get in touch [email protected]	Updated 15th August 2003 Solve Family Mysteries   Mary Ann "Polly" MANUEL (with daughter RACHEL) came to visit my grandmother Elizabeth HODGES, when my mother Kathleen Ruth BIRCH was about six years old (around 1933). This is the photo which my mother believes are the MANUEL family who visited.
Help solve a mystery Hammond or Gray family photo ? Do you know these people ?	Do you know who these people are ? Thought to be either Gray's or Hammond's This face looks like a Gray, but do you know who she is?

HAMMOND Problem The problem I have with my HAMMOND line is that as far as we know, James Richard George HAMMOND (born abt. 1872, died from tuberculosis, 24th November 1929, Preston Hall Aylesford) was a gypsy / tinker / traveller, who settled down around Bluetown around 1914-18's, along with a number of other travelling families, RIPLEY, STAVELY, HOLLOWAY, YACOB/JACOB, LEVI, though he seems to have been the only HAMMOND. Whether he and the caravan, were returning to an area, where they once lived, or simply came to a convenient stop, is uncertain. He may have ceased to be a traveller in order to join in first world war effort and volunteer. Family lore in respect of this most difficult man is very sketchy and mostly of an anecdotal and unsatisfactory nature. He fought in World War I, serving in the Queens East Surrey Regiment as Private 205644, being gassed and discharged and never seems to have taken to the road thereafter. He ran a rag and bone service and dealt in scrap around Bluetown, running three horses, named Whizz-bang, Freddie and Mary the mare. During the carnival season each of the boys in turn of age, became a Pearly Prince mounted on Whizz-bang and were toured in the Sheerness, Faversham, Herne Bay, Cantebury and Maidstone parades, in a pearly suit of over 3,000 buttons, maintained by my grandmother Hilda Florence HAMMOND (nee GRAY). Additionally Freddie, the other horse, drew a trap on which other family members would perch, with the 100 weight sack of confetti, selling twisted cones of confetti, to the spectating public for the price of 1D. Attached to the rear of the trap were 4 or 5 brooms so that the boys could follow after the parade sweeping up the confetti for resale. I wonder what condition the confetti got into a the end of the season? James R. G. HAMMOND was a thoroughly disreputable individual, caught on one occasion selling the civic flowers from the park gardens in bunches, outside Sheerness train station and on another occasion caught selling firewood, made from Admiralty furniture, from the dockyard at Sheerness, somehow, he seems to have avoided prosecution. A couple of his sayings have passed down through the family, "Never buy what you can steal, never steal, what you can borrow, never borrow, what you can cadge, never cadge, what you can scrounge." Another saying attributed to James "Never see, your children go hungry, always look the other way." He developed tuberculosis in the 1920's and died in the sanatorium at Preston Hall, Aylesford in 1929. He married Hilda Florence GRAY (born abt 1885 November. died 2nd June 1955, 43 Invicta Road, Sheerness, isle of Sheppey (C1S685979)) from Cliff at Hoo, near Rochester. Whether these stories are strictly true or partly fabrication is difficult to tell, though he does not seem to have had a birth certificate. Matters are made considerably more difficult as my father was aged only four when his father died and his mother does not seem to have discussed her husband thereafter. Other traveller family names mentioned by my father include : LITES, CROCKFORDS and BRIGHTMAN. When my father Albert HAMMOND grew up he returned to the tradition of entering the Sheerness carnival parade, sometimes with his brothers, but also with the Admiralty Apprentices, the Methodist Church and various youth clubs. Albert married Kathleen Ruth BIRCH on 18th May 1946,at Minster Methodist Church, Isle of Sheppey, Kent. They are now settled in Erskine, Scotland, which may be a return to roots, since one of the most ellusive stories in the family relates, to a traveller, my great, great grandfather, with red hair who originated from Scotland.

SISLEY Mystery The exact connection with my family is at present unknown, but my grandfather was named Henry Sisley BIRCH (Born 29th April 1897 the Forge Hill, Aldington, died 4th January 1967 at Eastchurch, Isle of Sheppey), and family lore suggests that it was a family name on my great grandmother Rachel BIRCH (nee HOAD)'s line (born January 31st, 1863 in Winchelsea Road, Rye, Sussex, died January 28th, 1922 in Sellindge, Kent, ENGLAND). The HOAD family came from Winchelsea Road, Rye, Sussex and although I have my line clear through the 19th century in respect of the HOAD line, I do not have Rachel's maternal line beyond her illusive mother Sarah Elizabeth HOAD (nee TOLHURST, late IFIELD).   What is certain is that there was a family connection, I know that the SISLEY family were friends of the HOAD family, attending early 19th Century marriages, but am yet to establish the actual link.   My grandfather apparently kept contact with a SISLEY lady who may have been living on the island of Sheppey, or elsewhere in Kent, around the early part of the 20th century and my mother remembers a whispered conversation wherein my grandfather pointed out the obituary notice of a SISLEY woman, to his wife, as if it were a secret. My mother was born in 1927 and married in 1947 so the conversation must have been somewhat after the first date and prior to the latter date.