My Crawford family in Australia expanded on me one day when I found my great aunt had arrived in 1888. Until now I've not done much about it, but recently her great-grandson contacted me and we have been going full out trying to finding her life 'layout'. We know she was born in Ma, in fact we know a lot about her very early days until her first husband died fighting in the Civil War. She was in New Hampshire at this point. We have had confirmation that she remarried in 1866 to a young devil, for some reason in haste she said in a Diary. No by-product of this marriage. In 1870 I find her and her two children from the first marriage living alone in New Jersey, working for herself as teacher of Painting and Music. In 1878 her son comes to Melbourne to work for Hiram Crawford in his Eastern Arcade which his brother managed. His mother is NOT on his shipping records. In 1881 this son is still working at the arcade - fighting a fire in January. In 1888 he is found leaving San Francisco for Australia once again with his mother in tow. Both died here in Australia. I have not been able to locate the mother, my great aunt from 1870 to 1888. She does not appear on the 1880 census and I've had several people check it out for me, under her Maiden name or either of her two married names. I am considering now that perhaps she made a visit to Australia around the 1880s (seeing I can't find her on census). Question - how or what can I do to check this out. Please don't suggest I look thru every shipping record (g). Now, if we had kept our own census records........ However if anyone has found a secret hoard of records......... Denise