I was always told that my maternal grandmother claimed that her grandmother was Welsh. As a Welsh girl - born here, living and speaking the language it does irk me that I can't actually find any Welsh blood in my tree, just English plus a lump of German.
All I know about said Welsh great x2 grandmother is that she was small, dark and liked to cook Christmas puddings all year round... None of which really helps identify which grandmother could possibly be the Welsh one.
I have researched this branch of my tree fairly thoroughly and there are no Welsh birth places or residences in it no matter how far I go back
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One greatx2 grandmother has a maiden name of Smith and born in Birmingham. Her father had a middle name of Griffin but I can't work out where he acquired the middle name from but it gets used quite frequently for boys in the family. Can't take his line back too far because of Smith in Birmingham but his maternal grandmother was born in Bass Church, Shropshire which is as close to the Welsh border as the tree gets.
The other greatx2 grandmother was born in London with a maiden name of Weatherill. (Her mother in law has a maiden name of Jones but born Essex) . Her mother however had a maiden name of Roberts, born London. The Roberts family, as far as I can trace them are Londoners but again common surname, large city so a reliable trail goes cold. Its possible my grandmother would have known this grandmother a little better but not necessarily.
So... what I'm trying to ask is could the Welsh link be 4+ generations back? Would someone call themselves Welsh on the strength of the original link being that far back? Or should I just accept it's a mangled family tale with no truth to it and I should give up on a Welsh link? Does anyone think there's any clues here except plain old clutching at straws?