Looking for information on ancestors

[hotczech]

My husband and I will traveling to Australia early in 2009 and we are trying to decide whether we should plan a visit to Charters Towers. The Gray family immigrated from North England in the late 1800s to this area. Grandfather Christopher Gray was born in Charters Towers. His family had been coal miners in N. England and we think that his father John Gray probably worked in the gold mines.
We would very much like to find any remaining family members in the Charters Towers area. We have family in Brisbane that we will be visiting but if there is family in this area, we would plan a visit here as well.
We believe that Christopher had a sister Florence and a brother Henry who may have lived to adulthood.
Christopher's daughter, Veronica, married an US sailor and has lived in Texas since 1948. My husband, Gray, is her only son. Gray has applied for his Australian citizenship and we are anxious to complete our family search by locating members of the Gray family.
If you are interested in helping please let us know.

[Kelly]

Hello hotczech, we have trying to get in touch with someone from the family history assoc. of Charters Towers for you, and are waiting for a reply from them. Someone from this group could help with your question. Please give it a little time for a reply from them here, but am sure they could better help guide you, to an answer to your question.

:)

K.

[hotczech]

Thank you Kelly. We have plenty of time to do some research. One of the genealogists from Sidney provided me with addresses for a couple of Grays still living in the area and I will post a letter to them. Also a John Gray was killed in November 1893 in a mining accident - the same year that Christopher was born. If this is our John Gray, he is probably buried in CT. His wife, Mary Ellen Pheby Gray, may have remarried at that time too. Christopher married Delia Mary Shannon in Grafton NSW and we so not know why he would have been in that area.
I understand that there are strict privacy laws in your states and we will need to abide by them.
I will look forward to hearing from anyone interested in this research.

[Kelly]

Hello hotczech,
We have been in contact with the family history assoc of Charters Towers for you, a few days ago. And they said they may be abale to look into it. Please give it a little time to see if they can help.

K.

[Kelly]

Hello hotczech, sorry for the delay.
We have been asked to supply you with this information, in the hope, it can help in your search.

Recent/currently living relatives:
1) white pages
2) The local paper "The Northern Miner" often prints family history requests and this would have the widest coverage to get your message out to the populace. Northern Miner E-mail Address(es): miner(at)nqn.newsltd.com.au or Gill Street Charters Towers Qld 4820

Deceased/historical relatives
1) Charters Towers and Dalrymple Family History Association PO BOX 783 Charters Towers has a wide variety of resources including Qld Births to 1919, marriages to 1945 and deaths to 1964, some Charters Towers school rolls, early electoral rolls, cemetery records, mining acccident reports and microfilm copies of newspapers 1872 - 1995 (not indexed). They have an upfront fee of $20.00 for research
2) The Charters Towers and Dalrymple Archives Group PO BOX 1224 Charters Towers Qld 4820 have a collection of historical items - photographs, books, maps, housing information, mining reports, maps which can include family history information. They will search their collection and then require payment for copies and a small donation to cover their time.

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This is the best we can do for now, we are sorry. To date, we have talked to many different people about joining the forum over the last few weeks, and maybe share some advice on such matters or help promote the history of Charters Towers. But have had little interest from anyone to do so.

But something like this can take time, so we will continue to try to get people involved with the forum to see if others could share knowledge and knowhow on the history of Charters Towers.

Hope this has been of some help.
K.

[hotczech]

Dear Kelly, that is some very good information. I will certainly make those contacts and see what information I can gather. If we decide to make a trip to CT, I will let you know.
I will continue to monitor your forum.
Thank you for all of your help.