In December 2000 having purchased my first PC I decided that it was time that I should
endeavour to trace my family tree and answer some of the questions that had perplexed 
me since my pre-teen years.
In the first instance I was intrigued to know why my father,Arthur Joseph Curtis,who 
had parents of English background,was born in Chefoo,North China and equally 
intrigued that his father Frederich Joseph Curtis,was born in Yokohama,Japan in 1869.
Having never known my Grandparents and gaining little information from my father,the 
Internet with its ever increasing data-base has been a wonderful source of 
information that has helped me unravel my Curtis Family story.
Of course this is not only a Curtis story but also a story of the families of their 
wives such as Harriet Vaughan,Elizabeth Mary Parker who left China for Australia 
after the untimely death of my Grandfather,and the Hewletts and Craddocks who will be 
found within this tree.
My dear mother the former Helen O'Brien who lost her mother,the former Marion Wells, 
when only 15 months old,passed on little of her family background so it has been 
fascinating tracing her Wells/Emery family to Donnington,Lincolnshire,England and 
Irish heritage to Galway,Ireland and the Scots heritage to the Isle of Bute,Scotland.
Of the O'Brien and Reilly line in Galway I have been unable to trace but of the 
Currie's and McKellars of Bute I have found much.
The Journey of Janet McKellar from Bute to Australia and her trials and tribulations 
have inspired me to record this family history. 

Also recorded herein is the family tree of my wife the former Margaret Claire 
McLachlan whose father Max migrated to Australia at the age of 13 in the company of 
his mother Margaret Little McLachlan(mn Aitken) and his Auntie,Jessie Richmond Aitken.