A Different Kind of Dawn Start, Emma Again and Disappointment.

Over recent weeks I have seen some really beautiful dawns while driving to work.
Now though, dawn is late enough that I miss it, by sunrise I am too close to the city and the roads are too busy and by then I am facing west not east.

I have photographed dozens if not hundreds of sunsets over many years.
Yet I have realised I have never taken piccies of a dawn.
So a few days ago, one morning I had off, instead of sleeping in I got up at my usual time.

Not being an absolutely dedicated photographer, I headed to the nearest location I could think of where I could get an uninterrupted view of the eastern skyline.

This spot happens to be one I have posted about before, the Arthur's Creek Cemetery.

So there I was setting up my tripod and camera in the dark.

Of course I thought of the people buried there. My thoughts once again went to Emma who bought a plot next to her young husband. Yet as far as I can tell she was never buried at Arthur’s Creek.

As a writer I feel almost compelled to weave a similar story into one of my tales.

Someday.

So I stood in the dark and waited for the sunrise.
My first photo of the day.This piccie is very misleading, this was a very long exposure. So what seems a light eastern sky was in fact very dark.

But there was a problem.The dark bank of clouds in the above photo was advancing very quickly from the south.

I turned my Camera to face south where the sky was by now almost completely covered by cloud. The lights in the centre are some of Melbourne’s suburbs twinkling in the distance.

By the time the sun actually rose above the horizon...this was all I could see of the dawn colour.

So I packed up and drove home feeling somewhat disappointed.

As I drove I was given some consolation. The sky decided to relent just a little and I stopped briefly to catch this before the world was completely flooded by daylight.

Sarah, India and Dawn Starts

No it is not quite déjà vu.

But oddly my post tonight shares a great deal with a similarly titled post of a month ago.

Like last month, and despite the heat of the day, there is a curry simmering on the stove.
Like last time I am going to ramble about my Indian heritage.
And like last month I am going to finish by talking about some graves.

As I have said before, one of the pleasures of early starts, is early finishes. This means that I have time to cook properly before the evening meal. Assuming that is, I am in the mood.

Well tonight I have taken the time to grind the spices (the lemony smell of fresh ground coriander seed is heavenly) and make a proper curry.
I don’t use a recipe but if anyone is interested I could write one out and post it another time.

With the curry simmering I have time to write this post.

As I said last time my Russell ancestors used to live in Jabalpur, MP, India. The world really is small and blogging seems to make it a whole lot smaller.
As a result of my previous post I was contacted by a gentleman by the name of Byram.

Byram lives in Canada but like me he has family ties to Jabalpur and he has an interest in genealogy. He asked If I had heard of Valmay Young’s Indian ancestry website and if I had any relatives left in Jabalpur.

I responded to Byram that my family (the Russells) were in Jabalpur by the 1850s but that if we were related to Russells still living there it was distantly. My Father left Madhya Pradesh in the 1950s (he came to Australia).
My Aunt also left in the 1950s initially to Calcutta, then Bombay and finally Australia in 1980.
The last direct tie my family had with Jabalpur and Madhya Pradesh was when my Grandparents left there in 1967 (also for Australia).
My Grandfather was fairly unusual in that he did not leave India at the time of independence (1947). Although he thought of himself as British he had no other home but India (he was born in Jabalpur, as were his father and grandfather) and he stayed there until after he retired.

The next email from Byram was fairly brief and I quote it in full:
“Hi Allan,
Does this grave in Jabalpur belong to one of your ancestors? Regards Byram”

Byram attached these photos:I responded to Byram - “I don’t know for certain, I would guess that it is very likely to be my Great-Great-Grandfather’s grave.”

William and Anley are family names (which fit the initials). I don’t remember my G-G-Grandfather’s name, but I do I know he was killed outside Jabalpur in a hunting accident at around that time. {As a by the by I posted about my ancestor William Anley who liked playing with matches a while ago }

My Great Grand-Father William Anley Postance Russell, was made an orphan by his father’s death, he was raised by his Grandmother. Interestingly our family has had a strong tradition of including both William and Anley in their names.

My Great uncle was William Anley Rupert Russell. My Grandfather was Arthur Anley Rupert Russell and my dad is Rupert Anley William Russell.

Anley and Postance are surnames from other British families that married into mine, that habit of including relations names is a real boon when tracing family histories.

But the plot (please excuse the pun) deepened.
Spotting the name Postance.
Byram shot back this email.

“Hi Allan.
Very interesting. I wonder if the enclosed grave of Sarah Postance is an ancestor of yours. Regards Byram”
And finally Byram posted:

Hi Allan.
The W A Russell and Sarah Postance graves have the same pattern. They are the only two graves that have this pattern. I photographed the other side of SP's grave but the writing is not visible.

So it seems that, by rambling about curries, India and graves I have more than likely found my distant ancestors.

What a small world.

Emma, India, and Dawn Starts

You are going to have to excuse me but I am in a rambling mood tonight.

One of the things that is nice about the work I do is that there are early starts. And no before you all say “is he mad?” I do not enjoy getting up at 5:00am any more than the next person (except of course this has the big plus that my commute time is less than half what it would be if I was going in at more normal hours).

The nice thing is the early finish and time in the afternoon and evening, this gives me the opportunity for all sorts of pursuits.

Often they are mundane, like hanging out a load of washing or mowing the lawn.
But as often as not I am able to use the time more creatively. Last week for example I went exploring with my youngest.

Yesterday, I worked on formatting my book before the house got busy in the evening.
Tonight I am in a culinary frame of mind. I am putting the time to cooking a decent curry. Oddly (or perhaps not oddly in this day and age) although I am an Aussie I also have a large chunk of Indian Heritage . My father’s family took a rather long (over 150 years) detour via India on the way to Australia.

As a total by-the-by, if you ever walk through Russell Chowk in Jabalpur a city in Madhya Pradesh India, you are close to some of my family history. If you do a Google you might discover that the Chowk (square) is named after Bertrand Russell, but in fact it isn’t. It was named for one of my ancestors considerably before Bertrand was famous. But that is another story, one I might put into a book… someday.

In the spirit of rambling I am going to jump to an entirely different topic. On Saturday as is our wont we went for a drive. This time we struck out along a road we haven’t used before though Arthur’s Creek. Up on a hill before you reach the village is an old cemetery.
I love cemeteries, they are such a vivid store of the culture of their time. Such a prompt for imagination.

This grave for example speaks of a tragedy, a young woman burying a much loved husband. Clearly at the time Emma, no doubt in love and grief stricken at the loss of her Harry could not imagine resting anywhere else. She has bought a double plot so one day she could sleep alongside her dear one.
Yet a hundred years later there is no sign that she was laid here. No headstone for Emma here.
What happened, the writer in me wonders. As her grief passed did she come to love another? Does she now rest alongside a second husband?
Who knows, but my mind races away across the valley below, thinking of other stories that perhaps one day I could write.Too many books not enough years.

Bless you Emma, I hope the rest of your years were joy filled.