Have You Looked into Your Family History?
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My brother has traced what he could about our family history, and my brother in law traced my husbands family.
The interesting people were already passed down by word of mouth and nothing else of great interest was discovered despite going back to the 1700s, but a friend was thrilled to find that she had someone who was hanged in her family tree. Rather a strange reaction!
Have you traced your family tree?
Did you find any surprises?
Yes. I've traced trees for me, hubby and ex-hubby. Ex had nothing interesting and contained to UK, though I did get back to 1500's. Mine spread across UK, Ireland, Canada and Australia with the most interesting fact being my 7th great grandparents 1660's were also my husbands 8th great grandparents!!! Husband has the most interesting fact in that his 3rd great grand-uncle had a very large rock named after him when he was Premier of South Australia 1870's.
lilyflower What interesting finds and such a long way back!
I imagine that many of us are related somehow if we come from the UK back in time as the population was quite small compared to now.
Both my mum and dad's family had come to England from Ireland, but I imagine that there was quite a few people coming across the sea looking for work back then.
We have a marriage certificate of my husband's Great Great Grandfather from Odessa where he had gone as a blacksmith from the Welsh mining community. Sadly, his name is signed with a X as he'd obviously not received any education, not even the ability to sign his name.
AlysonC My Dads parental side came from Ireland min 1800's. His maternal side were all Northumberland. Mothers maternal side originated in Yorkshire, while her paternal side were Cumbrian and that's where the connection to hubby came from. The 1851 Census showed both families living in adjoining streets. Who knew then what the 2020's would bring and neither of us are from Cumbria.
lilyflower omg thats mental. To randomly meet and marry your husband have the same relatives. Bonkers isn't how families branch off dilute so much that they loose contact crazy.
lilyflower BTW I live in jersey where the joke is if you're from a certain group of families you're married to your cousin or sister. We are a small place. It mental.
Jerseydrew It was weird as I kept thinking Ancestry was getting confused giving me matches to his tree. He hadn't known his Dad was from Cumbria. My Grandad born 1909 left Cumbria with his parents between 1911-1921. His father was one of 17 and they all survived childhood!
lilyflower omg thats crazy 17 and all survived that amazing given how things were at that time. OK better than victoriana times but only just
I've been researching my family history on and off for years. My ancestors are mostly Scottish, Irish & North East / Midlands England, with some Scandinavian & Italian. The vast majority of my ancestors were maritime workers, miners, and farmers. Most notably, I'v learnt that I share a very distant set of great-grandparents with Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey who was the British Prime Minister whose government passed the legislation that abolished slavery in the British Empire. (His great great grandparents were my 7x great grandparents if I remember correctly) In Newcastle we have the Greys monument statue that depicts him. He's also said to be the reason we have Earl Grey tea!
On another line, one of my distant great-grandfathers was involved in protests in North East England during the Industrial Revolution era and was imprisoned at least twice for violence.
My OH tree is a bit more interesting. His has some well-known artists and sculptors. Latest being a brother of his grandfather, whose work is held in various museums. There are also several sculptures in and around Newcastle created by some ancestors of his.
Glitterandgold How lovely, finding that you are related, even distantly, to Earl Grey! Have you watched the film The Duchess?
Both some of my mum and dad's families came from Ireland, and my husband's family were miners for generations, either working in the pit in Wales or as blacksmiths in the mine. He was a miner himself when we first met, but didn't carry coal on his back like his Great Grandmother did at the age of 14.
How nice that your OH could visit some of the works made by his ancestors.
Glitterandgold Have you been to Howick Hall Gardens and Tea Room, home of Earl Grey?https://howickhallgardens.com/history-of-howick-hall-and-gardens/earl-grey-and-the-earl-grey-family/
lilyflower I haven't yet Lily but it's on my list to do. Chillingham castle, which also was home to some Greys I have visited several times, I never knew at the time tho my ancestry stretched back there.
AlysonC I haven't but I will at some point! Yes, my mums family were all pit miners too. My mams grandad rode his bike from Newcastle to Yorkshire for work, only to die soon after in a mine collapse. Whilst on a shift that wasn't even his apparently. He'd swapped with someone. Which was lucky for them I guess.
Glitterandgold My husband's ancestor invented something called the dog-nail, but not knowing about patenting, gave it to the pit owners. As a reward, he was allowed to continue working there whilst he could still walk to the pit. He continued until he was 78 years old. These people were made of strong stuff.
I have looked into my family abit but I don't like having to pay to get information about my family. Most of my family on my dad's side are Irish and Yorkshire. My mum's side is from the North East and Yorkshire. I know my Great grandma remarried and he was related to the footballer Jackie Millburn and my Grandad's brothers wife's parents once owned Lumley Castle in Durham.
KAW18 My brother paid for some of our family tree information as I wouldn't want to pay either, but quite a lot of information about my dad's side of the family he got from dad's elderly aunts who were still alive at the time. Dad died at 40 years old, so we weren't able to ask him.
Dad had never been told who his father was and there is just a line for the name on his birth certificate, and strangely, his mother added a letter S to his surname, so our name had changed from Winter to Winters unlike the rest of the family. My brother asked Dad's aunts if they knew who dads' father was and they said that they did but the secret would die with them. They have died now and the secret did.
A little bit not a huge amount. My maternal side is almost impossible to find as a lot of information was destroyed during ww1 and ww2.
Jerseydrew How sad. Were your family in the Channel Islands during the occupation? It's quite incredible that all of these years later, we are still seeing the effects that the wars had on our country.
In my job, I cared for a gentleman who still had shrapnel in his leg from WW1 which needed regular dressing, and saw people who hated loud noises because of their service.
My own mum used to hate Wednesdays as a local hospital would test their fire alarms and used the siren for the incoming bombing alerts they'd used in her youth. She always said how the sound still turned her stomach.
AlysonC yes they were in jersey for ww2. However my gran was in france during ww1. She moved in between the wars. The documents were lost as there was only a brother left in france and he move away from the area and the documents were somehow destroyed. We looked into it to get eu passports but couldn't prove the French link and that was when my gran was still alive with a very thick French accent
Jerseydrew It must have been dreadful living under occupation, even though I've heard terrible stories of living in the mainland during the war, especially during the blitz of our city.
What a pity that you were unable to prove the French connection for EU passports.
Some of our family currently live in France and had to move to an apartment in Paris as the wildfires were approaching their village. One of them works in Paris anyway, but it's been an upheaval having to move there, especially for the children.
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