Genealogy Chat

Personally, it was because I didn't feel I had family to speak of (my mum had me out of wedlock and is still embarrased that I exist, her control freak husband doesnt like the fact she's got a past. My biological dad, who I met for the first time aged 23, is ok for a laugh but has millions of kids by millions of women lol. He's not family orientated, I've not seen him for 18 months) so I suppose I wanted to 'fit in', and feel I belonged to someone. My non-biological grandparents were fantastic, loving people, but have now sadly passed away. Now Ive come to realise that my true family is my wonderful husband and 3 children.

Good morning Rebekka, Sad story, but your tone is very positive. The reason I started my research is because I had not asked any question whilst my relatives were alive. i wanted to know where I had come from. Did I have a Lord, Knight, even a King in my makeup!!!!!!! I have found none of these, but have found that all sides of my family are of working stock, three sides from the bad areas of east London in the very early 1800s, and one side from a very rural Bedfordshire. I have read Charles Dickins and not been over confident that he wrote about the 'real' Victorian era, but the info I have been getting points to just how bad the housing was, how the women had a baby every two years and in between having a baby and carrying the next one, she has a child die. I can now thank my lucky stars that their struggle has given me a much understanding of what they had to endure. I have a lot of 'bones' to my history, I now am searching for the flesh to round it up. I can now add family stories that make them come alive again, I have met distant rellies and we have exchanged certificates and info that each of us did not have. I cannot see any end to this hobby, and that will keep me well and truely occupied for many years to come. kathlyn

Hi Rebekah, I started because I personally didn,t know anything about my ancesters, I also didn,t enquire of my relatives (had better things to do) I have a granddaughter now and intend to get as much information and arrange it into a book of some sort, perhaps she wont forget me so quickly then. Rod

Hi Rebekah, I started mine just over 3 years ago. Unfortunately I lost my Mum and Dad just as I started. I already knew lots about my relatives but have still uncovered things like my Great Great Grandad was married 3 times. My Gran had a sister who died just before she was born at 16 months and she was named after her and my Great Grandads brother married two of his wifes (my Great Grandma's sisters). I love it lol Linda

I began because my knowledge of my tree was so imbalanced......I knew lots about my mum's family, have trunks of photos, and Victorian memorabilia and furniture, paintings, handiwork etc etc....you name it, we have it!....but on dad's side I didn't even know my grandparents names, had never seen their photos or knew where they lived etc. Needless to say, I still know more about mum's tree, but I have a photo of dad as a child with his parents, which no one in the family believed existed as my grandfather didn't like cameras! Merry

I started because there is a hereditary genetic condition in my family called Dystonia and I’d always wondered where it came from. I have it and my mum had it and I assumed it was through her father who died when she was a baby and about whom literally nothing is known. After his death Nan had nothing to do with his family. Other than her parents, one brother and one sister Nan never spoke of family so I assumed there was no aunts, uncles or cousins etc. I was shocked to discover that her father was the youngest of eight and between them they had 43 kids meaning Nan had 40 cousins!!! In three generations I’ve found cases of Dystonia, MS, Parkinson’s Disease and Motor Neurone Disease….all neurological conditions so it does make you wonder…...I’ve only just started looking at Nan’s mother’s family and that looks like it was a big one too! What I like about this hobby is that you never know where it’s going to take you and one thing I have learned is “Never Assume Anything”!!

Lol Merry! Thats lovely Rod...if more people considered a book; or even any way of compiling their family history, I'm sure their grandchildren/great grandchildren etc would remember them better. And of course, pass everything on to THEIR children.

hi rebekah, i started my family search back in the early 70s i would get on the underground train from edgware middx and go to holborn to st. cathrine's house i got my g/fathers b/cert my g/g/fathers b/cert and his m/cert then i stopped. as it was costing me to much £11 for the certs and then train fare as well then my hubby bought me a comp for my birthday last sept and so i stared to do it again, i found out that my grandmother on my dads side died when i was 9yrs old i felt cheated that i was'nt told that i'd had a grandmother i asked my sister about her and she said that my mum and dad never spoke to his mum hazel.

My cousins husband had a go, got totally in a pickle , having spent a small fortune and was asked if i'd have a look and try and sort it out. Got back about 4 more generations whilst he was busy rotating round Croyden looking for one son ,still scratching his noddle! Jess

Lol Jess :-)

I suppose I started because I was a square peg in a round hole, so to speak, as far as my family was concerned. I spent my teenage years dreaming that I was either adopted (and therefore the love child of a Russian Princess, naturally) or that my mother had brought the wrong child home from hospital. I wanted to know why I was so different from my known family - not in looks, there cannot be the slightest doubt that I am the child of my parents, but why did I have such a different personality, why did I instinctively like the nicer things of life and so on. It has been a most interesting and informative exercise, which will never be finished. I find that on the one hand I come from cultured people who were natural leaders in the community, and from sturdy wholesome farming stock on the other hand (mostly sluts it appears LOL!). This helps to explain my peculiar character (to me, anyway) and although I never did fit in with my immediate family, I can closely identify with those long gone, particularly old Gilbert Holden who crashed around Lancashire in a towering rage, giving away all his land to the peasants, so that neither his son nor the Church could get their hands on it! And to the farmer's wife, whose jewellery fetched over £400 after her death - a fortune in 1801. OC

I think it was because I knew very little of my Mom's side of the family.Her parents both died before I was born and Mom's only sister died 16 years before Mom was born. Only relatives I can remember on her side are my great unlce Joe (original desert rat) and great aunty Gladys (both now deceased) Where as my Dad's side I have Aunts and uncles lots of cousins and can remember my grandad (died when I was 7) and my Nan (died when I was 21). I'm still pretty new to this only having started in Feb this year but am hooked.Whenever I find a bit more info I can't wait to tell my Mom and Dad and anyone else who will listen for that matter. Linda

