So Far Away
We're changing things up a bit for Week 22 with the theme "So Far Away." It's a pretty vague theme, to be sure. You could write about an ancestor who is from someplace far away from where you live. You could explore an ancestor who migrated far during his or her lifetime. You could tell about a research experience in a distant library or archive. I'm curious to see what everyone comes up with!
The distance between my home town of Goulburn New South Wales and Launceston, Tasmania is approximately 1223 kilometres. Not really very far by standards of how far some of my ancestors travelled to new worlds.
But my take on the Weekly prompt “So Far Away” is about this distance.
In December 2017 I was in Launceston Tasmania, for my Graduation in my Diploma of Family History.
I have an ancestor Alfred Ludwig Brandt who was a miner in Tasmania in the late 1860’s. So a trip to the local library of Launceston saw me scrolling through a microfiche for the birth records of my ancestor’s son Alfred Lewis Brandt, who was born in 1870.[1]
I hoped that by finding the Baptismal record that was on the Tasmanian website LINC I would gain some information as to the whereabouts of his parents residence, at this time.
Any Family Historian will tell you about the mind numbing experience of scrolling through page after page of microfiche. But I was rewarded for my patience and was able to take a photo of my find!
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| Photo of Microfiche |
This page has the residence as “Quadrant”. No house number, no street…. Just Quadrant !!! Very helpful…NOT.
I quizzed the local librarian and he knew of an area down the road known as the Quadrant Mall. Obviously this could be the place. But it was not much to go on.
Nether-the-less, my sister and I went for a walk around this Mall while in the area. One never knows, I might find more about this elusive family eventually in my search and I can then say I walked the ground where they lived.
While in Tasmania my husband and I also did quite a few kilometres looking for mines that Alfred may have been involved in. Unluckily for us these mines are no longer in existence. But many kilometres and some very interesting scenery was enjoyed. Such is the life of a Family Historian.
But for now this Alfred is a little “less far away”. Did I mention that he came from Sweden? Now that will be another story of “so far away”. I haven’t as yet proved his birth in Sweden or found out how he got to Australia, I think he either swam or came in a row boat. He just appears in Tasmania in the 1860's.
One day I will find out and that is the excitement of research. You never know what is around the corner, one day you may be "so far away' only to find the next you are "very close" to something exciting.
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1 http://www.ancestry.com.au Australia, Birth Index, 1788-1922 Index Reg #44 Alfred L BRANDT [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010 accessed 12 August 2015
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