Sunday 27 September 2009

Family Gathering

In Bella’s Garden

Bella, who was actually Agnes Isabella, was the older sister of my Nana, Euphemia Jane aka Jean, by five years. They both lived in Fife, and their families would gather together, often in her garden. Her garden brought her so much pleasure and she even kept a couple of chickens down at the bottom of it. Her husband, James Kidd Brown, was a gardener and worked away from home for a large part of their married life, in some of the large houses …and even in England.
This gathering is in 1925, not long after their niece Lily was married, where both Ella and Marjory were Bridesmaids. (Marjory is wearing her dress as a Best Dress now)
This tag shows who's who


James and Bella had three children Ella, Oswald and Helen.
In 1918, when Helen unexpectedly collapsed in front of her mother while dancing around the kitchen, both the doctor and Euphemia were called for. Immediately Euphemia answered the call for help .... even though she had year old twins at home.

Sadly Helen died less than a week later, of the flu that spread through out the world and claimed so many lives. She was only ten years old.
It was said that Bella never got over her death … I can see the sadness in her eyes.

The other significance to the top photo is that it is the last picture I can find of Horace, my grandfather, who died less than two years later.

Take Care xx

4 comments:

Morning's Minion said...

Your stories are such a wonderful look at lives that are past---truly a "glimpse" that makes me want to read a whole book on each person mentioned. Those of us who love family history and set about gathering old photos and tales find other families nearly as interesting as our own. Thank you for presenting these people so beautifully.

Paige said...

You have such a wonderful knowledge of your family. Thank you so much for sharing these stories with us all. even the sad stories are wonderful (sniff sniff) to read! Me thinks Twins run in your family ;)

Ginny said...

yet another wonderful story to accompany a wonderful LO...I too think it's great you have a book of these stories but you should also attach them to your LOs...can I join your wonderful family???

Kirsty.A said...

Such interesting stories, even though I now nothing of your family. You have inspired me to flesh out my own family history research with this kind of anecdote, rather than just collecting names from further and furher back