For those of you looking for answers at the Library & Archives Canada and wish to access the Microfilms they have on loan from Barnardos this may answer a few questions. I asked Barnardos and if you are a descendant looking for information about their ancestor who was a home child Barnardos will not give you permission access the microfilms at the Library and Archives in Ottawa. The microfilms are considered PRIVATE. This is what was written to me....

«Thank you for your email. The records held are private records and not public records and therefore permission will not be granted to view any microfilms held by either the National Archives or Barnardo's. To gain access to a particular record you will need to come through us here at Barnardo's.

To have copies of John Jones’s records you will need to purchase them through us here at Barnardo's for the fee stated. The microfilms held at the National Archives are the same as those held here and the N.A. and they do not have permission to release them without our consent which we do not give to relatives.»

This is probably why the person from Library & Archives Canada informed me via e-mail to get in touch with Barnardos. Mystery solved.

They are here and as I feared there was not very many pages to be had; but what was included was absolute gold. It had the day he went to the Liverpool Sheltering home and the tragic circumstances that surounded him being in the home. There was also his mothers new married name and the fact he wrote to her after he got married. They also have the name of the man he was placed with.So there is no question he is the John Jones we are looking for. There were no mention of the quarterly reports that Col Laurie was supposed to have written about the children in Nova Scotia. There was nothing written about him from 1875 until he was 28 years old in 1896. 10 years and no one watching out for you. Interesting - the silence speaks volumes. Barnardos supplied some background information about the Marchmount Home in Belleville under the belief he went there. So if you do a request for information and your Home Child went with Louisa Birt to Nova Scotia it would be prudent to let them know. It is all on the same batch of microfilms so they would have no way of knowing. Their knowledge of our country would be about the same as mine is of theirs so they would not realise that going to Belleville then back to Nova Sotia would require 17 hours of backtracking on todays roads. All in all I am happy with it - I gleamed a little bit into the life of John Jones.