Help us find and improve next week's Connection Finder profiles: Bond, James Bond

Question

Next week, the featured example profiles in the Connection Finder will be James Bond-themed. This is in honor of the recent death of Sean Connery, who will be our featured profile.

We're looking for profiles of people who played James Bond or were part of the Bond franchise in some way. Here are a few ideas of what we're looking for and some we're getting started on:

• Sir Roger Moore
• Ian Fleming
• Honor Blackman

Can you help with these profiles, or expand their families? Adding relatives in any direction helps with connections. Every missing relative you add will make our connections to them closer.

Who else should we feature? Do they need a profile?

All profiles we feature need a good biography and a connection to the big tree. We also want each one to have an image, and the image needs to have proper source attribution explaining why it's in the public domain or why we have the right to display it.

We can't feature everyone mentioned (we only have room for eight per week), but if we don't feature a profile you work on, we may use it sometime in the future. And, of course, all contributions help improve our shared tree.

We'll make a final decision on which ones to feature early next week.

Please reply here with what you're working on so that we don't duplicate our efforts. Thank you!

To help us plan future themes, see the 2020 Example Profile Plans post here.

Comments

Melanie if I get time I will work on the welsh roots of Desmond Wilkinson Llewelyn

commented by Hilary Gadsby

.

I have been documenting as much as I can.  His paternal grandfather Llewelyn Llewelyn is where I was at before I fell asleep.  Not that I have added much to his profile.  There is some question regards the name of the daughter, as she is on WT as "Elenita", but is documented as Eleanor, and as Benita.  (In one census, married and died as Eleanor, in one census as Benita.)

Was also looking at paternal uncle (of Desmond's) to see if there might be a connection going sideways, as Leonard's one wife had three husbands.  (Have not yet added her.)  I am happy to leave going UP any further to anyone else who wants to look!   Or sideways, so long as I know who's going which way, so I don't double-up!

---

I forgot to mention - his parents were cousins, so there's a bit of overlap.

---

---

---

Ian Fleming's conjured-up world of espionage is so far removed from reality that any comparison twixt the two can only reach fallacious conclusions!

---

PS The biggest conundrum in the world of espionage is why are the exploits of its fictional characters more popular than the real thing.

commented by Bill Fairclough

.

Because people like things that mimic life, while actually being removed from it.  There are those who prefer non-fiction over fiction, but more prefer the "escape" from their daily lives.  That's why sci-fi is so popular -  and sci-fantasy, or urban fantasy.  With the fantastic, one knows it cannot be real, but with the fictions, it just maybe could be possibly something that might maybe happen.  It's all related to suspension of disbelief.

---

@ Hilary and anyone else following along the Llewelyn trail -- Desmond now has his only sibling.  (And, BOY, did I have to work to find her death!)  She married once, had one child (who married), but I think the child is still living.  The ex-husband married a second time before he died, but that was in England.

I have not done anything more, yet, with Desmond's uncle Leonard and his wives, and the second wife's 3 husbands, because I got all tied up trying to find his sister's death reg.  (Wrongly named.)  I have no idea how to find divorces in England, so I covered that with what sourcing I could.  (I *think* it was a bankruptcy hearing, or an appeal to be discharged from it.)

I am hopeful that something will be found that can make a connection to the Tree, but whether in Wales, or England, is yet to be seen.

---

but I think the child is still living.

posted by me!

.

I proved myself wrong, as I found the daughter's death.  So she now has a profile, as well.  Don't know if a connection could go through the ex-husband (of Mia senior), but I will see if I can get enough sources to create him a profile.

This means I am leaving the Welsh line for now, but am still intending to expand where I can from Leonard (Desmond's uncle).

---

Cool description - maybe add to alleviate boredom too - but with espionage the problem is Ian Fleming's (unbelievable) fiction was so compelling it is now taken for real!

---

I don't think I am much closer to connecting Desmond.  I added his paternal uncle's second wife, but even though she had 3 husbands, she had only one sibling.  And husband #3 was the brother of husband #1, so that limits the pool for expansion.  She outlived all 3, and, as best I can find, she had only one child - to H#1.  I have yet to investigate the child.

