A Genealogical Mystery

Quite a few years ago, I started an exploration of my family’s genealogy. This began as a Christmas holiday project, then became a bit of an obsession until the ‘easy wins’ were all done. While clearing my late father’s house prior to sale, my brother uncovered a bunch of photos that we think were included in my paternal grandmother’s belongings when she died in 2000.

In these photos were three that included men in military uniform. One of these was clearly identifiable by the handwritten inscription on the reverse of the photo. The others are a little more complicated!

The first of these photos is of Harry Scott Case, who was killed in action in October 1917 while serving in Palestine. We’d not heard of Harry before, and the photo prompted a bit of investigation. As it turned out, his middle name of Scott was significant as this is may grandmother’s maiden name. 

Quite quickly I found out that Harry fitted into my exisiting genealogy database - he seems to be a cousin of my paternal great grandfather. 

The other two photos are a bit more mysterious, even given the inscriptions on the reverse of the photographs. Here are the two photos. They are both printed as postcards and were both printed by the same company, H. Hall & Co, Sidwell Street, Exeter. Internet searches bring up a number of similar photographs as well as peacetime photos printed by Hall & Co.  Amusingly, I failed to notice at first that the two photos were taken using the same backdrop! As to whether these photos were taken by Hall & Co, I can't say.

The inscription of the first of these photographs is

"With love from Flossie
Gilbert is 4 years & 5 months
Hetty 2 years 3 months
Taken August 17th 1916"

 And the inscription on the rear of the second photograph reads:

"With fondest
love from Dollie
Taken 11^th Sep^t 1916"

In neither of these two photographs is the identity of the man mentioned, and the two women, Flossie and Dollie, are identified only by familiar versions of their first names. In one of the pictures, the two children are named.

I'm assuming that if these photos are of part of my family tree, I should be able to identify good candidates. But the only names I have a diminutives of first names for the two women, and the names of two of the children. So far identifying the families has been beyond me. I dare say that in the fullness of time the family records I accumulate will extend to the point I know who these people are.

As an aside, there's something about old photos such as these that seem to hint at the personalities, and make one wonder about what happened to them - especially those off to fight in the war.