Berwick 900 Family History Day - Saturday 16th April 2016 at Berwick-upon-Tweed - Updated Programme

Family History Day is almost upon us !

Building on the success of the Berwick 900 Family History Festival held on 3rd and 4th October last year, we’re holding a Family History Day from 10am to 4pm on Saturday 16th April 2016 at Berwick Town Hall, Marygate, Berwick-upon-Tweed. Map.

Like last year, it’s free and there will be exhibitors, talks, displays about the research carried out, talks, refreshments, one to one family history surgeries where you can find out how to start your family history or overcome a problem.

There’ll be activities for kids and their parents, and the opportunity to see the Burgon family tree – please bring along your research, birth and marriage certificates and see if you’re connected.

Exhibitors
Berwick Freemasons Lodge
Borders Family History Society
Lothians Family History Society
North East War Memorials
Northumberland Archives
Northumberland & Durham Family History Society
Scottish Borders Council Archives (Hawick Heritage Hub)
All the above exhibitors are keen to help you with your family history.

Jura Consultants and Spence & Dower - Proposals for Berwick Barracks

Talks Programme
10am Northumberland & Durham Family History Society – North Northumberland branch
11am Ralph Holmes – My Weird & Wonderful Family
12 noon Paul Jardine and Tina Gough – Berwick Barracks Re-awakened
1pm Linda Bankier – The Berwick 900 Our Families Project
2pm Bill Stewart - A Century of Boatbuilders in Berwick and Eyemouth
3pm David Pye – Berwick War Memorial – personal stories of soldiers

Family History Surgeries
20 minutes with a specific expert in a quiet room to discuss your family history problem or interest.

We now have a fully booked schedule of family history surgeries.
However, there might be a cancellation, so if you need help and none of the exhibitors can help you, please ask at the Welcome Desk.

Maltings Youth Theatre Dramas - A Step Back In Time (to 1911)
11am Part 1 - outside the Town Hall (weather permitting)
11.45am Part 2 inside the Town Hall (upstairs in the Court area)
12.30pm Part 3 - outside the Town Hall (weather permitting)

Berwick 900 Family History Day - Saturday 16th April 2016 at Berwick-upon-Tweed - Revised Programme

Building on the success of the Berwick 900 Family History Festival held on 3rd and 4th October last year, we’re holding a Family History Day from 10am to 4pm on Saturday 16th April 2016 at Berwick Town Hall, Marygate, Berwick-upon-Tweed. Map.

Like last year, it’s free and there will be exhibitors, talks, displays about the research carried out, talks, refreshments, one to one family history surgeries where you can find out how to start your family history or overcome a problem.

There’ll be activities for kids and their parents, and the opportunity to see the Burgon family tree – please bring along your research, birth and marriage certificates and see if you’re connected.

Exhibitors
Berwick Freemasons Lodge
Borders Family History Society
Lothians Family History Society
North East War Memorials
Northumberland Archives
Northumberland & Durham Family History Society
Scottish Borders Council Archives (Hawick Heritage Hub)
All the above exhibitors are keen to help you with your family history.

Jura Consultants and Spence & Dower - Proposals for Berwick Barracks


Talks Programme
10am Northumberland & Durham Family History Society – North Northumberland branch
11am Ralph Holmes – My Weird & Wonderful Family
12 noon Paul Jardine and Tina Gough – Berwick Barracks Re-awakened
1pm Linda Bankier – The Berwick 900 Our Families Project
2pm Bill Stewart - A Century of Boatbuilders
3pm David Pye – Berwick War Memorial – personal stories of soldiers

Family History Surgeries
20 minutes with a specific expert in a quiet room to discuss your family history problem or interest.

Surgeries are currently available starting at 10.30, 11.00, 12.00, 12.30, 13,00, 13.30, 14.30, 15.00.
Book your preferred starting time now by email to

Please state brief details of your problem or interest, whether it’s English or Scottish and preferred time slot and provide your landline phone number.

Maltings Youth Theatre Dramas - A Step Back In Time (to 1911)
11am Part 1 - outside the Town Hall (weather permitting)
11.45am Part 2 inside the Town Hall (upstairs in the Court area)
12.30pm Part 3 - outside the Town Hall (weather permitting)

Berwick 900 Family History Day - Saturday 16th April 2016 at Berwick-upon-Tweed

Please note that this has been superseded by Berwick 900 Family History Day - Saturday 16th April 2016 at Berwick-upon-Tweed - Revised Programme.

