Manitoba Archives blog “At home and Away”

Manitoba Archives has had a blog since 2014, and its main emphasis is on the First World War and Manitoba.

In April 2015, there are two new postings -

On the 2 April 2015, there is the Keeping a Diary in the Trenches.

George Henry Hambley was one of over 600,000 Canadians who served in the First World War. Hambley enlisted at Camp Hughes (then Camp Sewell) on 13 October 1915 when he was almost 19 years old. He was a trooper in the Canadian Light Horse and served in France, Belgium, and Germany, fighting in the battles of Ypres, Mons, Cambrai, and Vimy Ridge.

And the second post was 7 April 2015 Hudson's Bay Company & Cable Communications

During the First World War cables (also known as telegrams) were an almost immediate source of communication. The Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) utilized this form of communication on a daily basis in the early 20th century, as demonstrated in a series of inward and outward cables records titled “Cables related to Hudson's Bay Company's wartime business with European governments” from 1914 to 1916.

If you are interested in reading these blogs, go to http://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/archives/ww1blog/index.html?utm_source=T270415&utm_medium=T270415&utm_campaign=T270415

Check the Canadian Week in Review every Monday morning for the latest in Genealogy, Heritage, and History news in Canada.

If you missed this week’s edition, it is at http://genealogycanada.blogspot.com/2015/05/canadian-week-in-review-04-may-2015.html

  It’s the ONLY news blog of its kind in Canada!

It has been a regular post every Monday morning since April 23, 2012

Some Canadian Archival Resources

Douglas Brymner (Dominion Archivist) July 3, 1823 - June 18, 1902

Douglas Brymner became Senior Second Class Clerk in 1872, and was responsible for the creation of a national archives in Canada. The government had voted for $4,000 to be spent in overseeing the collection of records, and in undertaking "general archival responsibilities".

Two archives that I use on a regular basis are the Nova Scotia Archives www.gov.ns.ca/nsarm and the Provincial Archives of New Brunswick http://archives.gnb.ca/archives because I have relatives in both Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

The NS Archives astounds me every time I go to it – there is always something new. I have searched their vital records and have found births, marriages, and deaths there; I have searched through one of their virtual archives, 'Seeing Yarmouth': Celebrating 250 Years of Community Life, and have found areas there that interest me; and I have spent hours reading the Nova Scotia Historical Newspapers from Shelburne, finding my family name (Barclay) in them.

Go to www.gov.ns.ca/nsarm/virtual to get a complete listing of their Virtual Archives.

The archives in New Brunswick holds Nova Scotia newspapers, and I found things here that I couldn't find anywhere else, especially in their Daniel F. Johnson's New Brunswick Newspaper Vital Statistics webpage at http://archives.gnb.ca/APPS/NewspaperVitalStats/?culture=en-CA. So it is well-worth a look, as they are adding to it all the time.

If you go to the Archives of Manitoba website at www.gov.mb.ca/chc/archives looking for estate records, take a look at the Winnipeg Estate Indexes, 1870-1983 webpage at www.gov.mb.ca/chc/archives/probate/wpg_estate.html.

I was lucky to find what I was looking for (for many people did go "Out West" when it was opened to find their fortune), and you just may be lucky enough to find your people listed in the estate indexes.

And, of course, I always come back to the Library and Archives Canada's (LAC) website at www.collectionscanada.gc.ca

One area that is worth a look on their website is the Search All search box, found in the upper right-hand corner of the page. Just put the name of the person you are looking for in the box, and you can search through four of their portals - "Library", "Archives", "Ancestors", and "Website" to see if there's a match.

You may be as surprised as I was when I discovered that a relative in the Boer War received a land grant from Canada, even though he had fought with the British in South Africa instead of with the Canadians!

So there is lots of information to find at these archives, either through the Internet, or by inter-library loan. All that one has to do is ask!

Tomorrow's Blog: Ontario Genealogical Groups