Category Archives: artefacts from the attic

My afternoons with Aubrey-the monster, the madness that was Dr Levin

Posted on August 31, 2015 by Shaun Smillie

Someone gasped. The fat doctor sitting in the big office in the mental institution had just said something disturbing. Dr Aubrey Levin, who one day would be caught on spy cam sexually assaulting a patient, had just finished telling us … Continue reading →

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The Search for the Soldier Without a Name (Part 3) – Ten photographs

Posted on September 28, 2012 by Shaun Smillie

So here they are, ten photographs taken as trophies of war. Some of them are 79 years old, if the dates on the back of those photographs are correct. Black and white pictures that through the World Wide Web and … Continue reading →

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Premonitions of death in a fox hole

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Shaun Smillie

  Private Dick Borain went to war believing he was going to die. He was only 24, but could sense death waiting for him in the desert, outside of the dugout that he shared with my grandfather. Their dugout was … Continue reading →

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World War one remembered

Posted on March 16, 2012 by Shaun Smillie

This week a century ago an unknown Bosnian Serb shot a prince and triggered the worst conflict the world had yet seen. It involved millions and families still hold tell me down stories from loved ones that fought in this … Continue reading →

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Myth confirmed

Posted on February 14, 2012 by Shaun Smillie

My great grandfather wasn’t lying. Polar bears were sighted in the north Atlantic. In a previous blog I told the story of my great grandfather William Frank Christie’s passage across the Atlantic in 1905. It is titled WF’s great north Atlantic … Continue reading →

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WF’s great North Atlantic adventure

Posted on February 7, 2012 by Shaun Smillie

Every family has them, heirlooms handed down from previous generations. Each has a tale and continuing with the artefacts from the attic series, here are some of mine and the stories they carry. Here two objects tell the story of … Continue reading →

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The ghost of a young man.

Posted on December 8, 2011 by Shaun Smillie

Every family has them, heirlooms handed down from previous generations. Each has a story. These are some of mine and the stories they carry. The ghost staring from the over exposed black and white photograph is the uncle I didn’t … Continue reading →

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