I’m a teenager, lifting the lid of a shoe box. I’m opening a small treasure chest of memories that my grandmother’s sister has given to me. For keeps. The milky eyes in this photograph of my grandmother’s father – my great grandfather – are looking at me, examining me in the same way that I’m…
Tag: Francis Sendall
Tuppence and Thrippence
I’ve got a new mystery to solve. Its about these pictures of my second great aunts. They are my great grandfather Francis Sendall’s sisters. They were working class people; their father was a butcher, their grandfather was a blacksmith. How did they afford to look so grand? And to be photographed? The women in the…
Hurricanes, cannon balls and cannibals: Francis Sendall, the tropics
Following the disastrous end to his marriage to Jennie, Francis was looking for something exciting to fill the void. In September 1891, Francis left Sydney on board the steamer Waroonga, bound for the warm, tropical climate of the New Hebrides. After sailing around most of the islands of the New Hebrides, Francis bought several pieces…
A life less ordinary: Francis Charles Stewart Sendall, the early years
Meet my maternal great grandfather, Francis Charles Stewart Sendall, an ordinary man who it appears liked to chew on the left side of his considerable mustachio. Francis was born in Bath, England, in 1852 to parents William Sendall and Caroline Neale. The Sendalls were ordinary working-class people. William Sendall was a butcher, and his father…
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