Uncle John
01-04-12, 15:59
As current custodian of the family archives I've just received a small leather-bound lined note-book which my g-g-grandfather gave to my g-grandmother (his youngest child). The cover is gold-decorated like a standard printed book, with her first name in a cartouche.
He has titled it "Latter Will and Family Documents dedicated to ..... by your Loving Father ...... 1877". This was about 5 years before he died in his mid-70s.
[It's worth pointing out that he was absolutely loaded! He seems to have owned most of the property in Rothesay that wasn't owned by the Marquess of Bute. The probate Inventory ran to nearly 40 pages, most of which was details of property rents.]
On each page he has ruled red lines as though it were printed and has numbered the pages by hand as though they were done with a numbering machine.
It consists of a Preface, a Latter Will and Codicils, followed by details of his and his wife's births and marriage and the births, marriages and deaths of their children. The final part is a page (or more) of Accounts for each child (and in one case an insurance policy for a spouse) showing how much he has given each of them during his life.
The preface starts:
The making of a Latter Will for the arranging of temporal affairs, was always felt by my Beloved Spouse and me, to be an imperative duty, which none were at liberty to neglect, accordingly as our circumstances changed, this was repeatedly attended to.
[He goes on to say that this was started six years after they married, when they bought their first house.]
Has anyone ever come across anything similar? It really is a work of art as well as a record of his family.
He has titled it "Latter Will and Family Documents dedicated to ..... by your Loving Father ...... 1877". This was about 5 years before he died in his mid-70s.
[It's worth pointing out that he was absolutely loaded! He seems to have owned most of the property in Rothesay that wasn't owned by the Marquess of Bute. The probate Inventory ran to nearly 40 pages, most of which was details of property rents.]
On each page he has ruled red lines as though it were printed and has numbered the pages by hand as though they were done with a numbering machine.
It consists of a Preface, a Latter Will and Codicils, followed by details of his and his wife's births and marriage and the births, marriages and deaths of their children. The final part is a page (or more) of Accounts for each child (and in one case an insurance policy for a spouse) showing how much he has given each of them during his life.
The preface starts:
The making of a Latter Will for the arranging of temporal affairs, was always felt by my Beloved Spouse and me, to be an imperative duty, which none were at liberty to neglect, accordingly as our circumstances changed, this was repeatedly attended to.
[He goes on to say that this was started six years after they married, when they bought their first house.]
Has anyone ever come across anything similar? It really is a work of art as well as a record of his family.