Genealogy Chat

See below in a minute

I love all the little bits of detail that add to the mental picture I have of my ancestors: I received a copy my gr gr grandfather’s Will yesterday (dated 1854) – in it he refers to his wife as “my dear wife Elizabeth”. They would have been married for about 30 years by this time. I’m wondering if they married for love and were still in love after all that time. On the other side of the tree I had an e-mail a while back from a distant cousin who quoted a letter written by his grandmother (to someone else) in which she mentioned her father’s brothers – one of them was called Tom. This Tom is my gr grandfather. In my tree (and in my mind) he’s been Thomas all this time and I thought of him as one of those upright noble types – he was an East End gunsmith so you get the picture (LOL). If I think of him as Tom I picture him as more of an East Ender and the upright noble bit seems to go out of the window – a bit of a lovable rogue? Jill

I laughed out loud at my 5 x GGM's Will. Ten children, pillars of the community - except for one daughter who had erm, blotted her copybook not once, but twice, and still no husband in sight. Mother leaves everyone money, except '...and to my daughter Sarah I leave my bed in my parlour and my bedhangings and my bedlinen and all appurtenances thereto, for she hath need of it' LOL OC

Hi OC Brilliant - it's great when their humour comes across and grabs you like that!! Jill

Oh yes, When we went one one of my wife's 'granny hunts' some years ago we met up with one of her 2c1r's who told us a story. When he was a boy his father had an old car with an augha-augha horn (OC and Clive will know!). They used to take an elderly rellie out for a drive at times. I can imagined elderly chap posing in his best Sunday suit, looking so serious, for a photograph. Story was that he loved that horn and at every opportunity, instructed the driver to 'Hootle-tootle Henry'. Presumably he had a great laugh at the consternation caused to the unsuspecting pedestrians or cyclists. The kids gave him the nick-name 'hootle-tootle-henry'. So we guess he was a character rather than a pompous old git.

Bernie fell off my perch at 'OC and Clive will know'! Yes I do know exactly what you mean - had a car which would tootle very well when I was young. However coming after reading discussions or rod, poles and perches and whether destitute kids should be sent to the colonies just made it funnier. (OC and I are both on soap boxes albeit slightly different ones). Clive

My step grandmother's Will makes me wonder what had happened in the family. Written in 1933, many things are itemised and left to her several children....including to a named son, ......& my forgiveness for the unpleasantness he caused in 1932. Whatever had he done? Gwyn