Family history research surprises...

[wheresmymojo]

I'm researching the family history on both my side and DH's.

I've come across quite a few surprises/interesting things and wondered if anyone else had anything they've found in their family trees that took them by surprise?

The ones off the top of my head in my tree are:

• I have a 4th Great Uncle who was a civil war hero in the US (he even has a Wikipedia page); I had no idea we had any ties to the US at all

• DH's family can be traced back to the 1000's because one of them was mates with William the Conqueror

• DH's family is full of Barons, Sirs, Lords and Sherriffs of Nottingham. Some of them have marble tombs and oil paintings

• Mine were poor as fuck, many died in the Irish famine, some lived in Liverpool slums, some died in workhouses. The ones that had a 'good' life still worked down the pits and raised lots of children in just two or three rooms

• In one branch mine eventually trace back to Scottish crofters near Aberdeen (also poor) trying to make ends meet for 10 kids off 7 acres of land

• One very sad suicide with that I think now would've been PND

• Lots of deportations to Australia and time in prison for petty crimes like stealing a chicken (probably to eat) on my poor side

Anyone else?

What does 1939 registry show?

I'm not especially emotional so I've been surprised at how much understanding the poverty my ancestors were in has impacted me.

In the late 1800s in the Liverpool slums they would have been living in one room, with dirt floors, sleeping on a bed of straw and rags on the floor. They'd have shared a toilet (basically a hole in the ground, not a proper loo) with up to 100 other people. They would have had a diet of basically potatoes and a bit of milk. Every single day.

And every day after sleeping all together on rags and eating just potatoes and milk they had to work 12-14 hour days doing hard labour, pretty much every day without holidays.

I took my research back to 1700s through family records.

FFS we are all related to each other. There is no escape.

Thanks Prokupatuscrakedatus it's not the nazi heritage that troubles me, especially now I know it was a myth, it's the very recent tragedy of my dad never having any family, the sad life his mother led and not really knowing how I would deal with it, if and when we ever uncovered any living relatives.
It's strange how the tragic lives of people you never knew existed can still bring grief.

Was it expensive to find all this out OP?
I'd like to have a go for my own family tree.

No, I think Ancestry.com is about £10-12 per month?

You can cancel at any time and your tree and everything you found is still available, it just means you can't do any serious research.

--I don't work for Ancestry

The 1939 census or whatever it was called shows all the same details as a normal census. It was a one off done just before WWII, presumably so they knew who they could call up(?)

I did an Ancestry DNA test to help with brick walls on my mum's side as dad is adopted so assumed I'd just have a bunch of matches that I wouldn't be able to connect on his side.
Matched with his cousin and now know my grandmother's name.

Also, DH and I grew up an hour apart and both his parents grew up even further away from mine but found that his GGG grandfather lived down the road from my GG Grandfather. I was blown away.

This is DH's 16th GGM (while mine were trying not to starve)

@Ihaventgottimeforthis

Having a look at family history made me (and HCPs) realize were the disposition for AS, ADHD, depression and BC come from. I managed to collect 3 of 4.
On a lighter note I've got the scan were my ancestor went to the mairie in Friesland and declared than form now on he and his family will carry the family name x (my name). His siblings all chose different names, to make my life more interesting.

Jenfur....I'm hoping to do the DNA test soon.

It will be interesting to see if it stacks up with the research...in which case I should be English/Irish/Scottish.

Does it give you any idea of what your background is over time?

So I know I'm Scottish back to 1500s in one branch but before that they could have been native Celts or Vikings for example?

We found a 3x g grandfather who died falling off a pit chimney stack while drunk. The report into his death basically said he was drunk and showing off to his mates how he could run round the top of the chimney. I guess it was a thick chimney? Or he was just thick, who knows. It's funny, it's stupid, it's sad. He left a wife and 4 children under 5.

Apart from that mine are all coal miners as far back as we can tell. My dad was the last one.

Ooh, she’s fancy.

I have some ancestors like that in my tree, but many more who were poor or average.

The one I always feel sad about is a wee Victorian relative who died aged 10 of an ear infection, just a few months after his mother and baby sister had died in childbirth. I realise it’s a completely typical story but somehow it’s upsettingly vivid to me to imagine him in pain from the sore ear, and wanting his mother I just want to go into the past and comfort him.

Ahhh, it’s set me off again now 😩

I do love the history-detective process though, even if it makes me a bit irrational.

My 4x great grandmother's first husband stole a horse on the morning of their wedding and was sentenced to be hanged. This was commuted to Transportation to Tasmania, and he was apparently never heard of again.

