Recent Posts
Easter 1890
Easter 1890. Easter 2025 feels really late, even for this movable feast. Which I guess isn’t surprising, given last year it was March 31; and (this year’s) April 20 is almost the limit of when... Read More
Folio 33: no harquebuses allowed
Folio 33: this post is another transcription of one of the Pacification of The Borders documents, from The Pennington Archive. For the background on the documents, you can read my first post on the su... Read More
James Fairbairn
James Fairbairn is buried at St Cuthbert’s Church, Carlisle. Whoever the stone mason was, he had a curious idea of what an angel or cherub should look like! With its wings crossed in front, and a le... Read More
Wills extracts
Wills are a great resource for family history. Sometimes, they tell us information we’d not have found or been able to confirm elsewhere: the married name of daughters, for instance. Often, th... Read More
History of Cumberland and Westmoreland (1860)
History of Cumberland and Westmoreland (1860) It’s A History and Topography of Cumberland and Westmoreland actually. And a title page inside goes further: A History and Topography of the count... Read More
Thurnam brothers, Carlisle
Thurnam brothers, Carlisle Like Goldilocks, sometimes there is too little information on an individual to make a blog post. Sometimes, there is just enough. And sometimes, there is too much. In the ca... Read More
King James I and the Grahams
King James I and the Grahams – Royal grovelling Grovelling to kings in times past was probably a wise, rather than a pitiful thing to do. Displease his or her royal majesty and it was ‘off with hi... Read More