Building on the success of the Berwick 900 Family History Festival held on 3rd and 4th October last year, we’re holding a Family History Day from 10am to 4pm on Saturday 16th April 2016 at Berwick Guildhall, Marygate, Berwick-upon-Tweed. Map.

Like last year, it’s free and there will be exhibitors, talks, displays about the research carried out, talks, one to one family history surgeries where you can find out how to start your family history or overcome a problem.

There’ll be activities for kids and their parents, and the opportunity to see the Burgon family tree – bring along your research, birth and marriage certificates and see if you’re connected.

Exhibitors
Berwick Freemasons Lodge
Borders Family History Society
Lothians Family History Society
North East War Memorials
Northumberland Archives
Northumberland & Durham Family History Society
Scottish Borders Council Archives (Hawick Heritage Hub)
All the exhibitors are keen to help you with your family history.

Provisional Talks Programme
10am Northumberland & Durham Family History Society
11am Ralph Homes – My Weird & Wonderful Family
12 noon Linda Bankier – The Berwick 900 Our Families Project
1pm Fred Kennington – Cross-Border Marriages
2pm Bill Stewart - A Century of Boatbuilders
3pm Peter Munro – Scottish Borders Poor Law Records

Family History Surgeries
20 minutes with a specific expert in a quiet room to discuss your family history problem or interest.

Surgeries are currently available starting at 10.30, 11.00, 11.30, 12.00, 12.30, 13,00, 13.30, 14.00, 14.30, 15.00.
Book your preferred starting time now by email to

Please state brief details of your problem or interest, whether it’s English or Scottish and preferred time slot and provide your landline phone number.

Unknown Branch of the Burgon Family Tree Identified

From Barbara Colman in response to Can you Place this Unknown Branch of the Burgon Family Tree ?:

Anyone interested in the Burgon family should take a look at the ancestry details on the James Burgon page:

You can trace back James Tiger Burgon's  ancestors as far back as John Burgon b. 1720.

Another interesting ancestor is James Tiger Burgon's brother, Robert Cowe Burgon (Blue Bob), my great great grandfather. 
Both these men had very strong connections with the RNLI and won medals.

Family History Festival, Town Hall, Berwick-upon-Tweed on 3 & 4 October

Advance notice of our Family History Festival which will be held in the Town Hall, Berwick-upon-Tweed on 3 & 4 October, from 11am to 4pm.

Come along and find out about tracing your family history in England and Scotland.

Meet local family history societies and record offices; so far confirmed are Berwick-upon-Tweed Record Office, Borders Family History Society, Northumberland & Durham Family History Society, Scottish Genealogy Society.

There'll be a program of talks from 12 to 3pm each day.

We'll also be holding family history surgeries at 11.30 am, 12 noon, 12.30, 1pm, 1.30pm, 2pm, 2.30pm and 3pm each day with local experts, to help you start your family history, identify records for you to look at, help you scale that brick wall or solve a knotty family history problem.
Booking for these surgery slots is essential (first come, first served), please email us at the address below stating which day and time you prefer and if possible, whether your query is about Scottish or English family history.

There will be family history displays on local families, the former Peel Hospital near Galashiels, the last 2 Scottish governors of Berwick.

Bring along your local family trees and help us extend the Burgon family tree and add to our knowledge of families in the Greenses and Ravensdowne.

We'll also have activities for children and there'll be Great Performing Rope workshops for all in the prison area, upstairs on Saturday.

As always, we want to hear your family stories, too.

Update: Download next 2 month's programme of Berwick 900 events.

Hattles and Burgons in Fishing Families of the Greenses, Berwick-upon-Tweed

From Alan Hattle of South Africa:
 
Further to the focus on the weekend of 18/19 July  on the fisher families of the Greenses, Berwick-upon-Tweed, I am hoping that someone will be able to give me clarification on the Burgon(e) side of my family tree.

My great-grandfather John Hattle married Isabella Elspeth Burgon(e) in Berwick in 1865, and her birthplace (November 1844) in censuses is given as Sunderland. Several descendants after that were given the middle name of Burgon (my father, born 1914 in South Africa) was John Burgon Hattle.

My research notes were all lost in a fire, so I need to follow this line up again, but I suspect the following:
Isabella Elspeth Burgone was the daughter of James Burgone and Elizabeth Douglass, and had siblings Mary (born 1840), Peter (born 1846) and possibly Elizabeth (born 10 years later in 1856).

James Burgone was possibly the son of John Burgon and Mary Fowlerton (I have copies of family letters from the early 1950s in which my grandfather and some siblings try to unravel the family tree, and comment that they believed Isabella Burgon(e)'s father was a James, and that her grandmother was a Mary).

