Roots of Annie Bess PALMER living in Lydbrook c1891 (General)

by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Wednesday, February 22, 2017, 17:10 (2840 days ago) @ BigEd

Hi Ed, you're very welcome for the help, hopefully I've also shown you some pointers as to how to trace the family using websites which I believe are freely available to you as well as here in the UK, certainly the FamilySearch one is.

Glad you've found Waters Cross. I can fully appreciate you're not familiar with the area, so don't worry about asking "silly questions", I'm an expert at doing that !. Personally I think this hobby is most rewarding when researching something yourself, but of course sometimes we all need to ask help from others. In fact I'm not particularly familiar with the Lydbrook side of the Forest, yes I visited my dad's mum's house in Joys Green nr Ruardean several times as a child in the 70s, but I moved away from the FoD in the 80s. It's only these last 5 years or so I've got to know the Lydbrook side of the Forest and thats mainly thro' this website and studying several maps etc; I just wish I was able to spend more time actually visiting it in person. It is a tricky area to get your head around wrt the census's, being on the Wye (the traditional border), so it was sometimes considered Glostershire, sometimes Herefordshire and sometimes even Monmouthshire hence Wales !
Regarding old placenames, as you'll know some names change with time, and sadly smaller places can disappear completely. Only last year a new Scottish site has come online which is great for old Ordnance Survey maps, here's the most detailed one (6" series) one for your area c1891 census; you can zoom into it with your mouse wheel, Waters Cross is shown in the upper L/H corner, overlooking the Wye at the bottom of it's bend, above the "k" in "Lydbrook".
http://maps.nls.uk/view/101453358
In case you're wondering, the nearby LB stands for letter Box.
http://maps.nls.uk/os/abbrev/l.html

In earlier years they had "their own" pub, the Kings Head, altho I don't think it was there long as I cannot find any references whatsoever to it in any of my books etc, see 1879 map
http://maps.nls.uk/view/101453361

I know I'm biased as I've always been fascinated by maps, but I strongly recommend you spending some time getting to know your way around the Scottish map site, as well as the various maps within this FoD FH website, see the dropdown menu below "The Forest of Dean" on the top blue banner - this site has a huge amount of info waiting to be discovered.
http://www.forest-of-dean.net/joomla/index.php/the-forest-of-dean/maps-of-the-forest

Happy hunting !, Jeff