Don't just book it . . . . . . . . . . . !

I know I should be doing something more useful, but while I'm scanning family pictures I thought I'd sort out some other family stuff. And it's raining.

This old leather box has only come to light recently, and as can be seen by the stencilled print on the side, belonged to my great aunt Emily. She married a water engineer by the name of Eldred Jane from Cornwall in 1925 and they went out to the Sudan before WW2.  This box presumably went with her on her travels. (I've since discovered that Eldred was actually Sanitary Inspector Gezira, 1929-1939 and Senior Public Health Inspector Gezira, 1939-1944. Gezira is one of the 18 states of the Sudan, in the SE of the country)

Returning to England after the war they built a house in Devon, rather unfortunately named 'Journey's End', where he died in 1955. I knew her well and we stayed with her in Devon on more than one occasion. Her lovely old box has found a second use for all my family history records and the various family artifacts that I've managed to acquire.

In front of the box can be seen my paternal great-grandmother's Bible, hardly used, and two Bibles belonging to my maternal grandfather, much used, one in English, the other in French. The latter was given to him in 1908 by his sister Win, whom I met when I was a child. All wonderful fun!