Have you proved or disproved any family stories?

I too have Bruce as a middle name on my father's side. It was the maiden name of my Gt.Gt Grandmother, she and my Gt Gt Grandad came from Aberdeen, Scotland and settled in Sheffield. Any connection ladies?

I was told by my mother that her grandfather was a spendthrift. That he came into some money and would hire a coach and take his 'cronies' down to London for a good time (this was from Pontefract, Yorkshire) then he went bankrupt (what a suprise!) and went to prison. I have found that he certainly inherited over £200 in the mid-1800s, which was quite a sum then, from an Aunt in Scarborough but obviously didn't keep it because he was living in Lemon Alley, Pontefract, when he died, which I am told by my mother was one of the worst places to live there. I haven't been able to find if he was an inmate at Wakefield prison yet, but hope to one day.

I have an ambrotype photograph of two middle aged men taken in a studio, inherited from his side of the family. Is one of these men my Gt. Grandfather and was it taken on one of his trips to London? It's so intriguing.

Another thing I love about family history is to be able to walk where they walked. On one of my lines I have got back to the 13th Century to a politician and when I take a trip to London and take a tour of Westminster Hall I like to think I am seeing the things he saw (in the parts that are original of course). I like to see where they lived, where they worked, it's taken me all over the country and I've seen places I otherwise wouldn't have seen. This is still a hobby as I work fulltime but I have been doing it for over 30 years and I find it much easier now because of the internet.

Hi
LIke Nano most of my dad's family have the middle name of Bruce, (taking your mothers maiden name as a middle name , whether boy or girl is an old scottish tradition) . My Aunt always told me that my great grandfather was the illegitimate child of Lord Elgin, I traced back , found his birth cert etc proving that he wasn't, but was the son of a farm labourer but she still doesn't believe me, saying it was a cover up.

Nano with reference to Robert Bruce, I am sure you are aware that Robert Bruce never had a son only a daughter so the name would not have come down in the family. Wishful thinking by most of our ancestors, especially for all the American 'Bruce' families.

In my husbands family we found a sad tale. David Reid was a shoemaker in our town and suffered from some unknown ailment . We found records of him being pulled up by what was a union of shoemakers for not paying his dues . This happened several times and then we found his wife going to the guild to ask if she could get his pension when he died ( he was still just alive ) if she paid back what was owing once she started to get his pension. Sadly she was refused and she subsequently died in the poorhouse.

Well my Great Grandmother told stories of a smuggler in the family who was hung…I’ve found the story is correct, there is a person of that name hung for smuggling, but I’m two generations missing that (may) link this person to our family. One day I will have time to get to the records office and may be find out the truth.

Nearil everyone in my dads family has the middle name of Bruce, including me. I was always told that we were related to RobertBruce.

My son has researched our family tree and it is interesting to see stories I thought were fact turning out to be just hearsay. For many years I believed my mother's cousin was married to a hero in the Dambusters, turned out he lived in the same village and everybody talked about him as if he was their relative. My father's cousin was the first civilian to be killed in an air raid in Sunderland.

Those are interesting skeletons to have in the closet, Durhamlady! I wouldn't be upset to discover some colourful characters but so far mine have stayed on the right side of the law. However, I did discover the truth of one story that was the familiar story of a 'maid' taken advantage of at the beginning of the 20c by a well-to-do employer but the truth seems to be an army wife playing away while her husband was in South Africa and having to cover her tracks before he returned.

My mum's family had no interesting stories at all - they didn't talk about the past and the few details they told us were almost spot on. But my dad told me lots of tales that proved to be true but with missing details and sadly by the time I managed to fill in the gaps he was dead and I couldn't tell him...that was hard as no one else was interested in my discoveries...ho hum!

Milliej,
I decided to preview when I realised there is no edit button after a post has been sent. This is the first site I've come across without that facility. I'm not findng it easy to get around this site layout and miss being able to click on a smiley to add it.

I'll have to start previewing my posts, my spelling! that should of course be bred, not bread lol.

Well we've all got 'skeletons in the cupboard' I think! My mother was very proud of her Scottish ancestry although she was geordie born and bread. She used to tell us (with great pride) that she was related to bonnie prince Charlie...but he never married so....;).
I also had a great-grandfather who was a bigamist, seemingly not uncommon way back when, he had a family in Scotland, moved to England where my grandmother was born, left that family here and had another over in the U.S.A.
My husband who never knew his father, researched his family tree and to his brothers horror found out that they weren't of Jewish decent after all. His brother had always had this thing in his head about his dad being Jewish (for some reason) when my husband disproved this...they didn't talk to each other for months! .