This will be just a quick post to say that ‘All’s well’.
Over the Australian long weekend I have been in contact with a few living family members.
First, I talked to my cousin using Skype on Thursday night. We share both gggrandparents, Sarah and William Ridgway, as he is descended from Lily Ridgway. He shared lovely anecdotes and told me a little about his family before we both had to attend to more pressing problems. (me: sleep, him: livelihood). I hope to speak to him soon about some of the questions I have (he still lives in West Monkton), and I’d love to hear about the photographs he has.
Then very early Friday morning I phoned another cousin in England, who shares a gggrandmother, Sarah Ridgway/Pring. We talked for over an hour and I asked quite a few questions, with some surprising answers. I don’t want to go into too much detail here, as these conversations will form the basis for some posts later on that will be much better thought out.
Lastly, after some persistent badgering by my father, I phoned my great-aunt in New Zealand – just to see if she got my letter. She had received it and passed the information on to my other great-aunt, her sister. She told me that both her and her sister would write me a letter soon and that she needed to finish the film in her camera so she could send me photos.
I was expecting some sort of negativity, confrontation or denial. Instead I was pleasantly surprised. Everyone I talked to was genuine, welcoming and more than happy to help me. It was quite humbling, not to mention exciting. All of them stated that it was a bit of a ‘jolt’ to find out about my grandmother (especially my great-aunt, who gained a half-sister), but they didn’t find it as upsetting as I’d imagined and fretted about.
It seems there is no history of dementia in the Ridgway branch of the family, something that I suspected from death certificates anyway. However, there is some evidence for a family history of diseases of the heart. I must go back and see if there is more of a connection. I also suspect if there is a history of dementia, it comes from the Parsons side.
Speaking of Ellen Parsons, none of the living relatives can shed any light on the Parsons side just yet. However, there is some hope. Today I received an email from the current Post Master at the West Monkton Post Office to say they will look out for family documents and artifacts as they close down the West Monkton Post Office (so sad). Also, a wonderful person using RootsChat.com discovered that the 1914 divorce of an Oliver & Ellen Ridgeway in Sydney I had written about previously was in fact my Oliver and Ellen. TropicalJ aka Jenn spent her own hard-earned cash to open the divorce file and look at the details, confirming that Oliver and Ellen did divorce and Oliver asked for the custody of Evelyn, my ggrandmother and her sister Olive. I thank her from the bottom of my heart.
So now I have a number of leads to follow in order to find Ellen Parsons, my gggrandmother, and perhaps discover the answers to my remaining questions: is there Alzheimer’s in the Parsons side of the family & who is my ggrandfather? I have already been able to trace the family tree past Evelyn Ridgway, but would like to trace it on my grandmother’s father’s side, if we can ever discover who he was. In the meantime, I have plenty of things to write about on the post. The living relatives I’ve talked to and things I’ve been able to discover with help have been most enlightening.
