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Topic: what made you search for your roots? (Read 2745 times)
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Skipworth
RootsChat Member
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Posts: 103
Census information Crown Copyright, from www.natio
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A conversation with my very alert 95 year old dad left me feeling a little sad. He knew very little of his paternal family history except they were cotton brokers in Manchester - didn't know when they emigrated to Australia - never met his grandparents - they died very young, but knew where they had lived and some of the names of his uncles and aunts but doesn't recall meeting them. He spoke warmly of his maternal grandparents and especially his gt. grandmother.
I decided to find out all I could - not only have I put on weight sitting for hours at the computer, but have had to budget for all the extras [certificates etc] but have had great success in tracing both sides of his family. He rings me regularly to ask what I have found. I have had wondeful help with library searches from people in the UK - couldn't have done it without them. My dad is starting to contribute as he oftens remembers snippets of info. He has a wonderful memory - it just needed a bit of a nudge. I love the stories - especially the funny ones and there are many.
Incidentally they weren't cotton brokers in Manchester, it was Liverpool and that makes a lot of difference when searching.
I'm disappointed that so far haven't found any skeletons in the cupboard - only wish I could find my gggrandfather William Hunter PEERS - I traced him as far as 1848 and then he seemed to disappear off the face of the earth. His wife and four children emigrated to Australia in 1852 as unassisted emigrants. His wife never said she was a widow, and he was not noted as deceased on her death certificate. I guess we all need a brick wall 
Cheers
Skipworth in Aus
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Webby
RootsChat Senior
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Posts: 300
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My father one day started to tell me about his school days and some of the trouble he got into (and expelled once.....he didn't tell me why?) and then I realised that I knew absolutely nothing about where he went to school or for that matter anything about his parents.
So I asked him did he remember his grandparents and he replied that yes he was a teenager before they passed away. "What was their names?" asked I....................he thought for a moment then replied.................grandmother & grandfather!!!!!!!!!. He never knew their names!
So I got interested, and then proceeded to bombard him with information until he sadly passed away a few years ago..........still waiting for him to contact me with some answers from a couple of brick walls!!!
Still waiting Dad!!.
Webby
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Wing, Isted,Lashmore, - Horsted Keynes
Green, Goldsmith,Mockford,Blackmar,Geer - Falmer & Brighton
Wing, Hack, Gray, Haywood Brighton
White, Vass, Tolhurst, Thatcher Sussex
Attree, Patching, Earle - Barcombe Sussex
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Skipworth
RootsChat Member
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Posts: 103
Census information Crown Copyright, from www.natio
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Interesting story Webby - my father didn't know his grandparents names either but then they died fifteen years before he was born. He had 9 aunts and uncles - some he never met. So sad - he has said many times since I have started searching 'how I wish I had taken notice of mother when she talked about the family' - I guess we have all been guilty of that when we were young
I also have a 90 year old uncle [my dad's brother] who when I tell him what I have found 'oh I knew that' - so annoying and then I find out that he has a family bible and hasn't said anything to me about it  I am just waiting for the 'right' moment - after all my dad is the eldest in the family and I think he should have it My dad thinks I have found out much more than is in the bible as he doesn't think it goes back very far.
Hope you brickwalls start to crumble 
Cheers
Skipworth
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debi-robo
RootsChat Extra
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Posts: 94
From one little nut grew the mighty oak tree
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I started researching after my husbands Gran showed me a photo of her Gran and i found myself looking at the spit of my own Gran who is still alive.
My Gran and my husbands Gran have now met and husbands Gran admits that they are identical.
So i thought there must be a link here somewhere, am still looking, though to be fair Husbands tree has sort of been brushed aside as i got carried away with my own.
Debbie
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ROBERTSON/ TRACEY/ MCKELVIE/ SUTHERLAND/ GARDNER/ IMRIE KANE/ MCGEOWN/ MALONE/ MCCULLOCH/ MCDOUGALL/ FERGUSON "This information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk" |
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nort
RootsChat Senior
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Posts: 292
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mine started with the release of the 1901 census online as i had read about it in some newspaper and i had just recently bought a computer but then that website crashed and it was months before we could view it again.So i asked for a lookup in the 1881 census and the reply amazed me so much i had to find out more and it seems to have become a never ending quest!
Steve
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kerryb
RootsChat Marquessate
 Online
Posts: 10057
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Steve
I remember the first time I got an answer from someone on Rootschat, to a lookup I requested. The answer was so quick I nearly fell off my chair!!!!
