Gunning & District Historical Society

Post afternoon tea with Edith and John Medway at Crookwell Shared Ancestors, Living Relatives By Garry Norman Smith (Images by Garry and Malia Smith) The research sources you use for your family history are many and varied. While little can match primary sources such as historical documents, eyewitness accounts, diaries and family photographs, it is the fortunate face-to-face meetings with people who share a family story that are arguably most valuable. Contributing to the Gunning and District Historical Society (GDHS) Blog has brought several personal contacts. These contacts extend and enrich the research I have done on my Alchin family in Gunning, Dalton, Jerrawa, Crookwell and other places. Morning or afternoon tea is such an enjoyable way to talk about family connections, such as I was delighted to do with newly-found cousins John Medway and Edith Medway (nee Clark) at Crookwell in late 2017. I uncovered, thanks to Edith – the real family historian in her family ...

Garry Smith at the Irish Famine Memorial at Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney (Photo by Malia Smith - provided) By Garry Smith: The 18th Annual Commemoration of The Great Irish Famine was held on Sunday 27 August 2017 at the Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney. Beginning in 1845 and lasting for six years, the potato famine killed over a million men, women and children in Ireland and caused another million to flee the country. During the early 1830s, approximately 3000 women accepted the British government’s offer of an assisted passage to Australia. Many of these women were educated, articulate and keen to escape the stultifying effects of their family and demonstrate their enterprise. By contrast, the young orphan girls from the workhouses across Ireland during the potato famine were very young, very poor and refugees of a calamitous famine that ravaged Ireland. In the Ennis, County Clare workhouse, built in the period 1839-41, there was an overwhelming crush of famine victims wanting ...