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Messages - SimonRoberts

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Alderney, Guernsey, Jersey, Sark / Re: Sir Arthur Vere Harvey, Baron Prestbury CBE
« on: Thursday 03 July 25 19:55 BST (UK)  »
Many thanks to everyone for all the quick and thorough responses. I will start to follow up all the guidance and advice.

@Rosie 17 - I will be contacting some of the Ancestry Tree owners later this evening.
I was aware that Sir Arthur's son Philip had committed suicide and, yes, he was married (to Julie A nee Roberts).

@ KGarrard - I will be getting in touch with the Guernsey Probate registry in the coming days.

@Andy J2022 -  I have requested a copy of Philip's will. I had never seen the Peerage News blog article, but it is almost exactly the same as the obit in The Independent. It looks like Guy A V Harvey was, indeed, the second son of Arthur and Jacqueline. It's a lead I will be following further. The Ralph Barker biography was on my radar, but I have not been able to locate ba copy yet. Another lead I'll be following.

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Alderney, Guernsey, Jersey, Sark / Sir Arthur Vere Harvey, Baron Prestbury CBE
« on: Thursday 03 July 25 14:59 BST (UK)  »
Good afternoon

Sir Arthur Vere Harvey was my 2nd cousin (my grandmother's cousin). He was born and brought up in my home village (Kessingland, Suffolk). His ashes are also interred in the churchyard at St Edmunds Church, Kessingland. However, The memorial stone on the family grave has been damaged and a couple of us who have been researching Arthur's life and military service wish to get the stone replaced.

While we have the blessing of the church, we feel we should seek permission from any surviving next-of-kin before we go ahead.

Sir Arthur died at Princess Elizabeth Hospital, St Peter Port, Guernsey on 5th April 1994. At the time of his death he was married to his 5th wife, Lady Carol (nee Cassar-Torregioni) and he had adopted her two daughters from her previous marriage (Charmaine (now Slottsdhal) and Rowena (now Wald)).

Arthur had a son (The Hon Philip William Vere Harvey) from his 2nd marriage to Jacqueline Ann Dunnett, but he died in 1998, and we have been unable to find any information about any other children or grandchildren.

We can find no way of accessing probate records for Guernsey. Are they publicly available on the island? Also, we wondered if there was an obituary or press release regarding the funeral/memorial service on the island. These resources might give us some clues regarding who would have been NoK.

Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Simon Roberts

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Durham / Re: Birth in Durham, but no connection to the area.
« on: Friday 04 February 22 20:43 GMT (UK)  »
Thanks, all. There are some leads to follow up there. I was aware of the two Abel Barbers born in Kidderminster around the same time and I have found it difficult to separate the two, especially when other people have them in their family trees as the same person!! Never trust someone else's research!

It's interesting to know that Durham was an important centre for carpet weaving in the 19th c. That's exactly the trade Abel was in, so it could be a good lead. However, he's nowhere to be found on the 1871 census.

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Durham / Birth in Durham, but no connection to the area.
« on: Thursday 03 February 22 22:59 GMT (UK)  »
My great-grandfather, John Henry BARBER, was born in Durham on 19 Oct 1870, son of Abel Barber and Ann nee Rose. His family were all in Kidderminster, Worcestershire and he and his mother were back in Rock Terrace, Kidderminster by the 1871 census. John was from a long line of Kidderminster weavers, who remained in the area for generations before and after his birth. I have found absolutely no family links to the north east, either maternal or paternal.

He appears on later census records as being born in "Durham, Durham" although his Royal Navy Service Record records his place of birth as Kidderminster.

Why would John have been born in Durham for no discernible reason?

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Yorkshire (East Riding & York) / Re: Loss of HM Trawler Courtier off Kilnsea 1916
« on: Thursday 13 January 22 22:55 GMT (UK)  »
Just discovered your message on Rootschat.

John Henry Barber was my great-grandfather. He was born in Durham on 19 Oct 1870, although his family were in Kidderminster, Worcestershire. His father, Abel, was a rug weaver, and I have yet to discover how John came to be born in Durham, as there are no other family links there. John was brought up in Kidderminster.
At the age of 16, John left home to join the Royal navy as a boy entrant, training and serving on various ships all over the world through the 1880s and 90s.
In 1899, he transferred temporarily to the Coastguard, initially being stationed in Faversham, Kent before being transferred to Kessingland in Suffolk.
This is where he met and married my great-grandmother, Catherine Maud Gouldby (13 years his junior), on 9 Jun 1903 and my grandmother, Pleasance Elizabeth, was born on 13 Aug 1904.
John continued as a coastguardsman and was promoted to Petty Officer in 1910 before retiring with a pension of £1 10/-. In 1911, the census recorded him as a Navy pensioner, while Catherine was recorded as a net mender living at Sea View, Cliff Road, Kessingland.
At the outbreak of war, it seems John re-enlisted and after a short period of training, was back at sea on HMS Fiona, a passenger cruiser requisitioned by the Navy as an "Armed Boarding Vessel". John volunteered for minesweeping duties in Oct 1915 and was drafted to the steam trawler HMT Courtier on minesweeping duties. The Courtier was lost off Kilnsea after striking a mine (probably laid by a German u-boat) with the loss of 12 of the 13 crew, the only survivor being Second Hand William John Ash of Brixham, Devon.

John's daughter, Pleasance, married Leonard Wallace Blowers in 1925, who was also lost at sea when his tug, the Aid, was shelled by German destroyers off Falmouth, Devon in 1940. Their daughter, Maureen, was 6 years old at the time. She joined the WRNS at 18 years old and met my father, Gerald George Roberts, Petty officer RN while serving at Portsmouth. They married in 1956 and moved back to Kessingland in 1958, where I was born in 1961.

I bucked the family trend and joined the RAF! No wonder my grandmother hated the Germans....

I hope that's some help.

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