Substack diary no.138: Wednesday, 29th. April 2026

Monday was early summer, yesterday was autumn and today is spring. I am hoping that tomorrow will not be winter! I am looking forward to a day of relative rest after yesterday’s frivolities, hopefully returning to the genealogy work I re-started a few weeks ago to help a great-niece who will, at some point in the future, hopefully take over all the work I have done over the years.

Genealogy is a hobby of sorts, although at times I feel like a cross between Sherlock Holmes and Lucy Worsley – forensic detective and historian. I pretty much gave up on my research a few years ago when I hit a financial barrier. This is no longer a hobby for those on a low income: membership of a genealogy website is prohibitively expensive to start with, and add to that the cost of ordering – often speculatively – birth, marriage and death certificates and other documents is beyond belief.

The situation is not helped by have a staggeringly common name. Have a guess at how many James Anderson’s there are and ever have been in Scotland. It’s f**king huge. The Brinnicombe’s of Devon and Cornwall are easier to trace – once you get past the multitude of ways of spelling ‘Brinnicombe’. That explains why I have been able to get back to about 1860 with Anderson but 1620 with the Brinnicombe family – who at that time happened to be tin miners in the far west of Cornwall.

I would dearly love to trace my maternal grand-father’s history, but Russell is a surprisingly common name. I suspect his ancestors came over to London from Ireland in the early/mid 19th. century, but I have no means of following this up. As for a key Russell I would really like to find – he emigrated to the USA (we think Texas) in the 1920’s or 30’s – I gave up year’s ago; how do you trace family in a foreign country? With difficulty and cash is probably the answer.

So, having committed my morning thoughts to paper (screen?) I am now fired up to help my great niece. Another coffee should do it!