Last year August, I was fortunate to travel to Brisbane for a few days. Together with my distant cousin Janis Morec-Townsend, we visited Geoff Drew's widow and daughter to pay our respects on behalf of all Captain William Townsend bloggers.
We also visited the Bald Hill cemetery, where Captain William Townsend and his wife Elisabeth Salmon Thomas are buried and the Toowoong Cemetery where a number of our relatives are buried including Victor Louis Townsend in an unmarked grave, a number members of the Raff family and Shirley Daisy Ferrers.
We visited Frank Purssell who's wife Gloria Purssell-Carmody was a very active family researcher until her untimely death on 6th March 2013. Her archive is still intact and we do hope Frank will find a suitable destination of the files to secure Gloria's hard work. I visited her grave as well as well as the places Captain William Townsend lived in Sandgate including the “Mango Cottage”, 32 Park Parade, Sandgate.
At the Sandgate Historical Society and Museum I met Fay Hebbard and checked what they have on file.
Sandgate Historical Society and Museum150 Rainbow Street, Sandgate,QLD, Australia, 4017Email sandgatemusm@bigpond.comPhone 07 3869 2283Business Hours Wednesdays and Sundays from 10 am to 3pm
With support from the late Geoff Drew's family, I have been added to this blog as editor to keep it in the air. That way we will be able to keep all of Geoff's contributions and those of others.
Next, I will be looking for a few more volunteers to join the editor's committee to secure continuity. As a minimum, I would like to have two based in Europe and two in Australia. Ideally, I am looking for a custodian for each branch of Captain William Townsend's children.
We have also been fortunate to retrieve the latest Captain William Townsend manuscript Geoff had been working on with the help from blog members.
Similarly to the blog, I intend to seek co-editors, to validate the entries and complement the stories with anecdotes and pictures.
Once the editor's are happy with the quality and completeness, I intend to provide hard-bound copies to family members at cost.
Publication as e-book will have hurdles to overcome about copyright of the photo's and censorship of people living.
Hope you will continue to support this blog and provide new and interesting anecdotes related to this illustrious family that have spread the globe.
Best wishes,
Thomas.
