Welcome to our site
Way back in what seems like the Dark Ages, we started to get interested in our family’s past lives. My mother was bed bound and although she couldn’t do any research herself, she was a fountain of half-truths that started us on our way to finding out about the Pridmores and O’Haras.
40 years ago (1982), Jill began her journey to track down the Bagshaws, Hopkinsons and Parrys after a chance comment by Sarah Helena Hopkinson on meeting her great grandson for the first time.
Little did either of us know where our research would lead us and what wonderful stories would be revealed. Our families have travelled the globe, crossed social divides, ranged from starving to affluent and held a variety of employment from pier diver to inventor, farmer to world famous neurologist and many more besides on all rungs of the ladder.
We have found convicts and heroes, the mundane to the extraordinary. Most families will be peppered with similar finds and as each one appears, the desire to find out more grows and grows.
We have tried to ensure that the information we present is as accurate as we can make it but we are sure there will be a few errors here and there. If you find any then please get in touch and we will gladly correct anything that you find.
Our Ancestors
A Few Characters to Note
As you might imagine with such varied locations to our origins, our ancestors form a wide horizon of characters, professions and claims to fame. A few examples of which can be seen opposite.
We have yet to find any blue blood in any of our lines although there have been side-line skirmishes with royalty where introductions have been made and hands shaken as well as poetry written to show admiration.
Our beginnings are firmly set in Southern Ireland, North Wales, the Peak District of Derbyshire and the lowlands of Scotland from which the family tentacles spread to other parts of the planet, probably in much the same way that many other family histories have developed to some degree or another.
There are some types of employment that dominate, chiefly in the form of coal mining, agricultural leatherwork, farming and some ventures to sea with the merchant navy.
Overall our extremely addictive hobby continues to border on the obsessive !
Killed at just 22 years old somewhere over Germany, Edward was a decorated rear gunner in a Lancaster bomber flying from RAF Syerston.
Internationally acclaimed psychiatrist, published author and academic Professor of Psychiatry, Saxby is descended from the first Pridmores to move to Australia.
Consummate showman who toured the seaside resorts performing pier dives. He also worked at galas diving from high towers.
Cissie was a prime example of how a determined person could elevate a lowly lifestyle as from very humble beginnings she became nanny and nurse to the Asheton family.
Robert Pridmore served in the Far East during the Second World War and was held as a POW by the Japanese in horrendous condition. Read his diary.
Rose Ellis was the first professional female deep sea diver in England. Married to Albert Powsey, her whole family were connected to the sea in a variety of ways, from pier diving to synchronised swimming.
Families in More Detail
To take a look at some of our individual families in more detail just click on the photos below and we will take you to a more detailed story of that family as we know it including the locations associated with the family.
Meet the Heads of the Family
The O'Haras
From Ballina, County Sligo (Mayo) as far as Pennsylvania in the USA and south across the Sottish border to South Yorkshire.
The Rynns
Originally from Ireland, Richard Rinn had emigrated to Scotland after 1828. The spelling of their name mutated in their new land.
The Pridmores
With a large concentration in Bourne in Lincolnshire, their saddlery skills were easily transferred to Sheffield in the mid-19th century
The Temprells
The Temprells were a Nottinghamshire family that settled onthe South Yorkshire border. A mining family.
The Bagshaws
Strething back many generations to the Derbyshire / Nottinghamshire border, the Bagshaws appear to have had little wanderlust.
The Parrys
Inhabiting Denbighshire and the North Welsh coast, they spread their wings into Merseyside but not too much further.
The Hopkinsons
Our Hopkinsons show a presence in Derbyshire going back to the mid-18th century with continuity there for at least 3 centuries.
The Allsops
Another family with a Derbyshire pedigree back to the early 1700's. Ashbourne, Hognaston and Brassington being favoured.
Copyright
Copyright Chris and Jill O’Hara 2022