Are you related?

My name is Roy William Shakespeare. I was born in Birmingham a long time ago. All my life I have been asked 'Are you related?'. Of course enquirers are referring to the great man himself, the Bard of Avon and England's greatest ever playwright and poet. As you can imagine my responses have changed over the years. When I was a young boy I would answer the question with 'of course!', then as I got older and learned that there are no direct descendants of William Shakespeare, I would use my new found knowledge and explain the facts, concluding 'probably not'. In the 1970s I started on my family history journey and was told by one expert after another that there was every possibility that I was 'related to' but not'descended from' the Bard. Apparently the world and their wives all know that the children of WS did not live until adulthood and therefore there can be no descendants. My reply to the age old question thus became 'maybe'. Understanding the difference between being 'descended from' and 'related to' was an important lesson to learn. After around 25 years of sporadic research and coming out of a particularly barren period of research, I received a letter from one of my many correspondents - a lady living in Scotland - who sent me a copy of an entry from Burke's Baronetage & Peerage. This entry was for a gentleman called Sir William Geoffrey Shakespeare, Baronet, who was a GP practising in Aylesbury. Sir William had inherited the baronetcy from his father, Sir Geoffrey Hithersay Shakespeare who was a Liberal MP in the cabinet of Lloyd George. As well as biographical details of Sir William this entry detailed his entire family tree back to a Humphrey Shakespeare of Feckenham, Worcs. living in the 17th century. Surprise, surprise. This Humphrey Shakespeare was also my own oldest known ancestor discovered from my research. The net result was that my family could now be linked to this other Shakespeare family that I knew nothing about. The exciting thing for me was knowing that the family tree of Sir William had been compiled by the foremost experts in the field, no less than the College of Arms, and therefore the accuracy of the information was beyond reasonable doubt. The CofA concluded in correspondence to Sir Geoffrey Hithersay,a copy of which I have seen, that this Shakespeare family appeared to be closer than any other family, researched by the College, to the 'family of the poet', that they were therefore prepared to grant him a personal coat of arms, based on that granted to John Shakespeare, William's father. The Herald compiling this family tree concluded that the family most probably were related to the poet via his grandfather Richard Shakespeare of Snitterfield, Warwickshire. Well, that's good enough for me. Anybody asking me the question these days very quickly wishes they hadn't bothered. Such enquirers are treated to a potted version of my family tree research and the inevitable conclusion which I now summarise as 'probably, but we just can't prove the last couple of links'. Only a DNA sample taken from William Shakespeare's bones, residing under a slab in Stratford-on-Avon's parish church, would prove common ancestry for interested parties such as myself, but the Stratford authorites won't hear of such a thing. Maybe it's the curse written on the gravestone. 'Good Frend For Iesvs Sake Forbeare, To Digg The Dvst Encloased Heare, Blese Be Ye Man Yt Spares Thes Stones, And Cvrst Be He Yt Moves My Bones'. No matter, I am content to know that my claim to be linked to the poet's family is as strong as that of anyone else bearing the name today. Roy William Shakespeare. 13x Great Grand Nephew of William Shakespeare, Gentleman, Swan of Avon, Poet & Playwright.

Ward End Adult School

Information required about Ward End Adult School, St.Margaret's Road, Ward End which was open in the early 1930's and closed by the early 1950's. This photo is from the mid 1930's and was taken outside 'The Barn', where the school was held.

unknown uniform

Can anybody identify this uniform please. There is a date on the back of this photo - 5th August 1916.