Genealogy Chat

Condolences on your loss Chris. Give yourself time to grieve and cherish your memories <3

Chris .............

so sorry to hear of your loss. xxxxx

Take care of yourself now.

I am coming back to my post today, with apologies to those who have kindly posted their experiences, as it has been my first opportunity to post on the Forum since recent events.

My Dad, my Avatar, sadly died Friday 15th February 2019 in a battle against Pancreatic Cancer bravely fought. He died peacefully with his family around him.

Chris

How lovely for you Chris. My story is from the start of my family tree in 2006. When I started I found that my gt grandfather, base born had a sister Chritiana. Can you imagine my surprize when someone sent me a picture of her. My eyes filled with tears on that day. Sadly though I never found one of my gt grandfather at the same time.

Later I received a picture of a gt aunt and sitting next to her is a man who I think maybe gt grandad. He is so like his son who I have a picture of. I would like to think so anyway and as I have been sent pictures of the family it always brings a tear to my eye.

When I was young my father was a builder and up on his dump at the end of the garden mum had thrown out a lot of my nans stuff from our loft. There were two painting on glass of a man and a woman but the woman was broken. I kept the picture of the man and later found out that it was my gt grandfather on my paternal side. I still have this picture and have been able to copy it and send it to relatives. I wish now I had dug deeper into that pile of things.

I'm still kicking myself for the mistake I made when clearing my parents house. There were 2 boxes of old photos, one labelled with my father's original home town, & the other with my mother's name.

Like a fool, I combined the boxes to save space. I've regretted it ever since.

Some of my father's have been identified by my father's cousin. She also allowed me to copy ones she had. She also had one of her grandmother (my grt grandmother) which was fantastic.

From my mother's photos, we've identified a few but not many. A contact & I shared the studio portraits we had of our great grandmothers who were sisters. They could have been twins - well, it does run in the family!
Although my mother allowed us to borrow a snap of her mother, it was so tiny that we managed to lose it. It was the only one she had :-0

My mother, when she was dying, wanted a copy of 'Granny with the white cat'. Thankfully her younger sister had it & was able to send a copy.

My cousin, some 25 years older & the daughter of the eldest Aunt, has inherited the majority of the family photos. I'm hoping that I'll be allowed to pick over them when her loft is eventually cleared.

I had quite a few family photos that I found in a drawer after my father died. Unfortunately I only had a short time to search the house as this was in 1971, and I had only 10 days in the UK. My brother was still alive then, and he did do a bigger search, and one of his daughters took all the photos from that drawer 'os she didn't want to throw them away.

Some of them included people I didn't know, but had heard about (eg, "the group we holidayed with during the '30s") ... I didn't know the names, but I could find my parents in the group. I'm not sure that my niece would ahve that knowledge, so any photos that she took like that have probably been thrown out.

I've posted several photos from that collection on here as my avatar at various times ...... my mother and grandmother plus my grandmother alone on the beach in Scarborough, both photos taken around 1928/1930.

I also found my current avatar photo of my grandmother and myself in 1945 in that drawer, although what I've shown is just a part of the whole photo.

But it was a cousin who had the best ........ she had studio photos of my paternal grandparents who were both dead by the time I was born, and a studio photo of the 4 eldest of their children as youngsters. I now have those photos, and my father (the 4th born) is just a baby sitting on a fur rug on top of a wooden support, in a dress and white pinafore!!

I had the fun of providing a second cousin in Australia with photos of her paternal great grandparents when I sent her copies of the above photo of my grandparents.

She was over the moon, as she had never known much of her family beyond her mother and aunts. I think she could remember her maternal grandmother and possibly grandfather as they both also emigrated to Australia. I am going to be sending her much more information on the family.

I have to say that I was not so happy when she posted the 2 photos on FB for all and sundry to see ...... she did it so that sisters and children could see the photos, but I think she does not have a "private" site on there.

Isn't it just great, when we can put faces to these people from the past? I'm really pleased for all of you.

My paternal grandfather left his home area in West Sussex to work as a shipwright in Portsmouth dockyard. He then raised his family there and although my parents visited extended family back in Sussex in 1930s, there were no photos handed down and great grandfather was long dead by that time.

Through family history research,I was delighted to be put in touch with other descendants, who were able to share stories and one lady had several family photos. There is a lovely one of great grandfather, born 1843 with 4 of his sons, probably taken around the turn of 19 / 20th C.... so good to see.

There must be many photos thrown away because nobody knows who they are, so perhaps we can all help, by recording what WE know, so that those after us have a record. This was brought home to me recently, when showing my nephew the great grandfather photo and explaining who everyone was. He took a photo of my copy and then made sure he too identified each person, otherwise the people would be unknown in years to come.

I'm thrilled for you.

I had a similar experience recently when a cousin, going through my grandmother's effects that had been left in the care of an uncle who is now sadly deceased, found photos of two sets of our mutual great great grandparents, and some of our great grandparents, including one of a great great gran on her 100th birthday, and shared them with me and a sister of mine who was also interested.

Copies of the photos are now proudly framed and displayed.

I certainly have Chris and found it quite a moving experience.

I had never seen a picture of my maternal grandfather who died in his 50s before my Mum and Dad were married. Nor had I ever seen a photo of my Mum before the age of about 30.

A couple of years ago my cousin was doing some clearing out after her parents had died and found a photo of our grandparents with three of their children. She sent me and my brother a copy each.

One or the children was our aunt, probably aged about 17, one was my cousin's father at about the age of 5 and the other was my mother, aged around 11. It was wonderful seeing what my mother looked like as a girl and particularly seeing the grandfather I never knew. I was immediately sure I would have loved him - he looked so gentle and smiley.

The photo is now framed and hanging on our landing wall so I see it every time I go up the stairs.

I have been researching both my paternal and maternal lines for over 15 years....Where did the years go :-0

Until now I have had many contacts on my Dad's line, one in particular where we have shared research and skills (online and in record offices) and got us back, confirmed and sourced, to the early 16th century. That line were landed and we even have photos of their portraits!.

Mum side were definitely not of the same league.....In fact even photos of my direct ancestors stopped at my Grandparents :-(

I have always been fascinated by maternal GGrandfather and have spent many hours and cash (before certain research resourses came online) looking into his life.

I have had contact with my own cousins who remember him but no photos....Contact with the GGrandchildren of his second marriage but again no photos.

Today I saw the face of my maternal GGrandfather for the first time thanks to a recent contact who is a half cousin (through the second marriage)...And spookily he looks just as I imagined he would.

Am I stupid to have shed tears :-S

Has anyone experienced something similar?

Chris