Authors Electric

Edinburgh Castle For some reason lost in the mists of time, or possibly dating from the Scotland Act of 1998, the Scottish census is separate from the one carried out in the rest of the UK, and it is only just in progress as I write - I think the theoretical date was the 20th of March 2022, but there is some leeway about completing the form. I've noticed people complaining about it on Twitter and vowing not to fill it in at all, so it will be interesting to see if they complain more if someone from the census team comes round to their house to try and persuade them to take part, and even more if they are fined for not doing it. As someone whose family history research has benefitted a lot from looking at historic census records, I am fairly happy in principle to fill it in. I wonder how different people's occupations will be in a hundred years' time when researchers might be able to look at the census records of today. Ours are quite a bit different from the occupations men...

I want to share an experience of no apparent import which has, nonetheless, proved to have a lot of personal significance. Many years ago, in a junk/antiques shop in Edinburgh, I bought a bundle of twelve old notebooks. They were some of the personal diaries of a lady called Joanna Hutchison, kept meticulously by her over the years from 1889 to 1921. I was fascinated to get to know whatever they revealed about the writer, so I learned to decipher her tiny writing and read through each one. It took several weeks and the personality they revealed left me with an even greater curiosity about her. Since then, they have sat undisturbed on the top shelf of one of my bookcases. Then, some weeks ago, a chance reference during a regular weekly online meeting with my five siblings reminded me of the diaries and, knowing the impressive research skills of my youngest sister, Lesley Taylor, I asked whether she could shed any further light on the mystery of Ms Hutchison, of whom I had only the f...

Today is the official date of the 10-yearly census in the UK. If you haven't filled in your details ahead of time (and I'm assuming nobody risked doing it early in the middle of a pandemic?), you should do so today, or as soon as possible afterwards. According to the letter I received through the post informing me of my legal responsibilities, I'll need to complete this year's census or risk a £1,000 fine - which is quite a lot smaller than the £10,000 fine for breaking lockdown, I note. I also note that this time around I am expected to complete the census online, whereas ten years ago my letter included a paper form to fill in and return by post. The census being online makes it somehow less official but hopefully it'll be straightforward enough, and at least I won't need to break lockdown to complete it. My elderly father, however (who does not have access to the internet during lockdown because libraries are closed) first needs to phone someone to request a ...