Kerry
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Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.ukSearching for my family - Baldwin - Sussex, Middlesex, Cork, Pilbeam - Sussex, Harmer - Sussex, Terry - Surrey, Kent, Rhoades - Lincs, Roffey - Surrey, Traies - Devon & Middlesex & many many more to be found on my website .... www.kerrysfamilyhistory.co.uk |
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Nick Carver
RootsChat Aristocrat
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Posts: 1240
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I started because apart from my immediate family, I didn't know any relatives with the name Carver. Now I am in contact with several distant cousins, but still haven't found a picture of my grandad who apparently looked just like me.
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E Yorks - Carver, Steels, Cross, Maltby, Whiting, Moor, Laybourn
W Yorks - Wilkinson, Kershaw, Rawnsley, Shaw
Norfolk - Carver, Dowson
Cheshire - Berry, Cooper
Lincs - Berry
London/Ireland/Scotland/Lincs - Sullivan
Northumberland/Durham - Nicholson, Cuthbert, Turner, Robertson
Berks - May
Beds - Brownell
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aspin
RootsChat Aristocrat
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Posts: 1087
taken from us too soon
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I always wondered if my maiden name McKenzie was Scotch or Irish
How ever I am Scotch
We had been on a tour to New Zealand two years ago and enjoyed it very much I was always told my granda McKenzie was born on a ship one mile out of New Zealand (as his mother liked to travel ) being little I never thought about people travelling in those days
After New Zealand we flew to Australia to my mums cousins where I was shown the marriage certificate of my grt grt grandparents (mums side )
I found out a genealogy class had started in the village so I went along and have done so well
Alas when we were in New zealand at Dunedin we had a day to ourselves we just wondered the streets and looked in the shops
It wasn't until I sent for my grandas birth certificate that I found out he was born in Alva Street Dunedin and his brother was buried there
Some day hope to go back and find these places
Elizabeth
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McKenzie,Helmsdale.,Mackay's,Gordon's,Polsons,Sutherland's,Loth Watson ,Munro,Pitsligo.Black. Harle ,South Shields.Black,and Short East Hollywell.Northumberland Gair, Amble,Douglas,Amble,Mitchell ,Fettercairns,Lyall, Brechin .Mearns ,Scotland.Thompson's ,Spittal.family of Maghie,Young .Raey Cumberland and Newcastle & Glasgow .Gilroy, Northumberland.and Starks Berwick.Skeen's Tweedmouth.Gregsons Northumberland & America. Andrew farmer Turnbull Berwick & Pode' and Black of Hull.Lounton Tweedmouth
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Emmeline
RootsChat Aristocrat
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Posts: 1289
Emma Louisa Tricker (1885-1958)
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Reading through a genealogy magazine I saw that the reason one lady was hooked was because as a small child she used to fill in the the forms required to keep track of her grandfather's pedigree cows. Finding out which cows were related to each other !
From then on she was hooked into finding out about her own generations......
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MansfieldTerrier
RootsChat Veteran
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Posts: 680
Henry Pashby, born Levisham 1816, and wife Mary
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Some years before my grandfather died, he gave me a package containing three items ...
1) a cloth map of Yorkshire dated 1824
2) a maths book dated 1863, and
3) a marriage certificate between a Thomas Dodsworth and a Jane Ruddock, dated 1839
The map of Yorkshire was lovely, and it's now framed and hanging above my fireplace.
The maths book obviously belonged to one of his relatives as it bore his surname, but the certificate really foxed my father and I! The problem was that my father's middle name is Dodsworth, but we didn't know any Dodsworth's or Ruddocks.
So that's what started us off; we were determined to find out how this marriage certificate came into my grandfather's - and ultimately my - possession.
Turns out that Thomas Dodsworth (of the Dodsworth/Ruddock marriage) sired Sarah Dodsworth, who married my gt-gt-grandfather.
Obvious, wasn't it? 
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PASHBY in Scarborough, Levisham, and outlying area SEDMAN in Scarborough BIRD in Easington, Patrington, Sculcoates and Hull DOBSON in Edinburgh, Wakefield, Scarborough SUTTON in Wintringham, North Yorks. Census information is Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
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Bill749
RootsChat Aristocrat
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Posts: 1239
crowdin' 60 and still wearin' genes!
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My wife started to research her family when the children were all at school and she had time to kill. Another mum from the school got her interested and showed her the ropes. She got stuck with her family, so started on mine, which got me interested.
In those days there was no internet to log on to and ask for help - we had to spend hours trawling through the indexes at St Catherine's House, reading wills at Somerset House and sitting in a darkened room peering at census films that had to be ordered up from the reception desk in (I think) Chancery Lane.
There was the IGI of course - on microfiche (almost unreadable in some cases) - for guidance, but not much use to me researching in East Kent, because coverage for this area was very thin.
When we had found what we could there, it became a long slog through the parish registers - the real thing, not microfilm - at the Canterbury Cathedral Archives. They used to charge a fee in those days - about 50p an hour if memory serves me right.
