who do you think you are

All I can say is that I would not like to get on the wrong side of Anne Ried. I felt so sorry for the historian who dared to tell her that her ancestor had been found guilty of forgery and transported.

Yes, surprised the historian wasn't sentenced to 14 years in Van Diemen's Land!

I have just watched WDYTYA and I was gobsmacked at Anne Reid's reaction to her GGGF being a convict. She is old enough to appreciate that punishment was different in those days and to say that she wanted to kill the people who punished him was just infantile.
She really has not done herself any favours appearing on the programme, I think the BBC should have pulled out of this one.

And it was just about one person - again.

It's not that unusual to have a relative who was transported, although perhaps more unusual if he/she was a direct ancestor.

I expect the producers found it very exciting to travel to Tasmania at our expense.

Well I have just watched the Anne Reid episode and I thought she was bit stupid to be honest.

The fact he forged his FIL signature and got caught was his fault, he was an alcoholic and yet she thought he walked on water.

No. He was a drunk who didn't look after his family and was a criminal which in turn caused him to be removed from his children. As mentioned he did it to his own family , which were her family too. She didn't seem to grasp that point .

A bit of wally to me and I thought when she said she was a person who looks for revenge I thought hmmm, I can see that in you.

Still feel the same as I posted before, this series and the last are not as good as when it started.

I was surprised that she didn't grasp that his parents in law were equally her ancestors and that she should be very pleased that they were there and able to look after the children when he was totally irresponsible.
It is a shame that the present series latches onto one individual and doesn't give the broad picture. I would have liked to know more about the children, the wife and the in-laws of John Reid. Had we had that I think that Anne Reid might have come to very different conclusions.

Ah - but there has to be an excuse to fly someone out to Australia! Nothing better to spend our licence fee on!

Fascinating episode tonight with the very brave and amazing journalist Gardner.

He turns out to be descended from William I as, I seem to remember did Alexander Armstrong when he was on the programme.

Perhaps we all are!!

Frank Gardner was very interesting. He didn't say anything stupid when he learnt that his obviously innocent ancestor was beheaded a la Anne Reid!

The fact that he proved a belief held by his recently deceased mother made the programme more enjoyable.

I enjoyed the F Gardner prog. But if W the Conqueror was an ancestor so were a large number of other people. Going backwards it keeps doubling, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024.......so interesting but somewhat misleading. That's 10 generations and I believe Frank's line went back 23.

I enjoyed this week's programme. I don't think I have any monarchs on my family tree. How interesting that the 'came over with the Normans' story has persisted in Frank Gardener's family. I know someone who swears she can prove her descent from Vikings; I am a bit sceptical.

My grandchildren can.
Two of them have a Danish mother whose parents can trace back to real Viking blood; the other two have a Norwegian grandfather who can do similarly.

Good programme - reminded me why I started watching the series; after the Anne Reid one I almost stopped.

I've been watching some of the American version on Watch. They make a pleasant change of perspective, apart from the adverts. I've never heard of some of the subject's but it's usually still interesting.

I must be the only one who enjoyed the Anne Reid one. I love colourful characters, who say things that make other people react, - rather like the grans really. There are one or two grans who do the same and it never fails to create a reaction -

It was fascinating! And, I always knew that Frank Gardner would be a nice man!

Haven't seen Frank Gardener yet though.

I liked the fact that it got beyond one person.
I expect that when we get back to the 29x greats we could often get back to royalty when they double each time.

I agree with HildaW I really didn't like Anne Reid very much at all. Enjoyed Frank Gardener last night although they were all a bit too "posh" for me.

I am very fortunate to be able to go back to the early 1800's in my own family without even trying. My grandma kept everything. War records, birth certificates, marriage certificates, brass rubbings, maps of where to find gravestones, old pay packets and thousands upon thousands of amazing photographs all of which we have talked about over the years making it quite easy to put names to faces. There's one thing for certain, there won't be any royal blood in my family !

This goes to show that those whose families had money and influence centuries back have left more records of their existence than those who are poor.

We all have family going back to the time of the Norman conquest and before we just did not make it to national records.

In my family I had a few literate ancestors in Cheshire in the 18 century. famers with a bit of land whose children had an education and were in business. The Ag labs and framework knitters on the other side left little trace other than parish records.

Enjoyed Frank Gardener interesting and informative. Obviously a "posh" family but not without its trials and misfortunes. A GG who was in an asylum and an ancestor who was beheaded, fascinating stuff.

I do not hold his "posh" against him - he just seemed a nice guy - that will do for me! And he was clearly very devoted to his Mum and was missing her.

On of DH's sayings is that everyone has their cross to bear and, in this case, being 'posh' didn't help much.