(I want to know what she did with the £796,153 she inherited from Hs #1 & #2.  )

---

I don't think I am much closer to connecting Desmond. 

by ME!

-

Thanks to some sterling assistance from Leandra F, we have made the connection for Desmond, through his cousin's marriage to an English notable.  The connection should show up after next update.  (Now I just need to go write the biographies. )

---

Bernard Lee's bio is now complete and was already connected.

---

Desmond Llewelyn is 29 degrees from Julia Stimson, 36 degrees from Arthur Currie, 38 degrees from Charles de Gaulle, 46 degrees from Otto Frank, 34 degrees from Arthur Harris, 26 degrees from Vida Jowett, 35 degrees from John Monash, 35 degrees from Georg Von Trapp, 34 degrees from Alvin York and 37 degrees from Gene Ellison on our single family tree.

Answer 1

What about James Bond, the original person who Ian Fleming got his name from?

[Bond-2412|James Bond]

Comments

We may have to dispute that that the ornithologist was the sole influence.

 John Bond of Dorset was an Elizabethan merchant, a privateer, and possible spy. He adopted  for his family , the motto ' the World is not enough' . The Bond family remained in Dorset.

A  seven year old  Ian Fleming  went to prep school at Durnford school, next  door to the Bond's estate. 

A recently archived Bond family album has a photo of a Bond family member ( as yet unidentified) He is with a group of  Etonians  including Ian Fleming [ Flemming ] at Surly Hall ( an apres boating house owned by Eton college) See photo 3rd tweet, 3rd August 2018  https://mobile.twitter.com/DorsetArchives/status/1025311999390109697

Plenty of opportunity, possibly a friendship over many school years, to learn of the Elizabethan spy  John Bond and his family motto. 

---

Magician John Dee was the original 007 in Elizabethan times:

https://blog.bookstellyouwhy.com/bid/274528/the-first-james-bond-john-dee-was-the-original-007

---

We don't have to dispute this.  James Bond the ornithologist is a family member of mine.  Flemming acknowledged to him and the family that he borrowed the name for his character, and sent my relative signed copies of his books with dedications to that effect.  Flemming reported that as he was casting about for a name, his eye fell on the ornithologist's book of birds, and he felt that James Bond was the most boring name he had ever heard.  It fit perfectly what he was looking for in a name - Anglo-Saxon and unremarkable.

---

It amazes me how much i learn here on Wikitree. I don't really follow James Bond movies. But i like to contribute to this Connection Finder thread. It helps round out my knowledge of trivia. Thanks for the discussion.

Answer 2

Diana Rigg played Bond's wife in "On her Majesty's Secret Service". She's connected and has a good bio.

Answer 3

Don't forget the Broccoli:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Broccoli-3

Comments

Good call, Mark!

Answer 4

Perhaps Cassandra Harris, who's on WikiTree under the name Sandra Colleen (Waites) Brosnan? She played the villain's girlfriend in For Your Eyes Only, and she was married to Pierce Brosnan (her Wikipedia article says Albert Broccoli met Brosan through her). She's connected to the main tree through another husband, but she doesn't have any ancestors on the tree herself, so that may be a job for the Australian research contingent!

Comments

Sandra Waites' parents are alleged to be Walter Waites (born 19 May 1918 in Melbourne, Victoria and Roma Alfreda Atkinson (born 9 Mar 1919 in Grong Grong,  New South Wales, died as Roma Alfreda Gleeson 23 Jul 1962 in Sydney). The biggest hurdle is linking Sandra to her parents. Her birth certificate is not in the public domain and there appears to be no notice in any newspaper when she was born. Roma's death notice in the Sydney Morning Herald states that she was the mother of Sandra, Diane and Christine.

Answer 5

How are we going to link James Bond to the tree?
Some time ago, I read that he was modelled on a real person.  The original was not a womanizer, like James.My wife was nee Bond, of an English family. She was nicknamed .007, also "Chesty" after the drawing on Bond's singlets.