARCH - 5:15 - 7:00 PM

The RHSV has opened their March talk to GSV members at the RHSV member’s price of $10. GSV members who wish to attend should book through the RHSV website, as if they are RHSV members.

Prof Russell:

Twenty years ago I wrote a book that documented a journey I had been on for over a decade. The book was A Little Bird Told Me: Family Secrets, Necessary Lives. This book represented a journey of discovery where I located my Aboriginal ancestors and answered a number of questions that had dogged my family for generations. Along the way, I discovered a story of secrets and lies, of madness, and refuge.  In this talk, I will reflect on this book nearly 20 years later with a focus on the importance of women as the keepers and tellers of family stories. In so doing I will consider the reasons why I wrote the book, what impact it had at the time and its ongoing influence. I hope that these reflections might have something to say to other family historians. I want to question whether there are there some family secrets and necessary lies that should never be told?

Professor Lynette Russell AM is an award-winning historian and indigenous studies scholar. In 2020 she is taking up an Australian Research Council’s Laureate Fellowship to examine Global Encounters and First Nations People: 1000 Years of Australian History.

This personal story will be interesting to those who would like to better understand the complex issues of aboriginal identification and the inter-relationship between genealogical records, biological descent, family stories, self-identification and community recognition. Though it has been about 40 years since a three-part 'working definition' of aboriginality evolved and has been adopted in Australia (see note 2), there are still popular commentators and some historians who can't get their heads around this.

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References:

Note 1.Family Secrets Research Project. Contact Dr Ashley Barnwell

See the previous blog for details of how to participate in this research project:

https://dev.gsv.org.au/content/unsettling-family-history-new-research

Note 2. For a full history of this topic see Defining Aboriginality in Australia, Dr John Gardiner-Garden, Parliament of Australia Current Issue Brief no. 10 2002-03

https://www.aph.gov.au/about_parliament/parliamentary_departments/parliamentary_library/publications_archive/cib/cib0203/03cib10

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ADVANCE NOTICE

On May 7 at GSV, Dr Richard Broome will talk on Frontier Encounters. 

Richard is a Professor of History and Associate at La Trobe University. One of Australia's most respected scholars of Aboriginal history, He has written many articles and books including  Aboriginal Australians and Sideshow Alley.

His last talk at GSV was sold out, so it would be worth getting in early to hear firsthand from a prominent historian, author and wonderful speaker.  

This talk will fill up quickly so go HERE to book early.

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Genealogical study is a hot topic. Witness the lengths to which some 'historians' and genealogists are presently going to deny Bruce Pascoe's aboriginal antecedence, possibly to undermine his views about pre-Colonial aboriginal society. This particular instance of genealogical research should remind us of the traps that can result from a simple reading and over-reliance on early records; even for so-called historians, who should know better about the inherent limits of documents in tracing biological ancestry (note 1). Anyone researching their early Australian forebears will have to think about where they were and what they were doing during The Frontier Wars, a period from 1788 to 1928 (note 2). 

The intersection of written records with family memory and oral history can be unsettling and sometimes divisive. If your family stories take you into this period you may like to contribute to a current university research project.

Ashley Barnwell, a Lecturer in Sociology from the University of Melbourne (note 3), is currently undertaking a national study that investigates how inherited family secrets, stories, and memories inform Australian’s understandings of colonial history. Ashley is looking to interview family historians who have found interactions between settlers and Indigenous Australians in their ancestry and who are doing some research into that aspect of the family tree.

Ashley outlines the context of the project 'Family Secrets':

'There has been a lot of research about how museums and schools deal with colonial history but not much acknowledgment that family historians are doing a lot of interesting historical research in this area and often writing up the findings for their families too, Ashley says. In his famous 1968 Boyer lectures After the Dreaming, WH Stanner spoke about 'the great Australian silence' around the treatment of Aboriginal peoples and the impacts of colonisation. Family stories sometimes mirror this silence, but families can also be places where past interactions between settlers and Aboriginal peoples are recorded and discussed, at least by some generations if not others. 

Popular texts based on family history, such as Kate Grenville’s The Secret Riverand Sally Morgan’s My Place, show that unpacking family stories and secrets can stimulate public discussion of Australia’s colonial history. Ashley is very interested in how family relationships add an important layer to how historical research is done. When we read and write about our own families there are often extra layers of emotion that can inform what we choose to write and publish. Family historians sometimes also have to navigate tricky conversations with other relatives who may not be happy with the revelation of family stories or who insist on a different version of events.' 

For this Australian Research Council-funded project, Ashley will do a study of self-published family history books, interviews with family historians, and some research into her own settler ancestors in mid-north coast NSW. 

If you are interested in participating,

please contact Ashley via:

phone: 03 83444559  

email: abarnwell@unimelb.edu.au; or 

mail: Dr Ashley Barnwell, School of Social and Political Sciences, John Medley Building, Level 4, University of Melbourne, VIC, 3010.

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Notes

1. Dark Emu(2014), Bruce Pascoe. See Keith Windschuttle citing Jan Campbell [Holland?] in QuadrantDecember 2019.

2. The Forgotten War, Henry Reynolds (2013).

3. Ashley Bardwell see https://findanexpert.unimelb.edu.au/profile/708324-ashley-barnwell

We have received many awards for our quarterly print journal Ancestor; it is highly valued by our members and others. 

Of course, being print hardcopy it is mailed out in the time-honoured way and that, as you may have noticed, is becoming very expensive. Obviously we are always looking for ways to drive our membership funds further - and one way is to save on postage. 

