The British Newspaper Archive

The British Newspaper Archive is a partnership between the British Library and Brightsolid online publishing (aka FindMyPast) to digitise up to 40 million newspaper pages from the British Library's vast collection over the next 10 years. So far almost 7 million have been done. You can access the collection several ways :-
British Newspaper Archive
Find My Past
Genes Reunited
All require either a subscription or the purchase of a 'Pay to View' package.

There are already quite a few Wellbelove(d) entries, although a number are the the use of the word as a descriptive term. An example of what is available is an unfortunate Wellbelove entry :-

Western Times - Monday 10 Jan 1905

 

What a sad story.

There are some rich pickings. I have found a number of my ancestors, including my g-grandfather and g-g-grandfather being charged and jailed for theft. Earlier this week in the latest batch added I found my ancestor Thomas Warwick's inquest report - he was crushed under the wheels of a wagon loaded with 2 tons of manure! The coroner noted that the deceased was under the influence of alcohol at the time.

So it's worth checking out all your British ancestors including your Wellbeloves.

Simon