A Family History Of...

Gallipoli may dominate the history books. But the records tell the rest of the story. 

Gallipoli is one of those moments in history that can seem enormous when we look back at it now. But when we delve into the naval records of the men who actually experienced it, something surprising happens – it barely interrupts the page at all. 

In this bonus episode, host and expert genealogist Jen Baldwin steps back from...

Gallipoli is over. But its effects ripple on.

After the chaos of the Dardanelles, HMS Prince George limps into Malta, a harbour strained by wounded men, damaged ships, and the unrelenting work of repair. For Nelson Langsford, the danger gives way to a different kind of pressure, as engineers and dockyard crews work around the clock to keep the fleet afloat.

Joined by naval historian Charlotte Ward‑Kelly, host and genealogis...

The battle for Gallipoli begins. 

As war comes knocking, Nelson Langsford moves from routine service into active conflict aboard HMS Prince George. Tasked with carrying troops and patrolling hostile waters, the ship turns toward the Dardanelles, a narrow strait Britain hopes to force open and end the war quickly. But it won’t be that simple. 

Joined by naval historian Charlotte Ward‑Kelly, host and genealogist Jen...

A childhood shaped by industry. A Navy on the brink of change. 

Nelson Langsford grows up at National Trust’s Cotehele Mill, as part of a family rooted for generations in skilled work. Beyond the mill, Britain is entering a new industrial age, and the Royal Navy is transforming with it. 

Joined by naval historian Charlotte Ward‑Kelly, host and genealogist Jen Baldwin explores how Nelson’s early life prep...

Gallipoli thunders on the waves. The engine room endures below deck. 

Gallipoli was one of the First World War’s most devastating campaigns; it’s a story usually told through strategy, maps, and failure. But for thousands of families, Gallipoli was experienced through service in the Royal Navy, far below deck and far from the history books. 

In this series of A Family History Of..., follow the story of N...

The General Strike wasn’t just fought on the picket line. It was also fought in the headlines. 

In this bonus episode, host and expert genealogist Jen Baldwin explores how newspapers shaped public understanding of the 1926 General Strike as it unfolded. Drawing on contemporary press coverage and the words of union leader Will Lawther, she examines how competing narratives influenced opinion, legitimacy, and memory, an...

In the wake of defeat, one man does what he’s always done: he keeps going. 

In the long aftermath of the 1926 General Strike, the banners are folded away, but the hardship isn’t over. As unemployment bites and the Means Test humiliates families across the country, Will Lawther steps once more into the halls, meetings, and street corners where miners gather to make sense of a world that suddenly feels smaller. Jo...

The General Strike begins. Britain comes to a standstill. 

It’s 1926, and the nation is unrecognisable. Trains idle, newspapers fall silent. In the middle of it, Will Lawther, councillor and trusted voice of the miners, finds himself pulled into confrontations charged with fear. Joined once more by historian Jonathan Kindleysides (Beamish Museum), host and genealogist Jen Baldwin follows the evidence that traces Will...

A boy raised in the shadow of the mines. A world forged in defiance.

Will Lawther grows up in Northumberland, in a vast mining household where every day begins and ends with the rhythm of the pit. But his life will take an unusual turn. Joined by historian Jonathan Kindleysides (Beamish Museum), host and genealogist Jen Baldwin walks us through terraced streets, dark mines, and the rise of early labour politics. They explore how...

A boy raised in the shadow of the mines. A world forged in defiance. 

Will Lawther grows up in Northumberland, in a vast mining household where every day begins and ends with the rhythm of the pit. But his life will take an unusual turn. Joined by historian Jonathan Kindleysides (Beamish Museum), host and genealogist Jen Baldwin walks us through terraced streets, dark mines, and the rise of early labour politics. They explo...

One working-class mining family, and nine days that reshaped a nation’s history. 

Humble miner Will Lawther rose from the pit to face the frontlines of the 1926 General Strike, swapping coal dust for politics. Across four episodes, host and genealogist Jen Baldwin is joined by historian Jonathan Kindleysides (Beamish Museum) to trace how one family and one determined young man met an extraordinary moment in British hi...

When records are fractured, biased, or simply gone, how do you tell a true family story? 

In this final part of A Family History of the Irish Famine, host and genealogist Jen Baldwin steps into the silences surrounding Archibald MacKenzie’s life. Through the archives, the missing lines, and the traces that remain, she asks what survival really meant, and what it cost the countless families who left no trail behind. 

One Irish family fights to rebuild after the Famine.

By the mid‑1850s, Archibald MacKenzie has crossed the sea to Merthyr Tydfil in Wales, trading the barren fields of Cork for the roar of furnaces. The MacKenzie family rebuilds in a world thick with smoke and prejudice. Host and genealogist Jen Baldwin, and her guest, Irish genealogy expert Fiona Fitzsimons, trace his footsteps through the evidence. What does survival look like...

Hunger spreads. Tempers ignite One man swept into a riot. 

It’s September 1845 in Coolderrihy, and hunger is beginning to bite. As fear and anger are on the rise, Archibald MacKenzie finds himself in the thick of a desperate riot. Join host and genealogist Jen Baldwin, and her guest, Irish genealogy expert Fiona Fitzsimons, as they unpick the records behind this moment. What drives an ordinary man to r...

A boy at the edge of famine-era Ireland. A world about to break. 

Archibald MacKenzie is 11 years old in Coolderrihy, County Cork, when the world he knows suddenly shifts. Joined by Irish genealogy expert Fiona Fitzsimons, host and genealogist Jen Baldwin traces the records that reveal what life looked like for a boy growing up in a land already restless with tension. How did a childhood shaped by loss prepare him for the ...

One family faces famine, fear and exile — and forges a future that spanned oceans. 

The Great Famine cast a long shadow across Ireland, hollowing out towns, devastating families, and driving thousands to the brink. It’s a familiar tale, but one not often told. Follow the story of Archibald MacKenzie, a man whose life veered from riot to imprisonment, and then across the sea to smoke and furnaces. Acro...

Why do women rarely appear in WW2 records?

Many wartime women left no diaries or letters, only the sparse traces of addresses, occupations, and brief entries in civil records.

In this bonus episode, host and expert genealogist Jen Baldwin explores how those small clues — a line in the 1939 Register, a registrar‑office marriage, a maternity home address — can reveal the pressures shaping a woman’s life during war...

Lucy Worsley returns to discover the next part of her grandmother's story - during the Birmingham Blitz.

In 1942, Edna Bourne becomes a mother during the Birmingham Blitz. Amid blackouts, bombing raids and disrupted maternity care, she endures grief with little space to rest or speak of it. Through death registers, wartime diaries and Mass Observation accounts, genealogist Jen Baldwin and her guest, historian Lucy Worsley, explore t...

Lucy Worsley returns to discover her grandmother's dramatic Second World War secrets...

By 1939, Edna Bourne is a young working woman in a Britain preparing for war once again. Her days in a Birmingham boot shop unfold against air‑raid drills, rationing, and uncertainty. But behind the everyday routines lie private complexities: a whirlwind marriage, a pregnancy under the pressures of wartime morality, and a truth hidden in the marr...