Ebay

Dev · Ebay

Anyone interested in local history and family trees, this is well worth the price. The book(s) available to collect locally in Southport, or it can be posted and its helped fill in some blanks with my tree. Maybe its not for everyone but its interesting all the same.

I'm told theres several copies left as i bought some books off him today. Just thought i'd pass on the info.

Cheers

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/The-Aughton...18%7C301%3A0%7C293%3A2%7C294%3A50

Published in 1995, this book is in brand new unread excellent condition. A clear, concise and detailed history of the Aughton family who lived in Aughton, which is near to the market town of Ormskirk in West Lancashire. Privately published by the author Richard Ball Howard, who sadly passed away. The format you see is the only one and it was deemed far too costly at the time to produce a dustjacket, when it was new it was about £16.00! As far as we are aware his widow has no plans for a re-print. A lovely book which even has a section at the back all related to the family trees which also cover areas like Birkdale, Crossens and Marshside.

SeaCopRimmer

Might be a good one to have in the NM(S)FHS Library - if not already in there

Bez

Well, I'm sorry, but I have that book and a lot of it seems to have been taken from Peter Aughton's book. There are extensive family trees but I'm not sure how accurate these are - they would need to be checked if anyone thought they had a link to them.

He has also made much of a supposed link to the Scottish and English royal houses through one of the sisters of King John Balliol (known as "Toom Tabard") - a link I can find no evidence for, and I spent almost 2 years looking (and wrote an article for the Sandgrounder), as this link would have taken my Aughton ancestry (via Millicent Comyn, wife of William Aughton) back to the father of William the Conqueror and also the early Kings of Scotland, if it had been true.

King John Balliol's parents were John Balliol and Devorguilla, the Lady of Galloway (a Scottish princess) and they were the founders of Balliol College Oxford. Balliol College have no knowledge of any such link either. The life of Devorguilla is very well known (apart from her exact date of birth) - she was a very rich and powerful woman who was given the responsibilty of acting as a gaoler for one of her brothers.

Peter Aughton, in his book, made no such claim and merely mentioned a kinship - his reference pointed to the Victoria County History of Warwickshire and Leamington Spa library, who very kindly faxed me the relevant page, which showed that Richard Ball Howard was wrong. The Howard book (unlike Peter Aughton's) is not academically referenced and has a single page for a bibliography - this mentions "The Hall of Names" for the history of the Comyn family. What I found when I put it into a search engine pointed to it being a scam where you pay a fee and are given a "history".

Having said all that, it is a very readable book so long as you take care to verify the facts. For my money, I would stick to Peter Aughton's book and copies come up for sale all the time.

SeaCopRimmer

So - maybe not worth putting in the Library if it's going to send people along the wrong track? Not having read the book then obviously I would suggest we rely on Bez to advise the benefits or otherwise of purchasing

Dev

Thank you for the advice Bez. I agree aswell always clarify and dont assume everything is correct.

Can i ask your opinion on "Megasaga" by Walter Jesson>

Thank you

Bez

I'm certain that I have commented on Megasaga somwhere else on this forum, but here are my thoughts anyway.

Again a very readable book and a good yarn, but absolutely no references anywhere and no bibliography either, but then it is more of a personal history or collection of memories - in his own words a "saga". The worst thing for me is the lack of an index.

It is a long time since I read the book and I've just been having a skim through it to find something I remembered reading - it is on page 91 where he claims to have found out the true facts behind the story of the "Lost Farm" and he subsequently published the story in one of the local papers apparently with the blessing of the late Lady Mary Hesketh. He stated that all of his papers would eventually be placed in the Botanic Gardens Museum but when I enquired there 8 or 9 years ago I was told there were no papers.

He stated on the same page that he had been writing local history "features" for all the local newspapers from the 1930's onwards, and he does write well, but newspaper articles are not usually referenced and this has carried over into the book.

If you like a good story, then yes, it's an interesting book, but when it comes to verifying anything you are on your own - the family stories may not be true anyway, and in my brief flick through it I've noticed several rather glaring inaccuracies which he states as being facts. I'd quote one of them but I can't find it again, however he stated that the Independent Church movement was started by a Mr Hall who built Hall's chapel and this is completely untrue. The first Independent Chapel was in Churchtown (now Churchtown URC) and was established in 1807; the second one was East Bank Lane, built in 1823 (later Chapel Street Congregational) and the first minister at both of these churches was the Rev George Greatbatch. Some time in the 1830's a Liverpool merchant called Bartin Haigh built Hall's Chapel in Hall Street for a Rev Mr Hall. Mr Haigh had tried to persuade the Rev Greatbatch to let the Rev Hall join him as a minister at East Bank Lane (and apparently tried to bribe him with offers of financial help according to Bland in his Annals of Southport), but Greatbatch declined. After 10 years the extremely small congregation at Hall's Chapel moved to Holy Trinity.

So, interesting to read and full of "facts" as well as family hearsay - the sort of stuff a good journalist writes to keep the readership interested. You'd probably find lots of leads to follow up on. There's also a fairly modern heavily annotated map folded into the back cover which may be worth looking at.

SeaCopRimmer

Megasaga is, supposedly, the history of the Rimmers and as such I find it very useful and it is not far removed from Arthur Rimmer's paper on the origins of the name. It is a readable book, it doesn't have an index, nor does it have a bibliography but Walter does mention many of his sources within the text and I find it both interesting and informative; it may have errors (as Bez says) but then it is up to us as family historians to back up a theory with fact - if we can find it

Dotty · Well...

As I have been out of the loop for several weeks I'm pleased to see that life goes on without me...

Dotty

Ebay

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