Jack gets over the line in time, for a change – –

My cousin Donald is the family historian and posted this today – So I had an ancestor who survived the sinking of the Titanic!

This post is for my Beck cousins in the main, and anyone who is interested in the sinking of the Titanic and the Battle of Jutland.

My great great grandfather was William Beck or Back, born in Musselburgh in 1843. He was one of eight, and was the second youngest with a younger brother Andrew who was born in 1845. The family appears to have changed the spelling to Beck in the 1860’s. Thus William was married in 1864 under the name of Back to Janet Sutherland but from the census of 1871 onwards he used Beck as his name.

William and Andrew appear to have been close as they both trained as House Painters in Edinburgh before converting to Ship’s Painters. They are resident together in Dumbarton in the 1871 census where I believe they worked in the Denny shipyard. They both took painting contracts in the Hampshire shipyards and one of William’s daughters married on the Isle of Wight, whilst I now know that both of Andrew’s daughters, Janet and Mary Beck, lived in Southhampton.

Janet Sutherland Beck (named in honour of her aunt) was born in Musselburgh in 1869 whilst Mary Beck was born in Dumbarton in 1871. Janet married Southampton man, Henry William Candy in Southhampton in 1887, and they had ten children before he died in 1915. She re-married Charles West in 1919 and died in Hampshire in 1929. Mary married Frederick Griffiths in 1891and had five children.

The eldest daughter of Henry Candy and Janet Sutherland Beck was Henrietta Janette Candy. She married Albert Charles Edward Self in May 1912, just a month or so after the sinking of the RMS Titanic. Albert Charles Edward Self was a stoker or ‘fireman’ on the Titanic.

Details of A C E Self are found here https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/…/edward-self.html

Who knew that each Titanic survivor has his or her own web-page!

The eldest son of Henry Candy and Janet Sutherland Beck was Andrew William Charles Candy. He joined the Royal Navy in 1911. from 1912 to 1918 he was a stoker on HMS King George V which was a super dreadnought and flag ship of the first battle squadron at the Battle of Jutland in 1916 (which was not heavily engaged in the battle it has to be said).

I’ve got photos of Janet Sutherland Beck and her second husband Charles West. I’ve also got a photo of Albert Self. I think I can see Charles and Janet, and other English relatives in a photograph of my great grandparents John and Georgina Beck, taken in Hampshire in the early 1920s. Always wondered who they were.

I believe I am named after John Beck of Hampshire although I’ve always been known as Jack.

Jack is slow again but there’s always an excuse – –

The last two weeks have been quite adventurous and enjoyable –

First of all, our good friends Beth and Brandon organized a week in the Boston area, staying at a lovely house in Manchester by the Sea. We were joined by our mutual friends Barbara and Oliver from Scotland and we had a great time visiting Salem, Boston and all the adjacent beaches. Sadly, Wendy was tied up with work meetings and couldn’t join us.

Following that Barbara and Oliver had a rather eventful train journey from Boston to Roanoke where they stayed the night in a local hotel. In the meantime, I had flown back to Asheville with Beth and Brandon and finally home. Wendy and I drove up to Roanoke the next morning to collect the train riders and bring them to our house and guest room. Three hours later Wendy set off to Montana for a conference, so not much time to catch up on our Boston experience!

The highlight of this week was a small house concert in the local bookstore here in Wytheville where Barbara and I revisited our musical past on Wednesday evening. Earlier in the day another two friends, David and Susan came up from North Carolina and then to the evening concert. In addition our Scottish friends and I drove down to the small town of Appalachia to visit with Sam and Kelley and their kids who they know from our time running our bookstore in Big Stone Gap.

Why is all this significant?

Well – all the people listed above live far apart and are of very different ages and generations. The only thing that really connects us all is myself and Barbara. But we have all shared memorable experiences here in America and in Scotland and are always in close contact via the internet. During the height of the Covid pandemic we ‘Zoomed’ most Sundays.

I asked the group earlier today how we’d describe ourselves and the consensus was – ‘a chosen family’!