CLARK
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Twenty-sixth post…
Today I have added a page to the site on some musings on some of the mathematics of family history. ChatGPT tells me I’ve looked at… The mathematical complexity of tracing ancestry, highlighting that if considering the simple series of multiplying parents, we would theoretically have over a billion ancestors 30 generations back – an Continue reading
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Arctic whaling: Tay, 1874
Delving into a document This is a Seaman’s Allotment Note issued at Dundee on 28 April 1874. My 2 x great grandfather William Taylor CLARK (1819-1902) was in his mid fifties, but still working as a harpooner, travelling to the Davis Straits off the west coast of Greenland in pursuit of whales. The Allotment note Continue reading
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Catching a glimpse
Sometime it can be frustrating as a family historian when we catch just a glimpse of what must have been a fascinating life, and yet it seems that no record remains (at least outside those tales that must surely echo amongst their immediate descendants). Hannah Elizabeth DURLEY (nee HORNSBY) (1870-1971) is surely a case in Continue reading
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Blenheim of Hull – Part 3
The story so far Part 1 recounted how an inherited drawing set me on the trail of my whaling ancestor Thomas CLARK and his capture by the French in 1806. https://wordpress.com/post/myancestors.blog/199 In Part 2 I explained why English sailors were being held by the French and delved into a contemporary account of conditions in the Continue reading
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Great Grandad’s Names
My great grandfather fascinated me as a young child because he had 4 names – Joshua Whitley Gill CLARK (1855-1901). Growing up, I didn’t ever came across anyone else with more than 3 names. Surely it was only royalty that had lots of names? Why would my great grandad? Of course, researching the family history, Continue reading
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Blenheim of Hull – Part 2
The story so far In Part 1 https://wordpress.com/post/myancestors.blog/199 I explained how through an inherited pen and ink sketch dated 1806 I was able to ascertain that my 4 x great grandfather Thomas CLARK was on board the Hull whaler, Blenheim, when she was captured by a French frigate and all the men were taken as Continue reading
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My Grandparents’ Golden Wedding
Marriage… My CLARK grandparents were childhood sweethearts. Sadly though the story of where they now met is lost. Perhaps at school – their Girls and Boys Junior schools were next to each other; perhaps through the Church where grandma became a Sunday School teacher; or perhaps simply through growing up in neighbouring streets. Before they Continue reading
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Blenheim of Hull – Part 1
In my first post [https://myancestors.blog/2023/09/04/hello-world/] I mentioned that I’d inherited a small pen and ink sketch dated 1806, showing a British whaling ship being captured and burned by a French frigate. The drawing The drawing measures about 6 x 8 inches. It’s in good condition, apart from its missing top left corner. The words at Continue reading
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Family tragedy: Just Williams
In May 1858 the Hull Daily News reported: Last Saturday, a sad accident occurred on the south side of the Queen’s Dock. It seems that a boy, seven years of age, named Peter William Clarke, son of a seaman [George Osbourne CLARK], who is at present, we understand, on a Greenland voyage, in the ‘Chase’, Continue reading
My Ancestors 