East Elgin Veterans of World War I

Elgin OGS is pleased to announce the release of "We Will Remember Them - The Men & Women of East Elgin Who Served in the First Great War, 1914-1918"
Published in four volumes, arranged alphabetically by surname, these books detail the lives of World War I veterans from Aylmer and the Townships of Malahide, South Dorchester and Bayham. See the Elgin OGS website - www.elginogs.ca for purchase details

"new" Elgin OGS site

The Elgin County Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society has moved its domain name (www.elginogs.ca) to a Google site. On our "new" site you will find all the information from our previous site plus lots more! The greatest benefit to this move is the search engine provided by Google, which now searches all our content.
Jim McCallum, Chairman, Elgin OGS

photos of East Elgin World War I veterans needed

As a continuation of the project resulting in the book "Age Shall Not Weary Them", giving information on the men who gave their lives during the First Great War from East Elgin, Elgin OGS is publishing at least four more volumes on the men and women who served in that conflict from the Townships of Bayham, South Dorchester, Malahide and the Town of Aylmer. Much of the biographical material has already been collected, but photographs are needed. A list of the people featured in these publications will be posted to the Elgin OGS website: http://www.elginogs.ca/WWIphotorequest.html Anyone with photos (doesn't have to be of the person in uniform) is asked to e-mail Jim McCallum at jmccallum@rogers.com

A Tour of the Fingal #4 Bombing and Gunnery School Historical Area

FINGAL WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT AREA

The #4 Bombing and Gunnery School, 34469 Fingal Line, Fingal, ON was in operation from November 1940 to February 1945. This unit was one of 105 Canadian and British Air Schools that were a part of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan in Canada. There were 50 temporary buildings, a large drill hall and 6 steel framed hangars. Three hard surfaced runways were laid out in a triangle. Bombing targets were located at Dutton, Melbourne, Frome and Tempo. There was a Marine Section at Port Stanley and bombing and gunnery ranges along the north shore of Lake Erie. During this period over six thousand non-pilot aircrew graduated from this school. These students and their instructors came from several countries, mainly United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Free France, United States and Canada. Nineteen men lost their lives due to accidents involving airplanes and their names are listed on a commemorative plaque at the entrance to the old RCAF site. The RCAF abandoned the site in June 1961 and the Federal Government sold the site to the Province of Ontario in September 1965.

The Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and the Elgin County Stewardship Council jointly manage the Fingal Wildlife Management Area (FWMA). At present, 390 of the 720 acres at the site are devoted to agriculture, employing conservation farming methods and the remaining space is managed for wildlife habitat and human enjoyment.

In September 1992 the Kettle Creek Conservation Authority started a project to collect funds to erect the memorial plaque at the entrance and also as part of that project, to provide an interpretive walking trail and thus the War to Roses Trail was established in 1994. The 1.5 km trail follows part of the old Air Force road system and combines nature along with history and takes about 40 minutes to walk. We can all thank Ian Carmichael, Gord Longhurst and Lorne Spicer for their efforts in constructing the trail. As we remember our history and enjoy the sites and sounds of nature around us, the War to Roses brochures ask us to “Please remember the hiker’s creed: take nothing but photographs; leave nothing but footprints.”

ELGIN COUNTY BRANCH OGS, JUNE MEETING

Tour: 27 June 2009

Time: 2:00 p.m.

Speaker and Tour Guide: Lorne Spicer, Naturalist

Meet in the Parking Lot, 34469 Fingal Line, Fingal, Ontario, approximately 2 kms west of Fingal.

Submitted by Pat Temple

Find Your Roots workshop

Elgin OGS is hosting a workshop to help beginner genealogists learn how to trace their family tree. It is being held on Saturday, April 18, 2009 from 1 to 4 p.m. in the Carnegie Room (downstairs) at St. Thomas Public Library, 153 Curtis Street. There is no charge, and pre-registration is not required, but anyone wishing to sign up can e-mail us at info@elginogs.ca or phone Jean at 519-773-9405
The workshop will show you how to fill out a pedigree chart and family group sheet as well as describe the type of material to gather and where to find it. An introduction to using the Internet for genealogy will also be given.

Elgin County Funeral Home Records - Indexes now Online

The Elgin OGS has now posted indexes online for several of the Elgin County Funeral Homes.

Elgin OGS has records from various funeral homes and undertakers throughout Elgin County in their holdings.

We can provide an extraction of genealogical information from these records, which will not include the cause of death or any financial details.

The extent and type of information varies with each funeral home. The usual information expected would be date of death, date of burial, age, date of birth, place of birth and death, place of burial and sometimes parents’ names and names of survivors.

The funeral homes / undertakers records from which we can provide lookups are:

Atkinson, Hughson & Kebbel, Aylmer -

Evenden Funeral Home, St. Thomas (c1873-1880 -

George A. Allen, Aylmer (1920-1950) -

Moedinger Funeral Home, Sparta (c1899-1911) -

P. R. Williams Funeral Home (1893 - 1910) -

P. R. Williams Funeral Home (1911 - 1920) -

P. R. Williams Funeral Home (1921 - 1927) -

P. R. Williams Funeral Home (1928 - 1935) -

Towers Funeral Home, St. Thomas (1909-1940) -

For information on how to order extracts of data from these sources please see the lookup policy at : http://www.elginogs.ca/funeralhome/index.htm

Civil War Veterans of Elgin County

It may surprise some researchers how many Ontario residents went south to fight in the American Civil War. Bob Moore and Bruce Johnson have identified over 50 Civil War Veterans who were at one time residents of Elgin County. Check out their research online at: http://www.elginogs.ca/onlinepubs/civilwarvets.htm

One Veteran, William Whitesell, born at Malahide Township, Elgin County enlisted as a private on the 26th of September 1861 at St. Charles, Illinois in the 52nd Regiment, Illinois Volunteers Company “G” to serve 3 years. He was mustered in at Geneva, Kane County Illinois in October 1861 by Capt. F H Bowman of 52nd Illinois Regiment Company”G”,. He began service 19 November 1861 at Geneva, Illinois. Whitesell was described as a native of Elgin County, Canada West, age 26 years old, 5 feet, 8 ½ inches tall, darkish complexion, brown eyes, black hair and by occupation a farmer,

He died of typhoid fever at Camp Montgomery near Corinth, Mississippi. On the muster Roll of Company “G” for the months of July and August 1862, it is reported "Died in Hospital at Camp Montgomery, near Corinth, Miss. July 7, 1862." He was buried at the Corinth Mississippi National cemetery