Stories and Memories of older generations

[AngiRay]

While tracing my maternal tree I remembered the stories my grandmother used to tell me about her family (Hardy/Haigh/Challand from Nottingham and Yorkshire).  One was that her great grandfather ran with the highway men on the road south from Yorkshire and of course as a small child I found this fascinating and believed every word. 

When I reached the appropriate generation I could find no evidence to support the story, although not sure what I would expect to find as no-one is likely to declare such an occupation on any census etc.

But one thing she failed to mention was that her grandmother was "famous".  Mary Ann Challand (1838-1903) worked as a "clairvoyant" in Captain Hudson's mesmerist show.  However, her claim to fame was to use her gift to find the body of a young girl who had fallen into a swollen river in Huddersfield https://netherton.huddersfield.exposed/2015/05/24/miss-challand-the-local-clairvoyant/  She was also involved in the riddle of the Seed Hill Ghost.  Many thanks to Dave Pattern for sending me the result of his research.

So the moral of the story as far as I have learnt is - never take anything at face value, listen to the memories you are told but still apply the same amount of rigorous research to verify them.

[dowdstree]

Very interesting article on Mary Ann Challand.

I agree with you that you listen to family stories and then substantiate them with the evidence if possible.

From my own experience some have worked out and others not. Only last year I followed up on a story my late father told me about the death and burial of his aunt. Not only did I find, after a lot of research, that he was indeed correct but she is buried with my 3 x great grandparents. Speechless.
Other stories have not been so accurate when I traced back the records.

Dorrie