Emigration
has been an underlying theme in most of the 2003 Issues of this
magazine. It occurred to us one day that although we had a number of
facts about conditions and family stories of success or failure, we
really didn't know much about how it felt to be an emigrant.
We
asked Roy Hayter (who emigrated not once but twice) if he would tell
us about his experiences and we are delighted
to publish his response this month. We are most grateful to Roy for
his interesting and very readable "insider" view as we follow him from his
student days through to the process of becoming an American Citizen.
We
hope the descendents of William Stentiford and Charity Born, together
with those of William Stentiford and Elizabeth Bright will find
the Wembworthy article useful in pushing their family trees back prior
to 1725. We've used a little bus journey across three Parishes to
point up the ease with which our ancestors moved around an area - it
would be very easy in the Coldridge area to plan a 3-hour walk which
crossed four or five Parishes, each with its own set of records, 50%
of which may not be included in the IGI.
This
month we recall Bertrand William Stedeford who died in the Malayan
Campaign which lasted from 1948 to 1960. He was professional soldier
who rose through the ranks to become a Captain and was only 36 when he
died. Readers of the Burma Star website will find him mentioned there
too - he also saw service in the jungles of Burma with the Chindits in World War 2.
Finally,
we noticed during the last days of May that the opening
"hits" counter had begun to show a four-figure number - not
much to shout about by comparison with many websites but a real
milestone for us. Our thanks to all of you for your support and
continuing interest.
Keep
in touch,
Muriel
and Richard
