Work has been progressing steadily, on coding and charting the SEWELLs. I sent out some 41charting packs to the members with SEWELL interests and I was very encouraged by the response. To date I have had 30 packs back, which has immediately swelled the charts held. This information is currently being coded and entered into the database.

Counties currently being coded and charted include: CAM, HUN, HRT, BDF, NTH, WES, CUL DUR. NFK’, YKS, LIN, RUT and last but not least, ESS. If you feel you would like to take on a county, the work involved is quite straightforward. Initially you allocate numbers to a printed list of marriages generated from the database, then add as many additional marriages that can be found that are not on the IGI. Brian Sewell lives in Northampton but has his roots in Essex so he is taking on the coding and charting of that county. Is there anyone with ancestry rooted in London willing to take it on? For that matter, is anyone is prepared to take on a country, preferably one in which their charted ancestors lived? Please contact Tony Storey who is co-ordinating these activities.

I hope to publish the first list of charts held early next year. Cambridgeshire will be the first with a list of marriages for that county and charts held relating to those marriages.

It has recently been bought to my attention that a group in America has been compiling a database on USA SEWELLs. I am currently investigating how things are going and if the Sole Society could exchange information with them. On the surface they appear to have done a lot of work.

Mrs Marion Sewell has written from Western Australia asking if anyone has information relating to Joseph Sewell born Essex c1891, father James or John, mother Sarah Rumball, who married Frances Matilda Needham in Dublin IRL, 5 March 1846, possibly in India and had two sons John and Christopher. If anyone has anything on Joseph, please contact me and I will put you in touch.

Coincidentally, Thelma Cannon of Essex is seeking the marriage of William Ambrose Sewell to Ann Blyth, one of their children, James Joseph Sewell, is her ancestor born 11 July 1863 in Plaistow, Essex. Can anyone help?

As to my own activities, at present I am collecting any marriage that does not appear on the 1988 version of the IGI.

Return to The Sole Society Home Page