New Relatives and More Memories

This month, I am excited to announce the demolition of a brick wall of nearly fifty years' standing, with the addition of Mary Newlands and her husband Robert Hogg to the family tree. Read 'Is Mary Newlands my 3x Great Grandmother?' here. I have also uploaded a highly expurgated version of my memories of my first forays into the world of work here. I won't be adding later work memories to this site, although I am writing them, as there are just too many privacy issues.

A VE Day Story and a Mystery

Ahead of the VE Day 80th Anniversary commemorations, I have added the story of my father's wartime experiences. Cyril Albany Braund spent the first years of the Second World War working for the Granada Cinema chain in South London. This was a time when the cinema was vital for morale and for the newsreels that it showed. He then joined up and was part of the RAF regiment, stationed at first in England but then in Sicily and southern Italy. Towards the end of the war, he was transferred to the army and seems to have peeled a lot of potatoes in Ireland. He agreed to stay on for a further term of service and attached to ENSA, he returned to Italy working in cinemas there.

Some of what I have written is taken from his biography that I wrote more than twenty five years ago. This was part of a much longer story So Soon Passeth it Away that was awarded 3rd prize in a competition run by The Institute of Heraldic and Genealogical Studies. I later published this in four parts and Cyril's story and that of his father, appear in part four In the Shadow of the Iron Horse. I do still have copies of this booklet. I can't imagine why you'd want a copy but if you do you know where to come. Since I wrote that account, Cyril's letters to my mother, written between July 1945 and August 1946, have been discovered, so I am able to add a little more. You can read Cyril's War, as well as listening to a podcast Ivy's War, which is my maternal grandmother's story, here.

This month I have also uploaded The Seear Mystery, the story of a genealogical brick wall of over forty year's duration. There are cracks in that wall but it still stands. I also posted the story on my History Interpreter website.

Latest Additions to Granny's Tales

This month, with the anniversary of VE-day approaching, I have uploaded a podcast 'Ivy's War', which tells the story of my grandmother Ivy Smith née Woolgar's World War 2 experiences, living in a south London suburb. You can listen here. In addition, there are memories of my time at senior school, which can be found here.