Genealogy Luck Story 2
Hurrah for collectors without whom I may never have found my great great grandfathers home and grocery shop, which was in the family from 1839 to 1905. Grandfathers name was Ambrose Chilvers.
Arriving in the small town I headed for the local bookshop to look for local history publications in a hope of finding out where my relative’s home was and whether it was still standing! To my pleasure the town did have a local historian who had written 6 booklets on the history of the town from early man to 20th C. As on so many occasions when delving into genealogy, people from all walks of life are prepared to help complete strangers and this was such a time. The shop owner kindly rang the local historian and explained my enquiry and in turn he put me onto the name of a local who collected postcards!!
A quick phone call I was on my way to meet the postcard collector. Over a cup of tea and many questions later as to my background and reasons for visiting him there was not a postcard in sight and I thought all was lost. Suddenly he appeared to decide I was genuine and said “you have come from the other side of the world to find your relatives you must really want to find them” “Yes”, I said!
With that he disappeared and came back with two large suitcases, and then went away for 2 more. On opening them they were all stuffed full of hundreds of postcards. They must have been carefully sorted, as he seemed to know exactly where to find the ones of the street I wanted.
After sometime he produced 4 of ‘my’ street all taken at different periods in time and then he proceeded to eliminate the properties along the street that he knew about which left us with the unknown. “Just make a phone call to Jimmy” was his next comment and I was left gazing at the suitcases bulging with postcards. Jimmy must have added more knowledge to the problem because after the call his next comment was “we think it could be that one or that one. How about we go and have a look now and see what we can find out?”
With my excitement building we were soon walking down the street that my ancestors walked for the 66 yrs that they lived there. The home/shop we stopped at first a 300 yr old Georgian building happened to be being renovated and the workers were asked did they know anything of its history. “Nope “ came the reply “but we have just found this behind some walling”
He was holding up a very dirty paper bag on which was written the words A.Chilvers, Grocer Draper and Tea Dealer!! I had found the ancestral pile and all because of an ardent postcard collector!
PS. He had 12 suitcases of them in all by the way!
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Anne Gentleman, nee Chilvers
