This photograph of my Scottish great-grandmother on the balcony of the family tenement in the Dumbiedykes in Edinburgh, overlooking Holyrood Park, is one that I only came across recently. It was hidden at the back of the cupboard in an album belonging to my great-uncle Adam which had somehow become separated from the rest of the photograph boxes (see Messy Boxes). And while it might not be of the same quality as the later photographs taken on the Neilson family’s tenement balcony between 1930 and 1945 (see A Tenement with a View), this informal image of a much younger great-grandmother is a rare find. It was probably taken when Catherine Neilson was in her mid-thirties and had finally become used to having a king on the throne after having known only a queen for almost the first three decades of her life.

Catherine Neilson, Dumbiedykes Balcony, Edinburgh, c 1910

Read more of this post at my new family history blog: A Scottish Family Album.

The Incidental Genealogist, October 2022