Who Do You Think You Are?

Bijou

When we traced our family on my maternal grandfathers side to the late seventeenth century we were upset to learn that they owned plantations in Barbados and were engaged in the slave trade and owned hundreds of slaves. After abolition when they returned to Bristol they were compensated for the number of slaves they owned but theslaves got nothing.

I also discovered that there were slave traders in my family, in the late 1700s/early 1800s, and they made their fortunes in Jamaica. One of them returned to England and lived in a castle in Herefordshire but sadly one of his sisters (my direct ancestor) died in an almshouse in London. How's that for brotherly love! But I like to think that my Gtx5 Grandmother went to London to distance herself from his nefarious lifestyle ....

Tracing your family tree becomes addictive. It certainly did for me.

My family tree on Mum’s side can only go back to her grandparents on one side as they were both abandoned in the work house. I found this very inspiring because , although they were both illiterate, they were great believers in education. My grandfather, their 13th child, became an optician and his son became a doctor. My brother has traced our family back to the 1500s . It is a great thing to do if you can spare the time.

MayBee70

I haven’t seen it yet but it must be good because DD messaged me about it (albeit saying how cool it was and not going into great detail). Does it make him more royal than Danny Dyer was my first thought when I realised what had been uncovered?

I hope so. He'd make a better royal than Danny Dyer!!!

It was a great one to start with. I hope the rest of the series lives up to it!!

On the subject of film reviews, pre pandemic when I used to go to the cinema a lot I made a point of not reading film reviews before I went. But sometimes, having seen the film I wished I had read a review, especially if it was a bit complicated and I didn’t understand it. I’d then have to get it when it came out on dvd and rewatch it. My biggest problem was trying to avoid knowing what happened in series 8 of Game of Thrones given that I didn’t have Netflix and had to wait several months for the dvd to be released. I then picked up a newspaper that had a give away picture of one scene so that was that.

I haven’t seen it yet but it must be good because DD messaged me about it (albeit saying how cool it was and not going into great detail). Does it make him more royal than Danny Dyer was my first thought when I realised what had been uncovered?

As royalty and there linage are very well documented, its much easier to find the information, as for the rest of use we'll just have to make do with badly keeped records and very scratchy handwriting lol

Forgot this was on......guess what i shall watch later today!!! lol. Love it especially if it is a really well known person whose family is being traced.

Grandmagrim regarding Josh's lack of historical knowledge, I have often thought that they must tell the participants to feign ignorance, to allow the experts to explain. Most of the people who take part in WDYTYA are obviously bright and are likely to be aware of well-known historical facts, but I don't suppose that applies to all the viewers.

Talking of spoilers, I don’t know why Amazon allow so many so-called reviews, which in fact are an often lengthy précis of the plot!

When we traced our family on my maternal grandfathers side to the late seventeenth century we were upset to learn that they owned plantations in Barbados and were engaged in the slave trade and owned hundreds of slaves. After abolition when they returned to Bristol they were compensated for the number of slaves they owned but theslaves got nothing.

MayBeMaw

Oh dear - is the word “spoiler” even appropriate?
We’re not talking about who was sent home from Strictly before the so called “Results Show” which we all know is recorded on Saturday or even a “whodunnit” - although the who” is frequently less interesting than the “how” or the”why”.
I recommend that anybody who needs to be kept in suspense also avoid reviews of the “Last night’s TV” type .
The interest for me in WDYTYA lies in the research, the background, the twists and turns , perhaps that is why I have enjoyed A House Through Time so much.
I would not dream of telling anybody when they “should” be watching TV of course or criticising “live” (as it were ) viewing - so there is no need for anybody to be so snippy

Josh talked about some of his discoveries on The Last Leg last Friday.
Many years ago when we were living with the military we got Match of the Day on Monday, a friend decided he wouldn't look at any news outlets so he could watch the Cup FInal without knowing the result and he managed it! As the programme came on the opening titles included the winning captain holding up the trophy!

MayBeMaw

^I did enjoy this episode although what they failed to mention (unless I missed it) was that he is obviously related too to Sabine Baring-Gould, clergyman who wrote "Onward Christian Soldiers" and "Now the Day is Over" amongst other hymns^
I was waiting for that connection too but they didn’t mention him. Too eager to get onto the aristocratic/royal connections I expect.
BTW Aveline Josh and Ann spell their surnames differently - Widdicombe and Widdecombe respectively.

