Have you proved or disproved any family stories?

What a great memento for the family archives gracesmum

I always watch the Dunkirk programmes to see if my uncle Maurice is visible, I know he was there and came back on the last big ship to leave...I haven't managed to find what ship it was though.

The first thing I knew about my family history before starting research was something my grandfather had told me when I was very young. He said that his grandfather had been a coachman for a big house. Naturally I had romantic visions of some stately home. In the event it turned out that he was indeed a coach driver (domestic) though the house wasn't as grand as I'd imagined. He'd started out as a horse keeper/trainer and many in the family went on to work with horses one way or another: blacksmiths, horse drivers in the pits etc. Given the general standard of living amongst my ancestry any private house of any size would have appeared "grand".
There is a horse breeder/trainer of the same surname now, probably related to us - the name is quite unusual - though I have not been in contact.

The only other thing I knew was never mentioned by my father - for fairly obvious reasons - and it was my mother who told me after dad died. Both of his parents had been illegitimate. I have no way of finding out who their fathers were which leaves me with two dead ends. In one case it seems a local farmer had given his name for the birth certificate but the story goes that he wasn't the actual father.

The mother was said to have gone to America leaving her little son behind with his grandparents. I have still to find out about this. Not only do I not know what year she went, or where from, but also her name was a very common one - the passenger lists have many of that name - but certainly the child, my paternal grandfather, was raised by the grandparents. The same applied to his future wife, my paternal grandmother. They both died before I was born.

I did my family tree whilst I was living in Turkey and it helped to keep me sane. My mother had done her father's tree but got stuck at 1831. She knew another name came into it somewhere but thought that there must be bigamy in the family. I found some others investigating the same tree and they helped me with this. It turned out that the father born in 1786 had become a father at rather an early age and the first child was born out of wedlock (my ggg ? grandfather). The result was that the first child took his mother's name. After this for a generation or so all the children used their mother's name but they eventually reverted to the male last name. Mystery solved.

There were always rumours that the same family was involved with smuggling. After long research by another researcher we were able to link my bit of the family to another tree with the same name. It transpired that this ancestor was indeed implicated in smuggling as he ran an inn. He was reputed to be involved with several gangs. The stranger thing was he disappeared in 1749 and no trace of him since.

I still have one family rumour to have a good look at but I don't think this one will ever be solved as the name Jones is involved.

I didn't come across any other major tales but I is possible my father's family were RC at one point because he was married twice, once at Kidderminster and on the same day in a private chapel.

I would like to go back to it at some point but I reckon I'll have to go local record hunting unles the info I'm after is on the 'net by then.

Happy Hunting

I discovered my Granny was two years younger than she claimed when her elder sister (100 years old and something of a village celebrity) mentioned her in a local newspaper interview. Then I got her birth certificate. I expect she was embarrassed at having got pregnant married so young!

My MIL always thought her father was in the Cavalry during WW1. His army records show he was a groom at the Cavalry Barracks, an important role, but not the gallant officer on horseback that his stories led her to believe.

When I started researching my family, a cousin said it would be nice to find there was a Lord or Noble in the family. Well, I have given up counting how many there were. I have confirmed that we were part of the army that arrived in 1066 and strangely, the family have personally served every King and Queen of England from William to Elizabeth 2. Many old 'stories' were found to be very true.

I now run a World Wide website for the family and answer many questions.

When I started researching my family, a cousin said it would be nice to find there was a Lord or Noble in the family. Well, I have given up counting how many there were. I have confirmed that we were part of the army that arrived in 1066 and strangely, the family have personally served every King and Queen of England from William to Elizabeth 2. Many old 'stories' were found to be very true.

I now run a World Wide website for the family and answer many questions.

What an interesting thread!

There was a story that someone in my father's family made a lot of money and then went into the church.

My brother has been researching the family tree and found a great great uncle who seems to have had money (still not found how) and went to London where he set up refuges for the poor where they could find a bed and be fed. So far as we can tell he never actually became a minister but was very religious.

I have found that the years I have spent researching my family tree solve some mysteries and throw up many others. I am now having to prune the tree and put some stories onto a website for future generations. At least we do not have to slog around record offices and churches any more.