An intriguing ADAMS document

I know I just said that I thought the ADAMS saga was over but....

I just found this intriguing record in The National Archives catalogue. Sadly it's £40 to get a digital copy so I'll likely never know what it's about. I could speculate though - perhaps some kind of dispute over Thomas ADAMS' will, with proceedings brought by his murderer dearly beloved son William?

Genealogical fiction - who's writing?

No, by genealogical fiction I don't mean those spurious family trees scattered far and wide over the internet.

I've been toying with the idea of writing a historical novel about one of my ancestors. After much pondering (and much listening to the wonderful I Should Be Writing podcast), I've come to the conclusion that I simply don't want the novel written enough to actually write it, so I've parked the idea for now.

However, it seems that other genealogists out there have stepped up, written, and published their genealogical fiction. Here are a few that have come to my attention over the last couple of weeks:

* D.J Wiseman - A Habit Of Dying is an English murder-mystery stemming from a journal found in a box of family heirlooms.

* Steve Robinson - In The Blood features an American genealogist solving a historical murder-mystery in Cornwall.

* William Leverne Smith (aka geneablogger Dr Bill) - Back To The Homeplace and the new sequel The Homeplace Revisited are set in more recent times in the Ozarks but feature family history themes.

I've just purchased the first two (from Book Depository and Smashwords respectively) - unfortunately the last isn't available in epub format with any online retailer that will sell to NZers, so that will have to wait for now.

What else is out there? Anyone want to confess to having a work in progress?

August update

The page about the Adams murder first appeared on the website in 2005 - after 6 years of occasional updates it now feels like this case is concluded. Further information about the fate of alleged murderer and convicted thief William Francis ADAMS has been unearthed and can be found on the Adams murder page, along with a new newspaper report of the murder trial, this time from the Brighton Patriot. This contains additional names and testimony of Wing folk. It also contains different forenames for a number of people when compared to the initial report I had from The Times, and one case (Edgar OLLEY/Walter RALEIGH) demonstrates how easily names can be misheard and misrecorded.

There's another important new page on the website this month - the first of the farming series. This first page covers the farms and farmers of Ascott. Over the coming months Burcott, Cottesloe, Crafton and the remainder of Wing will be added, along with a page about the farming industry in Wing in general. This is one of those big projects that can never really be concluded, so I have decided to upload the information as it is collated. If you are connected to any of these farming families and have further information to add, or have access to other maps that may help pinpoint the exact boundaries of a farm at any given point, please please get in touch.