And I suspect John Burgon was one of the sons of Peter Burgon and Ann Elliott, whose line down through other sons seems to be well-documented.

I have no knowledge of the ancestors of Elizabeth Douglass, other than her mother was probably a Sarah.

Regarding the name Burgon/Burgone, I have a copy of a 1954 letter to my grandfather from his sister, Mary Burgon Hattle (then living in Edinburgh) in which they discuss the difficulties of tracing the family tree, and at one point, Mary writes,
"By the way Mother's birth and marriage lines as she always told us it should be and we copied on her headstone - Burgone. The E she said gradually got dropped - perhaps considered locally "Swank", though her Rothesay cousins went a step further and added the Y - Burgoyne. French ? extraction which may add a thrill to .....'s (I can't make out the handwriting) imagination. I remember Alice was keen for me to join Edin. P O savings bank lent me 2/6 and to put Mary "Burgoyne" but at Ber got matters put right told them Burgon these things can be very awkward later on."

Alice was one of Thomas and Mary's sisters - great aunt Alice married Alexander Duncan late in life (1927 at age 49) in Hartington Gardens, Morningside District, Edinburgh.


If you can help Alan, please put a comment below.

Berwick's Maritime Connections Exhibition at Berwick Guildhall on Saturday, 18 July

Part of the Central Display

Part of the Central Display and another Display

Fishing and Whaling

The Salmon Fishing on the Tweed Story-Telling Booth

We were very busy (496 visitors) today, talking to people at Berwick Guildhall exhibition on Berwick's maritime connections, about their Berwick, Tweedmouth and Spittal connections, to people whose family lived on the Greenses, or live there now, people with salmon and herring fishing connections, their family stories, seeing if they are related to anyone on our massive Burgon family tree. Several details on the tree were updated, there and then, others said they would look at their family trees tonight and come in tomorrow (Sunday), others said they would email us.

Some people wrote a family story for us and others will email us a family story, another family story with lots of photos was handed to me and will go on the blog at some time.

The Salmon Fishing on the Tweed project were there with their story-telling booth - come and tell your story, tomorrow.

We had visitors from further afield too, from Bedford, Glasgow, Poland, Switzerland and Yorkshire.

Family Stories, Fishy Tales and Red Herrings Wanted

Yesterday's article, Bring Us Your Family Stories about Berwick's Fishing Families, Fri 17 to Sun 19 July in Berwick Guildhall said that we are particularly interested in these names: Burgon; Manuel; Borthwick; Jamieson; Crombie; Young and Hattle but we’re also looking for any other names in that area connected with fishing.

Recently, Newcastle University started a project to involve local people in recording their untold stories and knowledge of salmon fishing on the Tweed.

The project was launched at The Pilot Inn in Low Greens, Berwick and they had a follow up at the Jubilee Centre in Spittal.

They have displays and videos to watch and they’ll be looking to hear your salmon fishing stories too (and some free nibbles too). 

We hope to see you on Friday, Saturday or Sunday (17th to 19th July) at the Guildhall, Berwick.

Bring Us Your Family Stories about Berwick's Fishing Families, Fri 17 to Sun 19 July in Berwick Guildhall

As you’ll have already seen, with an exhibition in the Watchtower, Tweedmouth, and other events, this coming month is all about the area’s fishing and maritime history. 

Also from 11am to 4pm each day from Friday, 17 July to Sunday, 19 July, we’re mounting an exhibition in the Guildhall on Berwick's maritime connections (of course, it’s admission free).

This includes Berwick's connections with salmon and herring fishing, ships and shipbuilding; whaling and about Berwick captains. Year 4 of Holy Trinity School, Berwick, have done some artwork based on families and fishing in the Greenses which will be on display, too. 

As part of the weekend, we would like to gather information on the Greenses fishing community, the people who lived there and stories about their lives. 

We are particularly interested in these names: Burgon; Manuel; Borthwick; Jamieson; Crombie; Young and Hattle but we’re also looking for any other names in that area connected with fishing. 

We have a Burgon family tree to which we have added some information but if anyone else can help us add more, come along and help us, particularly where they link in with the other fishing families in that area. 

We’re still interested in hearing your family stories whether they’re connected with fishing or the sea or not. If you have any interesting information about characters from your family’s past in Berwick or would like to get involved in the project, come along and see us this coming weekend or contact Peter Munro on berwickfamilies@gmail.com or Linda Bankier on berwickarchives@woodhorn.org.uk .