Meanwhile his wife gave birth to their daughter and moved in with my 4x great grandfather. They lived together for 30 years and had 6 children before they eventually got married.

The vicar of their village in kept notes on all the parishioners, noting who was related to who and how many of their children were enrolled in Sunday School.

My family were mostly miners and agricultural labourers. I was shocked at the number of babies born out of wedlock, and that the mothers normally married after, they weren't shunned by the community. Found all the inter family marriages fascinating. Most illustrious family member, though the links are not proven enough to my satisfaction, is Nancy Astor. And also the person who started the Pudding Club at some Inn in the Cotswolds. That's more like it! 😀 I had a huge number of family members living in those small cottages in the pretty Cotswold villages that are now worth a fortune. They had huge families and I boggle at how they coped.

Most of my family were textile mill workers, I haven't come across anyone particularly wealthy or famous. I did come across a really sad part of my family tree - my great great grandmother died shortly after giving birth to twins. She was only in her early twenties and had a young toddler as well (my great grandma), one of the babies died a few days later from malnutrition. My GG grandfather remarried and emigrated to Canada and his new wife also died in childbirth, along with their baby daughter.
I found this so much more emotional as I knew my great grandma well and it was so different to just seeing names and dates on a page and not having a real person to connect it to.

All of it, really. I didn’t know who my dad was until we matched on ancestry, and I’m still piecing the maternal line together.

Currently absorbed by my Sephardi ancestors (about 2-5% of my dna) who were forced to convert or leave Spain or be executed - mine went to Spanish and maybe also British colonial America where they eventually melted in with other European settlers (about 70% of me) and indigenous people and African slaves (the rest).

My dd and both my parents recently did the ancestry dna test. It confirmed links with other family trees on ancestry that I thought we were connected to but wasn’t completely sure - until now. So that’s been useful. It also gave them % of where their ancestry came from, some was quite specific ie Ireland/Scotland others more general - eg Northern Europe. My mum was very impressed that my dad has a bit of viking dna as apparently she’s always fancied a viking 😂 (they are in their 80s)

We found that aunts had different dads to the one we thought, that once we owned a brewery but disinherited to marry the woman he loved! (It still exists and have tried the beer and met distant relatives)

We could get any further back as one side ends in Germany (records lost) and the other in slums in London associated with immigrants then, we suspect the Genoa area of now Italy but can't find definitive records

Does it give you any idea of what your background is over time?

Yeah, ancestry.com shows you the migrations (now called ‘additional communities I think) and if you link your tree to the dna results it all falls into place.

23andme also have a timeline showing you roughly when ancestors from each region were born - I found this also really helped, showing me where to look and at which generation etc

I found out that I hail from Ireland
Now that was a surprise
On both sides too

My Dad always said he came from fishermen because his ancestors always lived in Great Yarmouth, with one even moving to Hull.

He got the places right but as far as I've found out, not a single one of them were fishermen. None. The one that moved to Hull only went to finish his apprenticeship as a baker and then moved back less than a year later. The women weren't involved in the industry either.

How can a family live in a major fishing port for 300 years and avoid having any part in it . Nobody even joined the bloody Navy!

@stucknoue - did the brewery start with a B? I know someone who had a brewery in their family but there'd been a split in the family and all connection had been lost.

My biggest surprised was the illegitimate babies that were tagged on and brought up as the grandparents, or aunties, youngest child. One was someone who was still alive and I felt sick because it had never ever been mentioned. Thankfully she popped round and told me on the quiet that she knew her mum was actually her gran, and her sister her mum, and she’d really rather I didn’t mention it to anyone because there were reasons other than illegitimacy.

My Gr-Gr grandad was widowed. It appears his young sister in law moved in to care for his children and they went on to have 6 illegitimate children together before marrying.

My gr-granny lost 7 children to measles, 1 to bronchitis and 1 from a horrible accident in childhood. It totally changed my opinion on her as I remembered her as a bitter, angry old lady and now I realise she actually was pretty amazing to even get out of bed in the morning after that.

The funniest was one of my gr-grandads getting sent to military prison for a week for losing his jumper! In the records it turned out they were so serious because he’d been using it as a football goalpost then forgot to pick it up.

Interesting. My step grandad did a whole family tree and it is on a website somewhere but unfortunately, it doesn't have details of what they did or where they lived, just names. He did get a whole remaining side of the family together once though. I like to know the detail but then I am no longer legally part of that family so I feel like it isn't my past, either. I might need to do my own research on my mother's side. My father side we are estranged from so that would be difficult. I imagine that ours would be interesting and connect with quite a few of you as I am Australian. That would be weird!