Where there's such a lot in someone's background they should make a longer programme, he has so many interesting threads.

We discovered a lot about OH's grandmother and were sorry that his mother wasn't around to see it too, we will never know if she knew that her mother who she deified had been round the block a bit. She did know that her birth was a couple of months after the wedding but there were other children before that. She, grandmother, had been in service at a minor stately home which we once visited to see if we could see a family resemblance!

DanniRae

Doodledog - Elizabeth marries Mr Darcy???????
I'm just reading "Pride and Prejudice" and now I know what happens. Oh dear - that's spoilt it for me

Ah, but it may have been a double bluff! [tapsnose]

We all have 2 parents, four grandparents and assuming no inbreeeding we would each have 2 to the power 26 "24 times great grandparents" +which is equal to more than 67 million.
In practice there is much inbreeding at every level of society and the further back you go the more likely you are to find marriages between cousins, second cousins etc, so the actual number of ancestors an modern person has going back 26 generations is likely to be much smaller. Even so, it is still a very large number, so who knows how many people living today are descended from King Edward I?

DanniRae

Doodledog - Elizabeth marries Mr Darcy???????
I'm just reading "Pride and Prejudice" and now I know what happens. Oh dear - that's spoilt it for me

I'm just reading a book and read the reviews after I started - I know I shouldn't have done that as I found out the main character died prematurely.
However, I think this thread, discussing a TV programme, is in a different category. We're chatting about a programme and discussing what we thought about the revelations.

Doodledog - I have sent you a pm

There have always been strong rumours in my birth mother's family that we can trace our roots back to the Howard family of which Catherine Howard was one.
So, possibly I am sort of royal!
I've had my dna done and it's fascinating!
I particularly enjoyed the Josh Widdicombe one as he grew up not that far from where I live, - Dartmoor. And what a nice chap he seems.

Doodledog - Elizabeth marries Mr Darcy???????
I'm just reading "Pride and Prejudice" and now I know what happens. Oh dear - that's spoilt it for me

Agreed, Maw.

Oh dear - is the word “spoiler” even appropriate?
We’re not talking about who was sent home from Strictly before the so called “Results Show” which we all know is recorded on Saturday or even a “whodunnit” - although the who” is frequently less interesting than the “how” or the”why”.
I recommend that anybody who needs to be kept in suspense also avoid reviews of the “Last night’s TV” type .
The interest for me in WDYTYA lies in the research, the background, the twists and turns , perhaps that is why I have enjoyed A House Through Time so much.
I would not dream of telling anybody when they “should” be watching TV of course or criticising “live” (as it were ) viewing - so there is no need for anybody to be so snippy

Alegrias1

Gosh, we like to rain on people's parades, don't we?

Whether a show has already aired or not, I think its good manners not to give away the details of the "plot". Anyone want to give away the identity of Keyser Soze, while we're at it?

Regarding the million ancestors thing. Apparently anyone with European ancestry is descended from Charlemagne, because the number of direct ancestors in your tree in 800AD is more than the whole number of people living in Europe at the time (or something like that). Of course we're not all descended from Charlemagne because there are doubles in your tree; look at the Queen and Prince Phillip, both descended from Queen Victoria, so their number of ancestors halves straight away.

The point of knowing who your ancestors are, IMO, is being able to picture what went on in your history, and make it a bit more realistic.

As regards ancestors, dh and I once had our DNA done by Oxford Ancestors - going way back to remote roots.

Dh and I both had the same paternal one - going back 25,000 years IIRC - apparently he was ‘father’ to 45% of all native Europeans. So evidently a randy old goat.

Our maternal ones were different. Mine apparently went back to Northern Greece 45,000 years ago (same as Cheddar Gorge man, 11% of native Europeans), whereas dh’s was a mere parvenu - only about 20,000 years, SW France, and about 25%.

This was all years ago now, so I dare say the science has moved on considerably.

Aveline

I was annoyed by the continued pronounciation of 'Lettice'. They kept saying 'Lettees'. I have a friend called Lettuce. It's always 'Lettiss' ( like the veg!). I checked online and found confirmation that it isn't 'Lettees' and referred to it as 'faux french'.

Me too Aveline.

they can easily stay away from the thread

On reflection, if the title contains a 'spoiler', that's more difficult, but even then, it's not the same as 'Does anyone on here have a SIL who is a murderer but was caught because the rookie detective thought to test the dog's basket for DNA?'