I AM trying to research my family tree with partial names, approximate dates and it is easier said than done.

I always thought my family had lived for generations in Salford, Manchester. Not so. I find my grandfather was born in Warrington, his wife, my grandmother, born 1871 in Northwall, Dublin. They married in Salford where they raised a family in Manchester.

According to my late mother, Ada Shaw (nee Stevens), married William Edward Shaw, had a family, lived in Old Field Road, Salford 1937. They and their family moved to Blackpool in the 1940s.

My father William Edward Shaw and three brothers, Richard (Dick, married Lizzie) Manchester, Vincent, married and lived in London and Thomas, married and lived in Manchester, plus two other siblings, Harold, a still birth and John Thomas, who supposedly died at the age of three months.

I now find John Thomas lived and married a Marion Brieley, they had at least one child, Honara Shaw. Honara Daley was John Thomas’ mother, so he named his girl after his mother.

The daughter was born in 1919, married a Joseph Allan in 1946 and they moved to Bournemouth where I have reached a dead end to my enquiries.

It’s difficult to understand how or why my mother, who married my father in 1918 did not know his brother was alive and had a little girl in 1918. A mystery.

Could you possibly give my letter a mention in your paper?

It may jog someone’s memory and the mystery can be solved. I do hope so.

SHIRLEY McCartam (nee Shaw), Clinton Avenue, Blackpool