By Bob Solly

I have received correspondence from a number of people and have included extracts as follows:

From Deborah Ann Solley

My name is Deborah Ann Solley and my family hail from a small market town in Castle Douglas, Kirkcudbrightshire, Scotland, UK. I have recently moved back to this area and am interested in collating information about the family name. My father is now dead. He was Cpt James Solley, Master Mariner. But he grew up with my 2 aunts and uncle in this town at their parents hotel, The Imperial. This had previously been purchased in the late 1800's by my great grandfather William Solley when the name was changed from Globe Hotel to the Imperial. My grandfather James Solley had two other brothers who were also in the hotel trade David Solley, Waverley Hotel, Dumfries and Samuel Solley who owned at least two other hotels in the Border area of Scotland before settling in Edinburgh at the Kings Manor which is currently owned by his son Lesley Solley. His brother Samuel Solley owns another hotel, The Pitbauchlie in Dunfermline.

The Imperial Hotel, Castle Douglas is currently owned by my cousin David Fulton (his mother was Jean Solley).

I was able to download all the information on Scottish Soll(e)ys from the Scottish

From Susan Solley

David and I were very excited to read Tony Storey's excellent article entitled 'The Solley Farm Papers' in this month's copy of Soul Search.

For many year's I have been researching my husband's ancestors who have been farming as Solleys Farms since the early 1800s in East Kent.

David's great great, grandfather Stephen Solley is listed in the Post Office directory as a Farmer at Sholden in 1851 having moved from Goldstone, Ash.

As you will see from the attached Family Tree his eldest son Stephen Solley left for Canada in 1866 leaving James and Charles (my husband's great grandfather) to carry on farming.  We now farm at Great Mongeham, Sholden, Sutton, Eastry, Nonnington and at Ham Farm and we were interested to read about the diversity of farming in 1895 - we are to this day being told to diversify - they certainly seem to have had their fair share of problems and the documents are a wonderful source of farming social history - am not sure if it is much different now!

We are very fortunate to have a son who wishes to carry on the family farm in the not too distant future. He is at present a farm manager on a large farm in Essex gaining valuable experience before returning to the Solley Family Farm where his ancestors have farmed over the generations.

From Lynne Burlingham

I was very interested by your article on the Solley Farm Papers in the latest issue of Soul Search. By coincidence, browsing the web recently for any Solley/Solly references, I came across a reference to a web site for Solley Farm House (www.solleyfarmhouse.co.uk) at Worth, which is now a B&B! I thought I might contact the owners to see if they know anything the history of the farm and its Solley connection, so your article was timely. I am not aware that the James Solley mentioned is connected to my Solley family, but it is not impossible as I have by no means followed up all the numerous branches of the family - there are just too many to follow them all up in detail!

However, of even more interest was the source of the documents which formed the basis of the article - Emmersons & Co, Solicitors of Sandwich. By a one in a million chance, I have myself recently acquired a bundle of documents relating to the Will of my great-great-grandfather George Solley of Sandwich (1815-1899), which were being offered for sale on e-Bay (an article for Soul Search to follow in due course with more detail!!!). The documents also came from the offices of Emmersons & Co, Sandwich. The seller, from Skegness in Lincolnshire, was offering a lot of material, legal documents and local history material, relating to that area of East Kent including Sandwich, Ash, Deal, Eastry, Worth and Margate. I looked through the list of other items on offer but there were no other obvious items of interest. I guess the legal documents must have turned up for sale when the solicitors' office closed down/was cleared out and were bought up at some book sale or auction.

From Charles G Solley

Subject: Re: James Solley

James W. Solley- (wife) Lille (Moreland) Solley whom we believe were from Ashe.

Under Walter Goram and Mollie Hackmann we need to add under Charles Walter Thomas 1966

Diane (Jackson) Solley March 27

Walter Thomas Solley Jr July 15, 2000

Andrew Charles Solley April 7, 2001

Emily Capri Solley September 6, 2003

From Dianne Bray, Edmonton, Alberta

Subject: Averill Redsull

Hi I am trying to contact Averill Redsull re: the Solley's and Cory's. My husband’s great great grandparents were William Cory and Sarah Ann Solley. In about 1854 William Cory married Sarah Ann Solly who as the daughter I believe of Francis Solly and Ann Robinson and the granddaughter of Stephen Solley and Sarah Percival. William and Sarah Ann began their married life at 125 Middle Street Deal. They later lived at 4 Griffin Street and by 1881 were living at 161 Middle Street in Deal with their children (the last two being a set of twins). They had 12 children of whom I have some limited information but I believe that Jane Cory married John Redsull and the couple had at least 2 children.

