Out of the blue in 1974 I found myself in the happy position of being a  beneficiary of the will of someone, whom I discovered to be my late grandmother, Sarah Billington, who died 9th January 1915.  There had been a considerable delay, because it had been held in trust for the benefit of a maiden aunt, Ethel Ann Billington, who had died three years previously on 5th November 1971!  The will identified 24 members of my family, of whom I had only heard of five of them, including myself.  This created the desire to investigate further when I retired.  However, I came across an acquaintance, who was already bitten by the 'family history bug', and so I picked up the idea and made a start.  So far I have found four 'claims to fame', two from each side of my family.

My mother had told me that her father, Richard James Bradley, had driven the first steam tram along Coventry Road in Birmingham.  Richard had followed his father and started work on the railway, and worked up to being an engine driver.  He then moved to the employ of Birmingham Corporation as a tram driver for 40 years, and his funeral procession on 16th January 1930 was lead by the Birmingham Corporation Tramway Band along Coventry Road to his last resting place in Yardley Cemetery.

I had always thought that my father was from Barnsley, but after my mother's death I found that his birth certificate indicated that he was born in the town I now lived in, Huddersfield.  Consequently I discovered that the Billington family had indeed oscillated between Huddersfield and Barnsley area. From one of my hitherto 'unknown' Billington relatives I gleaned that there was a family rumour that 'Uncle Fred' was the first Sergeant at Arms in the 'Pirates of Penzance'.  After a few fruitless leads, I finally discovered that indeed my Great Uncle Fred Billington was a member of D'Oyly Carte from 1879 to 1917, and on 30th December 1879 took the part of Sergeant of Police in 'Pirates of Penzance' at the Bijou Theatre, Paignton to secure the English Copyright a few hours before the American Copyright was secured in New York.

My aunt Beatrice and her husband Bert Bashford, were for many years associated with Birchfield Harriers in Birmingham, and were athletics officials at the 1948 London Olympics and other large sporting events both in the UK and Europe.  On 6th May 1954, Uncle Bert was at Iffey Road, Oxford, one of the timekeepers when Roger Bannister ran the mile in 3:59.4 seconds and broke the 4 minute mile record.  He was also present, a 23 days later on 29 May 1954, where my aunt Beatrice was an official timekeeper when Diane Leather ran a mile in 4:59.6 seconds and broke the women's 5 minute mile record. Thus they were the only two British officials to witness both events.

On of my 'unknown' relatives Doreen Margaret Billington is mentioned in 'Debrett's Illustrated Peerage' because she married the Hon Anthony Charles Brougham, grandson of Capt Henry Brougham, only son of the 3rd Baron Brougham.

I would never have dreamt that sea going boats were built near Barnsley, but my research reveals that one of my great grandfathers, Samuel Bennett, was a boat carpenter at Basin, Barugh near Barnsley.  The Barnsley Canal has long since become defunct, but records show one of the sloops, which he built in 1833 and named 'Three Brothers', was lost at sea that year and the skipper was George Bennett.

My early attempt at recording my Family Tree was on an Amstrad PcW9256, and as such the program I used only recorded names and dates, and in this minimal form has been uploaded and published on the internet and can be viewed at http://www.gencircles.com/users/billogs

Now that retirement has come, like many others, I don't know how I found time to go to work, but I am now about to get round to entering my other known facts, such as places of birth, marriage or death and census addresses etc to my records.  Progress is being made with this and some information published, which will be updated as progress is made.  So far I have traced my Billington line back to John Billington of Huddersfield in 1775.  This interim family history can be found through clicking the following green banner button link -

My family history research interests are; -

If you can help me to add leaves and twigs to my Family Tree, would you please e-mail me.

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