How is it that these letters are still here today and who were these people that left England for a new life? To answer these questions it is necessary to give a little bit of family history. This will also help in identifying the people referred to in these letters.

My great-grandfather was Luke Liggins and he was the publican of "The White Hart" in Bosworth Street, Measham. His wife, Mary Ann, took over the licence of the pub after his death in 1876. They had eight children :- John William, Annie Elizabeth, Joseph, Thomas, William, Luke, Catherine and John. Of these John William and Thomas died in infancy.

Luke and Mary Anne’s son Joseph with his wife Sarah and children were the first family to emigrate to New Zealand in 1884 and so the first group of letters are from them. Apart from the first letters that Joseph sent home, the rest were sent to his brother William. The reasons for this was that William was looking after Joseph’s affairs in his absence and they were obviously very close and William was the head of the family in Joseph’s absence. Also, apparently their mother could not read or write and therefore William would be the best person to read and explain Joseph’s letters to her.

William lived in Loudon Terrace, Ashby with his wife Ellen, son Osborne and daughter Maggie and shortly after Joseph had emigrated he went to work for Davenports the wine merchant in Ashby. You will hear more of Maggie later.

Joseph’s sister Catherine married John Stanfield and they were my grandma and grandpa. John Stanfield had been lampman at Rugeley colliery and his father had been killed in a mining accident there in 1879. At some stage he left Rugeley and came and stayed at "The White Hart" where he met Catherine and started travelling from village to village selling ribbons and similar items "on a tray" (as I remember my mother telling me). Meanwhile Catherine had served two years as an indentured apprentice "from the fifteenth day of April, eighteen hundred and seventy two, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. ---- in the Art of Drapery and Millinery" with John Wade who was the previous owner of the draper’s shop in the High Street now owned by Mr. Taylor. She then started a small milliner’s shop just round the corner in Bosworth Street, now owned by Miss. Barbara Atherley. A milliner’s work in those days was to start with basic hat shapes and to decorate them to the customer’s requirements. I am sure that John and Catherine’s relationship would have started with him selling her his wares to decorate her hats. Later the three cottages opposite "The White Hart" were bought and turned into Stanfield’s General Drapery Stores consisting of the Women’s, Men’s and Boot Shops. Catherine (Katie) and John had five children - William,

George, Ernest, Edith Catherine (my mother) and Osborne (who died aged 8 months). My mother married Harry Wheatcroft and they had two sons - John and Stan. At last and least you can see where I fit into the scheme of things.

Joseph’s brother John married Emma and they went to live in Derby. They had five daughters - Molly (christened Mary Ann after her grandmother, but because she did not like these names or Polly, the familiar alternative, she was always called Molly), Alice, Dorothy, Ethel and Winifred. Ethel died at the age of seven with diphtheria.

Joseph’s brother Luke married Charlotte and they had a shop in the High Street, next door but one to the present newsagents shop owned by Mr. Christian. Their shop was subsequently owned by Mr. and Mrs. Griffin.

This now leaves Joseph’s remaining sister Annie Elizabeth. She married George Smith, a Measham builder, who built and lived in the house called "Ashlea" in Pegg’s Close Lane. He built a number of houses in Measham and during my researches a distant memory came back to me; he had built a pair of semi-detached houses in Leicester Road called "Tokomaru" named after the town where the Liggins’ family had settled in New Zealand. However, when I went to see them, they were not there and a new pair of semis was in their place. This was very disappointing but mining subsidence had left another mark on Measham. I still have a six foot wooden builder’s level with the name G. Smith burnt on it in three places which has survived the ravages of time even if those houses have succumbed to the NCB.

Annie and George had a son Joseph and a daughter Mary Ann who was called Polly!

I shall refer to this Joseph as Joe Smith to avoid confusion with our first letter writer Joseph Liggins. Now Joe Smith married Edie and I never queried who she was until much later in the story of these letters. I did not start these researches until after my mother and all her generation had "joined the majority" as Joseph says in one of his letters. It is a surprising fact that one has to ask the correct question to discover all the information that one wants to find out and this Edie proves the point in question. The answer to the question "Who was Edie?" got the reply "She was Joe Smith’s wife", but the answer to the question "Who was Edie before she married Joe Smith?" produced the answer "She was Joe Smith’s cousin!". While my mother was alive she was the best known to me because they had always written to each other over the years, Edie being in New Zealand. She was in fact Joseph Liggins daughter Mary Edith who somehow and at sometime must have returned to England and stayed with one of her relation’s families in Measham.

This was the third family to emigrate to New Zealand. They had three children in England and a fourth later in New Zealand.

I am afraid that now there is a sad part to the story. Annie and George’s daughter Polly had married Jim Walker and they had the Post Office at Draycott. They were in the process of packing to follow Joe and Edie out when Polly died suddenly. Nevertheless, in spite of his bereavement, Jim emigrated taking with him his two young sons, Jamie and Roy.

I am at the moment nearing the end of transcribing Joseph’s letters and I felt that now was a good time to at least start this introduction. It is September 1992 and a surprising calendar of events has happened since I started this "labour of love". I have remade contact with the Liggins family in New Zealand. They are Graeme and Linda Liggins, who still farm the original section cut out by Graeme’s great grandfather all those years ago in Tokomaru. Obviously, they are as interested in these old letters as I am and they are hoping to come and see England and Measham in the none too distant future. My son John’s plans are nearly complete to leave here in the middle of November and to go and see as much as possible of New Zealand in the following six months. This work has become not only a story from the past but a story of the present and the future; who knows as to where it will lead?