AIBU to expect to be asked in person - sorry a bit long.

[ModreB]

My family has a very old family bible, with the names of all my mothers family, dates of birth and death written in it. The oldest entry is dated 1807. This bible is in my posession, and it will eventually be given to my eldest son. It is a very precious family artifact and has been handed down to the eldest son/grandchild in each generation. I am the eldest grandchild in my generation.

My youngest uncle's wife, and her daughter, my cousin, for some unknown reason do not speak to me, ever. I have no idea what I have done to offend them, but it started with the mother when I had my DS2 - she just stopped speaking to me. This was over 19 years ago.

I never got to the bottom of it, and to be honest don't care. The cousin has told my other aunt that it is because of something I said to her - but I have no idea what I am supposed to have said and she declines to enlighten me. No other family members can recall anything that I might have said either. She does not speak to me to the extent that when greeted at family events, she will turn her back to me rather than acknowledge a "Hello".

She does have form for this, and has not spoken to her own sister for over 20 years.

Anyway, the cousin has asked my eldest son if she can take the family bible as she is doing some sort of family research. My son then asked me.

I have decided, after speaking to other family members, no, she can't take the bible, as I don't think that it will come back, (There is a history of things being taken and not returned) but that I will scan the relevant pages for her.

So, AIBU to think that if she wants me to scan the pages, she can ask me herself or am I being a petty cow?

Scan the pages.

YANBU to want her to ask you herself, but is it really worth the drama?

Even if you've done it all yourself, one thing YABU is the fact that all she has to do is ask and she can have the completed research, kind of misses the point. My Uncle has traced our family back a long way, spent a lot of time and effort tracing our roots. It would be easy for me to ring up and save myself the bother, but actually, I am rather enjoying finding out for myself.

It does all sound very petty and I don't think YABU, but life's too short, just scan the pages, give them to your son, pretend you've done him a favour rather than her and all is calm again.

aldi I have done that, and sent the scanned copies. Which they have recieved without any thanks to me but admitted via a 3rd party.

What they are asking for is the originals, sent to them without guarantee of return. I will happily allow any access that they want, but they are not getting the originals.

If you allow them access to the originals I would be prepared for them to try and steal something from them if I were you. Don't leave them unsupervised. And even supervised, they may still manage to take something if they are determined enough. And they probably won't see it as stealing either, just as taking something that belongs to the family and so is rightfully theirs to take.

My brother sold his house many years ago now and some relatives of his girlfriend, who had recently died, booked a viewing the the agent and managed to steal a lot of things from the house even while being shown around by the agent. For example, they followed him down the stairs and took pictures off the wall and put them into a bag they were carrying. Nothing in the house actually belonged to her, some of it didn't even belong to my brother as it was sold to him part furnished, so it wasn't like they were taking anything with sentimental memories of her. But they felt they had a right to access to the house and were angry at him for selling it.

I agree you just say NO as many times as needed. This person sounds toxic and not to be trusted at all. You have already done more than she deserves by sending the scanned entries.

I would scan all the stuff you have while its still possible (you said some of it was faded) and then get it stored somewhere safe. Even my late DH's birth certificate from the late 50's is no longer legible

And just ignore the loons

Why do they want the bible and suitcase so badly? Its pretty easy to trace family trees nowadays online without the use of family items. All seems a little odd to me, and you have done exactly the right thing in not giving them direct access. Im wondering if theres something in the bible and suitcase which could benefit them in other ways? Money and toxicity tend to run in tandem! Good luck OP

Regardless of the non-speaking, it'd be very unusual to release an original family Bible when scanned copies are more than enough for the sort of genealogical research other members of the family will be doing. Everything is done on a computer and you just need paper copies for verification of information.

As it happens, DP is the custodian of his family bible (he's been doing genealogy long before it became fashionable) and admittedly, while we don't have non-speakers in the family, nobody would dream of asking for this valuable resource to be parcelled up and sent off on a potential damaging journey when a scan is actually more useful. Alternatively, if we have family visiting, and they need to check some fact that isn't already available from the umpteen useful sources now online they might look at the bible and any other useful documents while they are here. But even if they look at the Bible, they don't want to take it anywhere because copies of the relevant entries are more useful and nobody wants to risk damaging the Bible.

In your case, OP, this relative has a fucking cheek of epic proportions. I'd sent a polite but short message along the lines of: "It is not possible to send you the original source material you have demanded but I have made copies which are enclosed". Then ignore any further demands.