Well technically you could say it was my second... unfortunately I accidently clicked the wrong button, and all my typing and thoughts and nice blog entry went into the deep abiss and now I have to type it again... oh well, this will probably be shorter, but has the same main content.

My name is Megan Emily Jamieson (nee Mansfield) and I'm working on my Son's family tree. There are four branches

Mansfield - My paternal side
Mudgway - My maternal side
Jamieson - Rowan's (my husband) paternal side
Sarten - Rowan's maternal side

So I've been very lucky, on the Sarten side of the family, Rowan's mother (June) has been doing a lot of work on this tree, which has been very handly as I can piggy back off her research. Although she is more interested in the 1800 Sarten's and I've been working on the New Zealand Sarten's which is post 1840. Still once I complete the NZ Sarten's, there will be a lot of research I will be able to pull in from her tree. On the Jamieson side of the family, two people have been working on this. Rowan's cousin Julia and Rowan's second cousin once removed Scotty. So I have an excellent base for the Jamieson's. Unfortunately this usually means that I ignore the Jamieson's and the Sarten's as I know other's are working on it, but that's just the way things are.

I have the following goals

1: To create a living family tree. This will be a family tree of all the living Mudgway, Mansfield, Sarten & Jamiesons as a start. The course I've been doing reminds us that all too often we don't concentrate on the living first... once they are dead, they can't tell stories or provide you with informaiton. So I've emailed around my cousins, Rowan's cousins and I have a few more letters to write to obtain living family tree's.

2: I'll be working on each generation back from my son to ensure I have living and dead (sounds so morbid, but they are) relatives. working back on each generation, checking for siblings of my direct tree and expanding down to add living members to my tree.

3: To identify the boats that all my direct & indirect ancestors arrived in New Zealand on. This has already proved interesting as I have two returned serviceman in the family tree and they came to New Zealand on boats where I can not find passenger lists ... Usually says 123 soldiers. So I have had to make some assumptions, which has been interesting and informative.


Where am I at

1: Sent emails out waiting for information to be provided. Still need to send some letters, will endeavour to do that this week.

2: Need to finish 1: before moving onto 2. Although I do currently have almost a full 6 generation family tree completed. There are only 1 or 2 people left to find parents for, which is encouraging.

3: As I work on 2, I'll obtain the information that they came to New Zealand on. I have probably quarter of the ships now, so it's a matter of figuring out which ancestors I haven't got boats for and then manually searching through to find them.

Who am I currently working on:

[colour=red]Mary HAWKINS[/color]
[colour=grey]Birth: approx 1872 in Hokitika, West Coast, New Zealand[/color]
[colour=darkgreen]Marriage to Louis Mudgway: 01 Feburary 1892 at Registrar's Office in Wellington, New Zealand[/color]
[colour=brown]Death: 08 March 1930 in Tararu, Thames, Thames Valley, New Zealand[/color]

Mary Hawkins married Louis/Lewis Mudgway in 1892. They had 5 children, of which one is my mother's Grandfather. Lyndia's Lot has alot of information about the Mudgway's ... Although some of the information on this particular branch is incorrect, morely likely because original documents have not been obtained and information has come from verbal accounts and likely not verified.

Mary Mudgway died on 08th March 1930 in Tararu, Thames, not in Wellington. She was buried on 10th March in Te Aroha. The death certificate leaves a couple of things open, one the fact that the "age of widow if living" column is not populated with Louis/Lewis age when Mary died and most family tree's have Louis dying in 1954 as do I. So this is a bit confusing. Also an undertaker wrote out her death details, not Louis. If he was living, I would have expected him to fill it out. The second point is that on Louis & Mary's marriage certificate, Mary's mother's maiden name is Senior and I have found an NZBDM record for Annie Senior and James Hawkins, but the death certificate has her maiden name as Gerity. There are very fiew Gerity's in New Zealand at the time, and none that I can find around Hokitika. It could be that the undertaker has written down details from someone else's death on Mary's certificate or just that he has incorrect information. This may never be solved.

Next on the list of things to do for this particular couple:
1: Louis' Birth Certificate
2: Louis' Death Certificate
3: Verify children
4: Children's marriages & children if records allow.
5: Find a living relative and try and get information about living relatives in this part of the tree. There was a Mudgway family reunion about 10 years ago, so this may not be hard to obtain.