Why did I start? Well I fell into it by accident of course (the story of my life, let me tell you!!). I was busy nosing round on friends reunited and had got fed up with that so clicked on the link to bring me here. After nosying round a bit more, I remembered that saying about putting your name on the internet and something would be there and wondered if it applied to this site yes, it did!! I quickly checked my brother and sister's names and lo and behold they were both there. I then realised it was my aunty who had emigrated to Canada some 20 odd years previously who'd put us on. Well that was enough excitement for me ....................................... but it didn't get me started. The next day I came back to this site and wondered through the trying to find pages - mostly seeing how things didn't work!! I eventually realised what I had to do to find specific people and started going through the names I knew off the top of my head. Suddenly a message sprang out at me 'Looking for the Stretford Paynes' and a long list of names I knew nothing about or had ever heard of before. Now I have quite a wicked sense of humour, and I very much tongue in cheek sent a message saying 'Oh, we're the Paynes of Stretford, it must be us, there can only be one' NEVER, for one second, imagining getting a response - afterall, the original message had been posted about 2 years previously. Well, the rest as they say is history. It turned out to be my dad's cousin who no-one knew of (her father moved away when he returned from WWII), I was so pleased to be able to introduce her to her remaining cousin (my dad having died 4 years previously) and consequently other family members. But she was then able to tell me about her granddad and give me a photo of him in his uniform. This was enough to pique my interest and I eventually went on to tell her far more about her granddad than she'd already discovered. I also went on to having no life, no money and no time for anything else other than this hobby which I love! Seriously, I have met through this hobby some lovely people (both in real life and on this board). It has given me the push to go back to night school to take an evening classe. It allowed me to have a purpose to get out of the house to the family history meetings (ok, it's only once a month, but I'm a saddo, what more can I say?). But most of all, it's given me the side of my family I never knew.

I started mine before my mum passed away 2 years ago she would sit down and talk about not knowing much of her dads side of the family as he left when my mum was just a kid, and she was an only child, so when mum passed away me & my sister set out to find out what we could and on asking my dad questions abouthis family he didnt know any thing so that was another task for us we have managed to go back with both sides a fair way turns out dads side are from kent about 15 miles away. Dawn now drag my children around the churches they enjoy looking around with me

My dad never knew his grandfather and wanted to know who he was, poor dad use to go searching the records office, I told dad wait until I get the computer and Ill help you. Dad only had a couple of clues and one was that his grandfather came from Cornwall and his mother was spanish, turned out his grandfather never even stepped a foot in Cornwall and came from Durham where all the Harrisons were born and dads mum wasnt spanish either she came from Durham also LOL. Dad now has more than he bargained for. Mum wasnt really interested but she helped me and she is also suprised as too how many ancestors she has.

Started my family tree as I knew quite a way back on my adopted family, but nothing on my birth family. Now I am hooked and want to give a blood relative family tree to my children so they know exactly where we come from. Along with this they will have an adopted family tree too as this is also relevant history to me. Pity more people don't leave more information on their history for future generations. Donna

everyone has really nice stories. mine is a bit dull really. I don't actually remember when i starting getting into the family tree. You see my Dad was researching his side of the family and I think he started around the time I was born. I've always asked far to many questions for my own good, and so naturally I was curious as to what dad was doing, so he slowing explained it to me and got me helping him out etc. I love History and especially social history so this was a fab hobby for me. Now I've moved away from home and it's just kind of stuck. I have started looking into my mums side of the family and it's been so much fun and so exciting doing a whole tree on my own without dad there. I am compleatly hooked now and the great thing is that it's pratically never ending. I'm only in my early 20's and i get a few odd looks when people as me what my hobbies are, or what am i doing at the weekend, but i don't care. I'm just thankful that I started this early so that I have been able to speak to the maxium number of living relatives.

Nice thread! I remember Grandma going threough the family photos, telling me about all those sepia-tinted heroes who died in WWI. I remember Grandad telling me how there was an accident at the colliery his Grandad owned, and how the guilt drove him mad and he died in an asylum*. And how Great-grandad went to America and was supposed to send for the rest of the family, but never did. And I drew my first little family trees... And thirty years later when my niece and nephew were doing family tree projects at school, I was the 'family expert', as I'd listened to all those stories, and I got a phone call from my sister... and I realised, for all I was able to help, that I'd forgotten much of what my grandparents had told me. And the ninetieth anniversary of the outbreak of the great war came along, and there were all these stories on the television... and I thought, 'right. Time to do something.' So, it's partly in rememberence of those past, and partly for the future generations. Gordon *He never owned the mine, but he did die in an asylum...

I started about 3 years ago, because I was looking for my birth mother, my father and her split up when I was about a year old, and when I was 3 they divorced. I have never had anything to do with my birth mother and was brought up by my aunt and uncle and am still in contact with my dad. I found her but unfortunately after saying that she did want to be in my life decided that she didn't want any contact with me at all. I've always know that I have 3 brothers and a sister but she never told them anything about me. I Know exactly where they live and one day I will have my chance to get in contact with them. In the mean time I will just have to wait, I promised that I wouldn't get in contact again all the while she was still alive and I won't. But its still upsetting that know that you have been brushed under the carpet as if you never exsisted. On the other hand have had a good life and I wouldn't of changed that for anything. Nicola

I started because I was intrigued by my mother's side of the family. She died when I was 8, and her mother died when she was in her teens. I had some contact with my mum's cousin's, but knew nothing about her family. Ironically, I now have two of mum's lines back to the 1600's, thanks in part to distant cousins on this site, but I can't get my dad's side back beyond his grandparents. Barbara