Reunions and Discoveries in Britain:

I just returned from a nearly two week trip to Wales and England. I went for my brothers wedding, but it also turned into an opportunity to do a little family history. I already knew we'd spend a couple of days with my Uncle Michael who has done a lot of research on his side of the family. I went armed with questions and a camera.

The first pleasant surprise is that my Dad carved time into one of our trips through Wales to look for the grave of his grand father and grand mother.

Now, my dad's cousin had previously sent us a picture of the grave. 

When we visited we saw that it was definitely in some disrepair, which we had figured out from Roy's earlier pictures.

Wendy Thomas (nee Davies), Me, Dad (Merthyn Davies.)

Wendy is my Dad's sister, and she had actually helped at Price and Annie's house when Annie passed away, but in Wales tradition said that women were not to go to the grave site for the funeral. It's a tradition still held to in some parts of Wales today. So Wendy had never seen the grave, I am glad we could take her with us. 

While there we raised one of the side stones which had collapsed and we discovered one other thing. There was one line missing from the inscription Roy sent me. This is because it was carved on the tail end of the grave and not on the headstone.

In Welsh it simply reads:

"Gwyn eu byd y rhai addfwyn."

Translated it reads as:

"Blessed are the meek."

On my last full day in England we also visited my grandparents and great grandparents graves on my mothers side.

Mum (Christine Davies), Kathleen Hobbs (Nana's cousin who grew up with her), me.

Christine Davies (nee Hilton), me, Dad (Merthyn Davies.)

A sapling has grown up between my grandparents grave and the one behind. We didn't want to remove it in case it had been planted purposefully, or in case it disturbed the earth around the two graves. This made it a little difficult to take a photograph. We took Auntie Kathleen with us, who was my Nana's cousin.

The inscription for this and my great grandparents grave can be found here.

Dad and Mum (Merthyn and Christine Davies.)

I'm glad that we visited.

Now, in between the grave visits we stayed with my Uncle. As a result of that trip I now have:

1. 14 more photographs of Nana and Grandad together.

Just one of the photographs - Grandad receiving a gift from the British
Post Office upon his retirement. Nana caught the camera and smiled.

2. 1 more photograph of grandad alone, he is playing the accordion. 

Incidentally, this means I now know we had accordion players on both sides of the family tree.

3. Pictures of Grandad's war medals. ( I will go into more details about the medals in a future post.)

4. Memorial from Grandad's funeral.

5. 4 Letters written to Nana when her eldest was born. (Since he is still alive I may not blog these transcriptions in their entirety for a while.)

6. A photograph from Victory in Japan Day.

Grandad is front row second from the right, in uniform.

7. Great Grandad Wright's National  ID card and 3 medals from WW1 and 3 from WW2

8. A newspaper article on John Hobbs (My Auntie Kathleen's father.)

9. A newspaper article on Herbert Wright. (My Great grandfather's brother.)

10. Potentially a gedcom file with all my Uncle's research. (Depends if he can figure out how to send it to me.)

11. A photograph of my great great grandmother Hannah Elizabeth Westerman.

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12. Some information about Sarah Sharratt (My 2x Great Gradmother.)

13. Some information on George Hilton (My 4x Great Grandfather.)

Of course, this is a lot of information, and considering I've hardly started blogging about all the research I discovered from my Dad's side of the family, it may be a while before you read it all here. So stay tuned, there's a long road ahead!

Remembering David John Davies

Earlier in the year I put in a request on the website Find a Grave. It was for anyone who could photograph the grave of my great grandfather's brother, David John Davies. For more on what I know about his life you can read the following:

David John Davies: Following the trail. 

David John Davies: Cause of death. 

I had forgotten about the request I made, but this morning I received a surprise email from Find A Grave letting me know that a David Wilson-Pinkney had discovered the grave and photographed it. Thank you!

Some of the letters are missing but I was able to piece together the wording. The inscription reads as follows:

In affectionate remembrance of David John, 

beloved husband of Edith Davies, 

who departed this life Feb 4 1931, Aged 52 years. 

Home at last, thy labour done.

There is no gravestone of his wife, Julia Edith Davies because she married some years later and emigrated to the United States. I write about her little adventure here. I have yet to find her gravestone but it is somewhere in Pennsylvania. 

I feel a sense of completion having now transcribed his gravestone as well as knowing the cause of death.

The only thing left to say is that he is buried in Penrhys Cemetery, Rhondda Cynon Taff, Wales at plot number D20, and burial number 434.