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August and September 1999: Added in a descent from the St Johns to Georgiana Poyntz via Morduants, from Ian Poyntz.

Visited the parish church of St Mary the Virgin, Whitchurch, Oxon for the first time in my life and found a host of memorials to Lybbes and Powyses, even to the point that two days previously someone had written in the visitors book "seems a lot of Lybbes" to which I added "and here's one more...". Added entries from these memorials for all and sundry and created a flag for these people with memorials or burials in this church so that I can list them at will. Noted that Philip L P L was merely buried here in 1897 and had no memorial. The family vault needs a bit of repair: its iron railings have gone: for the war effort?

Got hold of a copy of a book of my mother's ancestors from a cousin: "Fragments of Bingley History" by Johnson Atkinson Busfeild, another great-great-grandfather. I last read this book, another cousin's copy, about six years ago and thought it was a bit dull, but then I was looking for a family history. Now I realise it is a compendium of all the documents he could find about his forbears, with some linking comments, particularly about those he knew. I now have some considerable respect for his efforts to find contemporary documents of all the people he referred to. So, an excellent book and a must for adding its contents to this family genealogy, now completed. I now show a fairly complete account of the Ferrands and Busfeilds of the West Riding of Yorkshire from around 1580 up to around 1900. Perhaps this could be useful to Rosemary Ferrand, not knowingly a relation, who had done an enormous amount of the work for a one-name Ferrand study?

A friend of mine, thanks Alan, found both my Bartholomew great-great grandparents, pub-keepers, in his copy of the 1881 census and then found an entry by contrast for a rather splendid household of William Stedman Gillett, another great-great grandfather and of whom my sister says she has a photograph. All I need now to complete the list of all great-great-grandparents is the maiden name of (Mrs) Mary Ann Bartholomew, alas not part of the 1881 census...  And I have even decided that I must have my own copy of this census to see what it says about all the forbears of those times; it gives a bit of a picture of their lifestyles.

Had some correspondence with Mrs J A C Richardson about the Carews and Sanders of the 15th and 16th centuries; she is the living Carew expert and has also gone to the enormous labour of running a proper Carew GOON. She corrected a little of my information and I was able to give her Walker's seriously good article on the ownership of the Bataille Manor in Surrey by the Carews and Saunders, filling in some blanks she had on the Sanders. There are three inter-marriages between the Sanders and the Beddington Carews, hence the mutual interest. She has told me more of what running a GOON involves and I'm now quite sure I don't have the time to do it; perhaps when I retire?

On a short holiday in Haye-on-Wye I found a copy of the verbatim report on the Manchester case in the court of chivalry. I had never known it had been published, by the Heraldry Society in 1955. Absolutely fascinating about the history and role of the court.

On almost the last day of September I achieved what I had been searching for seven months, the sign of other descendants of my great-great-grandfather's, Philip Lybbe Powys Lybbe (no hyphen), second family. Not merely that, I am now in e-mail contact with these third cousins in Australia and am happily exchanging vast quantites of information about our respective families.

And to cap the month, in the same e-mail batch came a report of the surname of of last unknown great-grandmother, Mary Ann Seal, wife of William Bartholomew. It needs a little more confirmation but looks solid enough to me: the Seal surname appears in the birth certificate for their daughter Eliza whom we first found in the 1881 census, with her birth location. I'm hoping Sarah Bartholomew's birth record will soon be found and with luck also that of the marriage of Mary Ann and William. I've realised that the previous licensee of the Crown Inn at Ashley was a T Bartholomew; I wonder if he was a relation and if so what, father perhaps? Sounds like some Real Genealogy is happening here, unlike the information given me on a plate for most of my other forbears!

Looks like a busy two months. I had been wondering why some correspondence was not getting done.

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