Many organisations are moving to digital-only versions of their publications. I even get Christmas cards by email these days. However we know members value receiving our print journal and you can be assured that the GSV has no intention of changing this. 

Ancestor has been available as a PDF version for members on our website for some time now. Some may find this not so easy to read, so we have been exploring 'flip-books' as an alternative. 

Apart from saving on postage, some members may appreciate the option of being able to read Ancestor in a digital version to improve our environmental footprint. I am building up quite a collection of back copies of Ancestor. Recently I had to find a way to 'downsize' nearly 2 metres of my collected glossy, architecture magazines. It hurts, but so does losing trees! 

We have set up an example of what a digital flipbook version of our journal could look like - and we would like you to try it out and think about if you would be happy to read your Ancestor in this way. We would love to get your comments, so we can better assess this option.

GSV Members can read more about this in a recent post - 'A new way to read Ancestor' - on our Forum 'GSV Website'. Please add your comments on that forum thread, or as a comment to this blog post - or if you like, by email to socialmedia@gsv.org.au

Have a look at it HERE and let us know what you think.

Please note that we are using a trial version of the Flipbook software so you will see advertisements when you are viewing one of the books. However, if the GSV decides to adopt this new delivery method at some time in the future, we would be using a paid version of the software so the advertisements will not appear.

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Do you have a thorny problem with your family history research?

Do you often feel someone else will have solved this or know a way to find that vital record?

You may just want to bounce an idea off others and get their suggestions.

This month the GSV is excited to be launching a new online forum for members to help each other or simply share tips and experiences.

It's easy and secure to use - just jump on the FORUM on our website and give it a go. It's free as part of your membership!

... is an online forum hosted on the GSV's website only for members of the GSV to help other members with their genealogy queries or simply to share their family history tips, tricks and

experiences.

If you have joined any of our Special Interest Groups or Discussion Circles you will know how others can help with your research journey. We hope this online forum will enable you to tap into the wide range of family history experience that our members have. Because it is for GSV members only, you can be amongst like-minded searchers on this Forum, complying with our policies regarding ethics, privacy and harassment. Forum Posts are monitored and unsuitable material will be removed.

The Forum gives regional Members and others who cannot easily get to our Melbourne Research Centre another way to communicate and share their knowledge.

This service is not a substitute for the research services available from the Society’s

experienced volunteers via the GSV Research Services. The Society does not accept any responsibility for the information posted, and like all sources of information you need to independently check and verify. But often a breakthrough comes from a good tip!

How do you get started?

Login to our website as a Member. Click on 'FORUM' in the top Menu bar. Then select membershelpmembers. You can post your own new query (Topic) or respond to an existing post. Check back to see any responses or, if you wish to get an email notification of any new posts, you can subscribe (or unsubscribe) from this service.

Remember not to share private information of a sensitive nature about persons who may be living (see our Ethics and Privacy policies) and to respect the feelings of others who may be hurt by insensitive disclosure or comments.

Read the guide notes about using forums and you can have a play in the Test section before you add any posts of your own.

Much of the enjoyment and wonder of family history is through discovery and sharing. Now this Forum membershelpmembers gives you a way to do that.

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Our program of Zoom events continues to expand in October. We have extended the number of participants we can accommodate in our classes and discussions as we gain experience conducting these sessions.

'The Good Oil' - Oct 20

We are introducing a new series of events commencing this month. ‘The Good Oil’ will be sessions designed to enable members to share their tips and tricks about a wide range of subjects. The topics will be initially discussed by a panel of GSV Research Assistants and other volunteers before being open to questions and answers and general discussion. The topic for the first session on 20 October will be: useful, mainly free, tools to assist with digital image manipulation, and ideas, systems and techniques for filing your digital images and documents. The tips and tricks discussed will be pertinent to both the Windows and Mac OS operating systems. 

Suggested topics for future sessions have included the pros and cons of some family history software programs, methods of citing sources and tips and tricks for using Trove.We would be interested in receiving suggested topics from you. You could email those to education@gsv.org.au

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There are spaces available in our Discussion Circles and our classes including Linley Hooper’s class about GSV’s new library catalogue and our databases. 

Oct 8 - Catch up with our Catalogue and Databases - Linley Hooper

With our new look catalogue and databases now is a good time to catch up with their attributes. These small-group classes are designed to enable you to get the most out of the computer-based resources available in the GSV library and at home. This class will be held online via Zoom. 11 am - 12 noon. Maximum of 15 participants.

Free for GSV members -  $20 non-members. Please Register HERE.

Oct 13 - DNA Ancestry's ThruLines - Alan Rhodes

 

ThruLines is a feature on Ancestrythat provides you with another way to view your matches and potentially identify new ancestors.  The presentation demonstrates how to use ThruLines, verify the suggestions and extend your family tree. This talk will be presented online via Zoom. 

Please Register HERE.

There is something of interest for everyone. If you did not have an opportunity to attend an event at the Centre now is your opportunity to join online.

Make sure you book! Log in to the GSV website as a member to book your place, and the session details with a clickable link will be emailed back as part of your booking confirmation. Information about using Zoom may be found on our website and in the September issue of Ancestor.

We are still here to help you on your family history journey. JOIN US

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Photo credit: 'Is this your family?'  A typical suburban family spied on a Covid walk - within 5 k of course! Courtesy of one of our members, Louise Wilson (author 'Sentenced to Debt: Robert Forrester, First Fleeter', 2020).