Hello to all Hesom and related family searchers/researchers! This is my first visit to this site, it wasn't here last time I did a Hesom search, so this is very exciting! In reply to one of the enquiries about Robert and Ida Constance Hesom (nee Bowen) - they were my grandparents. Robert was born in South Africa and he and Ida met when he was invited to ride behind Queen Victoria's carriage on the occasion of her Silver Jubilee. I understand that they returned to South Africa in 1907 when my father, Bernard (their firstborn) was six months old. They had two other surviving children out of five born to them, Leonie and Jack. They lived a rather nomadic life stretching from Harrismith to Natal to the Kimberley diamond fields to Knysna and onward to Northern Rhodesia. Robert died in 1948 in Luanshya, Northern Rhodesia and Ida in about 1968 in Cape Town. I am in possession of a sketchy family tree which includes Wades, Arbuthnots and others that I would need to look up. I also have a couple of early newspaper clippings about early Hesoms in the Pietermaritzburg area. I would love to connect up with any of you who are distant relatives and exchange info!