The failing eyesight of James Arthur Wilkey

My great grandfather, James Arthur Wilkey, died in 1907, aged 30, after falling from a train, while trying to rescue his hat which had blown off.

I was searching through some of the recently added records on Ancestry this morning, plugging in some surnames to see if anything new came up. I was particularly interested in the NSW Teachers Rolls, 1869-1908, as there were a number of teachers in my own ancestry around that time. On a whim I put in the surname "Wilkey" not expecting to find anything, but....

James Arthur Wilkey, who I understood to have been a clerk when he died, had a record in the NSW Teachers Rolls! Slightly surprising.

The record says he was employed on probation as a Pupil Teacher at Darlington Public at the end of 1895, but by the beginning of the 1896 school year he had been transferred to Stanmore Public instead. Sadly though, his teaching career never really started before it was over because on February 24 of 1896 he called the Chief Inspector and stated that on account of his failing eyesight (aged only 19) he didn't feel he could continue his appointment as a pupil teacher.

No one in the family has ever mentioned his eyesight to me, probably because they didn't know about it - his son, my grandfather wasn't even born when he died. I wonder what the cause of the poor eyesight was? And now I wonder if his eyesight contributed to his death... 

Hints and Tips: German family history - historical newspapers

I have always found that historical newspapers can be very important sources of information when researching family history. In an English speaking world that can be reasonably easy, however switching to other languages can make it more difficult.

I have a considerable amount of German ancestry, and have in the past, on the suggestion of Pauleen Cass from Family History Across the Seas, researched German newspapers with Google Books by guessing newspaper names e.g. Blatter, Zeitung and putting it with location names. It's hit and miss, but can yield some wonderful results.

The other day I found a fantastically useful book to assist with German historical newspaper research: Zeitungs- und Zeitschriftentitel- Register by Gert Hagelweide, published by de Gruyter in 2007. It is available (though with limited pages) on Google Books. If you want to buy the e-book it will only cost you €269...

Of course, you still have to find access to those newspapers, and not all of them are available online. Your best bet is to start by searching Google Books and also Internet Archive for the online ones. Look for newspapers with the town/city/region name in them. Once you've found some search the newspapers for the surname(s) that are relevant to your research. If you find the surname, and assuming you don't know German, use Google Translator to get the gist of the information. Then you should be able to work out if it is useful, even if the sentences only vaguely make sense!

Good luck!

The Holsts in Riga

It has been a long time because I've been working on other things, but I'm here!

I've recently been researching the Holst family, in memory of Harro Lange, who was a distant Holst relative and a keen researcher of the Holst family. Before he died in 2013 he hoped that others would take up the reins.

I'm interested in the Holst family because my 3x great grandfather Charles Nicholas Weiss married Benigna Catharina von Holst. Her father Matthias adopted the "von" when he moved to England, but he was born Matthias Holst, in Riga. I've recently discovered online parish records for the Lutheran churches in Riga, through Raduraksti.lv, and so have been delving into the Holsts. The records are written in German, which is something I'm reasonably used to reading, so I'm finding lots of new info.

Benigna's parents were Matthias Holst and Catharina Rogge. The story goes that Catharina's brother, Johann was a knight or a prince of Russia but there has never been any evidence found to support this. Catharina was married before Matthias, to Johann Wilhelm Becker. They appeared in Riga in the 1790s (from Russia?), and had a child, Matthias Alexander, of whom Matthias Holst was a godfather. On the baptism record for Matthias Alexander, Catharina's name was given as Catharina Beata Roggen. Was this really her surname, or a misspelling? I can't find her in any other parish records for Riga, so have no other primary sources with which to compare the spelling.

Matthias Holst's father was said to be Meno Holst. Meno Holst married Maria Saumann at St Peter's Lutheran Church on the 3rd Sunday after Trinity in 1753 - I think this was in July. I have found records for many of the their children, but still have to nail down Matthias' baptism record.

According to all published information on him, Meno Holst apparently died in Riga in 1805. I have searched the parish records for his burial record and cannot find it in his family church of St Peter's, Riga in that year (though it may be in another parish). I have, however, found a burial record for a Meno Holst, with the same occupation description as on the baptism records of Meno and Marie's children, at the same church, who was buried on 31 January 1787, aged 63 years. I think this could be him. Although I haven't yet found a baptism record which corresponds, working backwards, this Meno Holst's birth year would be about 1724, in which case, if it IS my Meno Holst, he would have been 29 years old when he married Marie Saumann, which seems reasonable.

I wondered if there were two different Meno Holsts so I went through all the parish records that I could find for him, and checked his occupation:

Date	Event	Occupation of Meno Holst	Source
Jul 1753	Marriage of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	Ältester der Schwarzen Häupter	St Petri Riga 1712-1842 German, married
18 Mar 1754	Baptism of Adolph, son of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	No occupation given	St Petri Riga 1737-1762 German, born
20 Mar 1754	Burial of unnamed child (possibly Adolph) of Meno Holst	No occupation given	St Petri Riga 1657-1811 German, died
Feb 1755	Burial of unnamed daughter of Meno Holst	No occupation given	St Petri Riga 1657-1811 German, died
Jan 1757	Baptism of Lorenz Christian, son of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	No occupation given	St Petri Riga 1737-1762 German, born
Jun 1757	Burial of Christian Lorenz, son of Meno Holst	No occupation given	St Petri Riga 1657-1811 German, died
Jun 1758	Baptism of Anna Gerdrutha, daughter of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	No occupation given	St Petri Riga 1737-1762 German, born
Aug 1759	Baptism of Matthias, son of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	Kaufmann	St Petri Riga 1737-1762 German, born
Sep 1759	Burial of unnamed child (Matthias?) of Meno Holst	No occupation given	St Petri Riga 1657-1811 German, died
3 Oct 1764	Baptism of Meno Hinrich, son of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	Commercien Rath	St Petri Riga 1763-1800 German, born
May 1766	Baptism of Martha, daughter of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	Commercien Rath	St Petri Riga 1763-1800 German, born
Jan 1770	Baptism of Meno Hinrich, son of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	Commercien Rath	St Petri Riga 1763-1800 German, born
Oct 1770	Burial of Meno Hinrich, son of Meno Holst	Commercien Rath	St Petri Riga 1657-1811 German, died
Jul 1773	Baptism of Maria Eleonora, daughter of Meno Holst and Maria Saumann	Commercien Rath	St Petri Riga 1763-1800 German, born
Oct 1786	Burial of Maria Eleonora, daughter of Meno Holst	Commercien Rath	St Petri Riga 1657-1811 German, died
Jan 1787	Burial of Meno Holst, aged 63	Commercien Rath	St Petri Riga 1657-1811 German, died

A bit of further research confirmed that unmarried merchants could become members of the Schwarzen Häupter, and then after the married they would join the Gross Gilde (the Great Guild). This would explain why he was no longer referred to as Ältester der Schwarzen Häupter (Elder of the Black Heads) after he was married. Commercien Rath was a title for someone who promoted trade activities, while kaufmann means merchant.

As far as I can tell, Meno Holst died in 1787, not 1805. All the information that I can find stating that he died in 1805 was written at least 100 years after either death date, so therefore I will stick with the death year of 1787, unless someone can prove to me otherwise!

Edited to add: I found Meno's wife Marie's burial record - she was buried on 14 August 1805. I believe that the year of Marie's death has been assumed to be Meno's. I'm not surprised no one had found her death record before - she was named as Maria von Holsten, however it says she was the wife of the Commercien Rath, and that she was 72 years old, which fits. Glad I sorted that out!