About
Welcome! I’m an experienced and professional genealogist and house historian, qualified with an MA in English Local History, with a particular interest in families and their homes. I’ve been researching family histories for over twenty years and house histories for over five. I love the buzz involved in tracking generations of families through time, and discovering more about the properties they called home. In 2024, I gained a Distinction for the Pharos Teaching & Society of Genealogists Intermediate Certificate in Family History Skills and Strategies.
I’m a Lancashire lass from Haslingden, Rossendale, although I’ve lived all over the UK, including Scotland where I picked up my very non-Lancastrian accent. My earliest memories as a child were of living next to the railway line in nearby Accrington, listening to the trains rumble past. One day even the Flying Scotsman made an appearance!
My maternal family worked on the land and in the textile mills of Haslingden for generations, and some of my family still live there. One of my earliest known ancestors, Robert Warburton (who died in 1694), farmed at Sunyard Law, close to Haslingden Moor. My MA dissertation was an in-depth genealogical investigation into another branch of my family, the Woods, who also farmed in the area near the moor. I’m now researching this area in more detail for a One Place Study.
Most of my paternal family are from Rochdale, textile workers down to my grandmother’s generation. However, go back far enough and you’ll find them in Rossendale, too. This time at the other end of the valley, in Newchurch. I also have extensive Cornish heritage through my grandmother. Her grandparents and their extended families made the journey to Rochdale in the early 1870s following the collapse of the tin and copper industries.
Whilst I live in Cumbria now, I’m ideally placed in the south of the county to visit archives and other centres in Lancashire. I’m a regular visitor to Cumbria Archives and Lancashire Archives, and look forward to assisting you in your search to find out more about your family or your home.
If you would like to explore an interesting and engaging read, why not try the Bolton-based book I facilitated for the Woodland Trust that was made possible with Heritage Fund assistance. In addition to working with the volunteer authors, as editor I oversaw the book’s construction, layout, design, and readiness for publication.
It won the Alan Ball Award 2022 for Best Community Local History Publication, with judges describing it as “an outstanding publication”. With chapters about the area from the end of the Ice Age to the early twentieth century, it will take you on an unforgettable journey through time!
It is available from Amazon, or directly from the Woodland Trust at Smithills Hall, and Horwich Heritage Centre.
I’m a Member of the Society of Genealogists, Cumbria Past, Lancashire Ancestors, Oral History Society, British Association of Local History (BALH), British Agricultural History Society (BAHS), Kendal Oral History Group, and am a Friend of the Regional Heritage Centre at Lancaster University.
