Welcome to the July issue of FTF Magazine, which has been inspired by Family Tree Forum’s Places of Worship (PoW) Project.
Our members had been working hard collecting images of churches, chapels, synagogues, citadels etc, from all over the country, some of which are included in this issue. There are presently over 5500 images in the project, which is an excellent achievement – well done to all concerned!
However, there’s still plenty of work to do, especially now the project has expanded to include Scotland. If you would like to help, then please take a look at the Regional Co-ordinator boards, as well as the Places of Worship Project pages in The Wiki.
In this issue, Georgette takes a look at church related occupations and members share the stories of clergymen found in their trees.
The gathering of photographs for the PoW Project was never going to be an easy task, and some members have had more than their fair share of mishaps trying to obtain the ‘perfect shot’, as Liz from Lancs found out on her recent thread on the subject. She brings us a humorous article based on her findings.
Whilst the church provides us with the records of baptisms, marriages and burials, which are particularly useful before Civil Registration, Guinevere and Olde Crone Holden examine the other types of written records which can be helpful in family history research. Continuing the ‘My Kind of Town’ and the ‘Family Treasures’ features, Yummy Mummy of 2 tells us about her home city Peterborough, and Caroline shares the stories behind her family heirlooms.
However, we lead this issue with the story of Katarzyna’s parents-in-law, Stanislaw and Anastazja, who were both captured as prisoners of war in Poland in 1939 and transported to the horrors of the Russian gulags.
In 1941, after the Germans invaded the Soviet Union and the Russians became the Poles’ allies, they were both released to trek to Kazakhstan to join the recently formed General Anders’ Polish Army, for which Stanislaw fought in the North African and Italian Campaigns, most notably at Monte Cassino.
They married in Egypt in 1945, and unable to return to the free Poland for which they had fought, they came and made their home in Britain.
It’s a fascinating and heart-wrenching story and we feel privileged that Katarzyna chose to share their story with FTF Magazine readers.