If you could pass on my email to Averill I would be extremely grateful. Thanks in advance

From: Gary Doidge

Subject: Flood family photographs

I have read an article on your web site regarding the Solly-Flood family notes. I am a keen photographic collector and have a small collection of early leather bound photographs (Daguerrotypes and Ambrotypes) which tie in with the article. They are photographs of the following : -

Henry Flood of Viewmont (1818 – 1877) it says that he married Isa bella Flood

William Lloyd Flood of Flood Hall, heir of John Flood  (1809 – 1881)

Lieutenant Ferdinand Henry Flood of Slaney Lodge (1832 – 1862)

Edward Thomas Flood of Slaney Lodge  (1827 – 1897)

James Douglas Flood of Slaney Lodge (1835 – 1851)

Henrietta Flood (1827 – 1901) and Issabella Flood  (1830 – 1896) of Flood Hall (a single portrait of them as children)

I wonder if these photographs would be of any interest to any of your members, if you could tell me anything about their history or the history of the family.

From Caryn Solly

Editor of About.com

Thanks for getting in touch! My dad, Michael Solly, knows more about our family than I do, so I'm forwarding this to him.

From Rosemary Solly – new member

Broadstairs, Kent

The ancestors in question are actually my husband's, although I'm researching my family too. My husband, Michael's father was Leslie Cyril Solly 1906 - 1962. His siblings were Ellen, born 1892/3, William born 1899/1900, Thomas, Leonard Minter, Edna. There may be more that I haven't located.

Their parents were Thomas Minter and Jessie Westlake Solly (nee Hamlyn). Thomas was born 13/7/1871 His parents were William Hodgman & Charlotte Solly (nee Minter)  - maried 20/8/1854 .

William's father was also William and he was a plasterer. He may possibly be William Minter Solly, born 1811 and died 1894, but I haven't any proof as I assumed that Minter was a family name from William Hodgman Solly's wife !

I am afraid that's as far as I've got, but as I mentioned I'm researching back from all four sets of grandparents.

When I received my first journal 'Soul Search' , I eagerly went to the article about Richard Solly, The Elder, and was very surprised to find that his daughter, Mary married Stephen Long in 1720. This is very odd because my maiden name was Long and my brother and father and grandfather all had the middle name of Stephen. I had wondered where it came from as it wasn't in previous generations although they did live in Preston, Wingham and Ash. Now speculating that my husband and I may be very distant cousins !

From Deanne Griffin

Here is the gedcom as discussed. I have actually exported the descendants of Thomas Solley and Elizabeth Smith, Juliet's great grandparents, so that you can see all of what I have in my file. I would be grateful if you could look over it and see what I am missing. I would really love to add as much as I can of Thomas and Elizabeth's extended family, including their ancestors. Bob -I have compared this to our records and replied accordingly.

From Jonathan Ellis– new member

I am interested in my family history, but the extent of my research only runs to occasionally searching for random family names through Google. One of the names is Solly, so I was delighted to find the Sole society website.

I was wondering if you could let me know how relevant the information on the CD available to members (or other information you have) would be to my ancestors in this family. I have two family trees which I guess would have been made at about the end of the 19th century.

The last Solly on my tree, relevant to me, is Ann Solly (1765-1841 according to my tree), who married C P (Christian Paul I think) Meyer, daughter of Isaac Solly and Elizabeth Neal (see attached).   Any further details of these people, their lives, their ancestors etc. would be fascinating.

I have attached to this scans of two rather crude miniatures, probably copies of originals of Isaac Solly and his wife Elizabeth Neal, and a transcript of one of my 'trees' going back from them (hopefully you have broadband!).

I have sent the details we have of this family tree (357 names).

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