I never knew my grandparents and was curious to discover my origins

[Helen7]

All four of my grandparents died before I was born, so my knowledge of them was limited to scraps of information gleaned from my parents, which wasn't very much as they'd both lost their parents young: my mother never knew her mother as she'd died when my mother was born and my Dad's father died when he was 12. We had a few old family photos, but not much else.

I was inspired to find out more when I came across my paternal grandparents' 1912 marriage certificate, a beautifully written, ornate document, my favourite to this day. Reading their occupations - cotton weaver and housemaid - and those of their fathers - innkeeper and stonemason - got me wondering what their lives were like in that pre-WW1 era, where they'd lived, who their families were, etc. Also, as an only child of two only children, I had no other close relatives, so was curious to discover my wider family. I didn't have much to go on, but I soon found myself piecing together the bits I knew and started to trace my family tree, initially using free on-line resources such as the IGI and 1881 census.

And so this fascinating hobby started for me 12 years ago. Both my parents had passed away by then, and I wish I'd started earlier, as I think they would have been fascinated to learn all I have been able to discover about their forebears and cousins.

 

[jorghes]

That is a shame - I've lost all but one of my grandparents, and I never met one of them - my maternal grandmother died when my mother was 16-17 (a good 20 years before I was born), and her father when I was 5, and then my paternal grandfather when I was 12. My mother is also an only child, and while her parents were not only children, they did emigrate from Wales to Australia when she was 2, so contact with her extended family has been limited to letters and phone calls - equally unfortunately, all my great-aunts on that side of the family have also died. (I first visited my mother's cousins two years ago.)
I am fortunate to have been much more blessed on my father's side of the family (my father has four siblings, his father had 8 and his grandfather was one of about 13; my grandmother is one of 5 and her mother had 9 siblings) - and a larger number of them have spent many years researching parts of my family tree, including research and a family tree created by my paternal grandfather. He and my grandmother have also written down parts of their own story, which has been good.

I hope you get many more discoveries along the way, and particularly the chance of distant cousins who are also searching your tree - that is what has helped me the most on my mother's side - the discovery of cousins (and their stock of photos and other documents).

 

[Helen7]

Thanks for this. It is interesting to hear about your family. You are fortunate that your relatives laid the groundwork for your research, though actually I've quite enjoyed 'starting from scratch' - more of a challenge!

Whilst I have no 1st cousins, my grandparents all had several siblings and I have quite a lot of 2nd cousins, some of whom I knew whilst growing up, and have maintained spasmodic contact with since, but others I have found through my family history research. This includes one who sent me a beautiful photograph (professionally taken) of my grandfather as a young man with his 6 siblings and their parents. This was the first photograph I had ever seen of my great-grandparents or any of my great aunts and uncles on my father's side. I found it quite moving.

I knew nothing at all about my maternal grandmother before I started the research, as my mother was brought up by her father's family, and had no contact whatsoever with her late mother's relatives due to a rift between the two families. She knew she had an uncle and cousins on her mother's side but had no idea who they were, so I was delighted to trace one of these cousins to Canada where his family had emigrated in the 1950s. He is my strongest DNA match (Ancestry predicted 3rd cousins, even though the shared ancestry hint shows clearly we are 2nd cousins) but we had already made the connection on our trees before that.

Many 3rd and 4th cousins have also emerged, so I feel I do have some family after all!

 

[jorghes]

Oh I know, all of the previous research has been on the paternal side, so there has been a lot more "starting from scratch" on my mother's side. I have been able to "correct" things from some of my grandfather's research, and I've used one of the biggest pieces of prior research (an item I refer to as the "Dawbarn book" - which is basically a list of descendants of a particular ancestor along with birth and death dates if known, and marriages etc, as well as notes on various members) to help another researcher add some interesting items to their tree. Our family copy has been mislaid, so I took pictures of pertinent pages of our local family history society's copy.

I do love photographs, I am really happy that I have a family photo for most of my 2x great grandparents and their families, often shared with me by distant cousins. The most recent photo I received was of my great-grandmother who died at 24 with her parents and entire family, and a letter from my great-grandfather about her death to her sister who had emigrate to Sydney and a lovely formal photograph of him. One of the most moving I've identified are photos that show my grandfather's three siblings who died as infants and small children - one is a family photo with my grandfather, his parents, one sister who survived and one who died.

It sounds like you've had a lot of great discoveries. Other than the photograph, what has been your favourite discovery?

 

[Helen7]

Favourite discovery? That's a difficult one as there have been a number of interesting things.

One thing I did appreciate was that after literally years of trying to find my paternal grandmother Elizabeth Cross (the housemaid on the marriage certificate mentioned above) and after going down several blind alleys as a result of her common name, following the release of the 1911 census I was able to narrow down her date and place of birth and finally managed to find a birth record that I thought could be her. I sent off for the certificate with fingers crossed that it wouldn't be another disappointment, and I jumped for joy when it came back showing her father with the right name and occupation - Thomas, stonemason! I was also delighted that although her mother had a very common surname, her first name was Adonia, and there was only one Adonia Johnson of the right age in the whole of England and Wales, which was just as well as it was in a completely different part of the country to where Elizabeth was born. It turned out that Adonia's father was also a stonemason and that the family had spent some time in Manchester, so I speculated that Thomas may have been his apprentice and that's how my great-grandparents met (the boss's daughter syndrome) but that's pure speculation on my part!

I finally discovered that one reason I had found it so hard to trace my grandmother was that she never appeared on any census with her family, as she was born a few months after the 1881 census, lost both her parents before she was 6 (they both died of TB) and grew up in an institution, thereafter going into service (as per her marriage certificate). It must have been very hard for her and her siblings. I remember I knew one of her brothers when I was a child/teenager, but sadly I never thought to ask him about his family history (but thinking about it, he probably wouldn't have known much anyway as he was even younger than his sister when their parents died). I should add that I have found a number of DNA matches to my Cross ancestry (thus nicely confirming my research is correct), but unfortunately none close enough to supply me with pictures of Thomas and Adonia, which I would dearly love (though as they died in the 1880s they may well never have been photographed).

On a lighter note, I am amused by the fact that my direct ancestors include a butcher, a baker and a candlestick maker, and I also have a tinker, a tailor, numerous soldiers, but am still looking for the spy!

 

[Bryman]

I also have a tinker, a tailor, numerous soldiers, but am still looking for the spy!

Don't be greedy. Spies are very well hidden - even more so than ancestors. It's part of the job description.
Perhaps you should just be satisfied with the odd sailor or two, followed if you are lucky by a rich man, then poor man, beggar man and thief.

 

[jorghes]

That is a wonderful story.

I have a bunch of sailors, soldiers, shoemakers, butchers and bakers, but no spies or candlestick makers. I also have some sheet iron and coal workers, plus some cotton weavers.