By the time the registers were filmed, I had more or less completed my direct line research as far as I could go.
Now I make full use of every means I can find to expand my knowledge of the family, but I still enjoy going back to the primary sources to make my own decisions about what is actually written there!
Regards, Bill
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« Last Edit: Tuesday 29 August 06 19:18 BST (UK) by Bill749 »
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Banks, Beer, Bowes, Castle, Cloak, Coachworth, Dixon, Farr, Golder, Graves, Hicks, Hogbin, Holmans, Marsh, Mummery, Nutting, Pierce, Rouse, Sawyer, Sharp, Snell, Willis: mostly in East Kent.
Ey, Sawyer: London
Evans: Ystradgynlais, Wales
Snell: Snettisham, Norfolk
Knight, Burgess, Ellis: Hampshire
Purdy: Ireland/Canada/Durham/Pennsylvania
McCann: Ireland
Morrow: Pennsylvania
Sparnon: any
Beers, Heath, Conyers, Miller, Russell, Larson, Cark, Sibert, Hopper, Reinhart: USA
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meles
RootsChat Marquessate
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Posts: 3018
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I started over 30 years ago when my father died, and I realised I did not know anything about his parents, who had also died when he was young. It took me ages going into London to plough through books with birth, marriage and death info. A year to find his parents' names. Eventually, I found out that his mother died when he was 5 and his father committed suicide a couple of years later. No wonder he never mentioned them - I wonder if he ever knew...?
Nowadays, it's so easy, and I've gone back to the 1700's. Which means I have to plough through Parish Registers!
meles
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Brock: Alburgh, Norfolk, and after 1850, London; Tooley: Norfolk Grimmer: Norfolk; Grimson: Norfolk Harrison: London; Pollock Dixon: Hampshire; Collins: Middx Jeary: Norfolk; Davison: Norfolk Rogers: London; Bartlett: London Drew: Kent; Alden: Hants Gamble: Yorkshire; Huntingford: East London Census information is Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk |
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Lydart
RootsChat Aristocrat
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Posts: 2748
Roots-chatting about ancestors
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Hello all !
I started this pursuit after clearing my mothers house when she went into a nursing home, aged 91. Apart from finding love letters from my father to her (she said "Throw then away, too sugary !" - I've kept them !) ... I also found a cutting dated 40 years previously - 1960, reporting the death of her aunt in Canada. I had known about Great Aunt Lizzie from my childhood ... she sent parcels in the war, and there was always something for me ... a huge red apple, a book ... and had often wondered what had happened to her, and if there was any way I could find out. To me, she was a magical, exciting person, who had 'run away' to Canada as a young girl; I too, wanted to travel and see new places, but for me, it was Africa (and I did, for 11 years !)
So I asked my mother if she had contacted this apparently huge Canadian family listed on the obit. "No", she said, "I didnt know how to". I said "I'll find them !" and did, by dint of writing to the mayor of the town mentioned in the obit; he put my letter in the local paper ... and bingo ! Letters in reply from all over Canada ! One cousin even came to visit her in the home (she was actually 'doing Europe' but mother thought she had come specially ... it made her day !)
So a few years later, when Mother had died and left me some money, I used some of it and went to Canada to seek out the relatives; that started a whole flood of photos of 'the old country', pictures of me as a child, but they didnt know who it was, and so on ... A second cousin is coming from Canada in a couple of weeks to see her English roots.
And that obit ? How did my mother have it ? You won't believe this ... but its true ! A friend of Mothers was going on a 3 month trip to Canada in 1960; Mother told her she had relatives there, and the town they lived in. About four months later there was a knock at the door, and Mothers friend called round for tea, bearing a piece of paper ... "Is this your relative" she said ? You've guessed it, more or less ! Mothers friend was visiting a relative of hers in BC, and idley picked up a local paper ... and there was the obit ... if she hadnt been in that town on that day, she's never have seen it ! And if my mother hadn't been the sort who never threw ANYTHING away in her 93 years, the paper, too would have been binned. Who says there isn't a God ??!!
So my start into family history was not in the UK, but via Canada ... I've been hooked on it, and Canada, ever since !!
Lydart
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Dorset/Wiltshire: Trowbridge, Williams, Sturney, Prince, Foyle, Fripp, Triggle ... and more Cornwall/Devon/CANADA: Pomeroy Somerset: Clark(e) Durham: Law London: Poplett Lancashire/Cheshire/CANADA: Stubbs, Walmesley WRITE LETTERS TO YOUR FAMILY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS TO TREASURE ... EMAILS DISAPPEAR FOREVER ! Census information is Crown Copyright from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk |
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