Family rumours have they turned out to be true?

[Flattybasher9]

My uncle (Indirect) was told when he was young that he was decended from one of the Leiths of Leith Hall. This story came from a branch of his family in Dundee. After some time digging, I finally found a birth record of his 4th great grandfather being recorded as "James Leith of Leith Hall" who went on to be Sir James Leith, governor of Barbados.
I was told when I was a child that I was decended from the Whytes, of Whytes and MacKay distillers.
Alas, no "proof"

Regards

Malky

[aghadowey]

Hmmmm - concealed Irish ancestry, eh? ... I need to stretch my brain a bit to begin to think what it must be like to want to conceal your ancestry. It's impossible to know what the experience of the Irish migrant might have been, but in these cases it doesn't seem to hav e been Irish pride.

I never said my relatives were trying to conceal thier Irish ancestry. The McLeods were very proud of their Scottish background and whilst they often gave their ethnic origin as Scottish they equally gave it as Irish in official records and the family Bible clearly listed where they lived in Ireland.
My grandfather's family called themselves 'Scottish from the North of Ireland' (more commonly known today as Ulster Scots) and since my great-aunt married a man born in Scotland she probably identified more with the Scottish (mainly Protestant community) rather than the Irish Catholics in the area.

[BumbleB]

When I was a little girl my father would often come out with the phrase "when we lived at the castle" to which my mother always retorted "you mean when you were on your barge".

Mum was so right - my father's grandmother was indeed the daughter of a Waterman   

[Marmalady]

On my mother's side we are supposed to be descended from General Fairfax (one of  Cromwell's generals) the proof being a silver spoon in the possession of my grandmother. The story was that Fairfax's son stole the family silver but was drowned crossing a river while making his getaway. The silver was recovered and thereafter it was always passed down the female line of the family
Unfortunately, none of it is true -- we have no Fairfax ancestors, and Genreal Fairfax had no daughters to inherit and pass the silver down

My other family story is more recent and on my fathers side. My grandmother always asserted that her father went out to China with the Sassoon family and was a vet in the Imperial Stables. One day he came home from work, rang the bell for tea and fell down dead.
Truth -- he was a vet and went out to China -- but certainly not to the Imperial court. We can find no evidence of any Sassoon connection, although the captain of the cargo ship his wife & baby went out to join him on was a Capt Gassoon.
As for his death -- according to the coroner's report he came home drunk on day, had a row with his wife over his drinking & gambling habits and then grabbed a bottle from the mantelpiece and drank its contents. He then said "i have taken poison" but his wife did not at first believe him. Unfortunately this was true and within half an hour he was dead.

[KGarrad]

My family "tale" was that we were somehow supposed to be of French origin!

Closest I have found is G-G-Grandfather who was born on Jersey - but his family were only there for 5 years or so!

A modern tale that may well be passed on:
My twin brother used to work at BAC in Filton, Bristol - where they made Concorde?
We told younger brother's girlfriend that he glued the noses on Concorde - because he was the only small enough to fit!!
She believed us!!

[IgorStrav]

I don't have any romantic legends in my family, but there were two particular rumours

One was that my cousin had been asked to do the family history as he was the first son of the first son of the first son of the first son of our celebrated (well, to us!) ancestor John Pay.  He passed the details of the history to me only reluctantly, as his only child was a daughter and couldn't continue this pattern.

He was really distressed when I found that our mutual great great grandfather was not the first son, but the third son of his father John Pay.  And even worse, it turned out that the celebrated John Pay himself was illegitimate!


And the second rumour, from the other side of the family, was that my great grandfather, my mother's grandfather, (originally from Belgium) had left his wife and young family, stealing the money his wife had saved to return to visit her family in Belgium, using it to go the the US to make his fortune.

He failed miserably, and came back home again penniless but his wife refused to take him back, and he used to hang about the street and try and get money from my grandmother when she came out of work at the cigar factory (shades of Carmen, here!!).  The abandoned family had to be supported by the nuns, and my aunt reported that her grandmother (the abandoned wife) henceforth hated nuns, and the whole family abandoned the Catholic faith.

I investigated this as much as I could.  The whole family, including great grandfather, were together in the censuses including the 1901, so if it were true, the story must be after then.

However, my grandmother was married in 1902 and would at that time have given up work and not be coming home from the cigar factory (she did indeed work there) to be approached by her destitute father.

The other "children" of the family in 1901 were Mary (aged 30 and married with children), John (aged 25 and married), my grandmother (23 and just about to be married), Henry (20 and employed), George (17 and employed) and finally William (13, the only one still at school).  So scarcely a "young family".

I couldn't find any record of a trip to the US by my great grandfather Victor Desire Van Steenhoven, or a return.

However, he was in the workhouse in the 1911 census and I can't find my great grandmother and her remaining unmarried children anywhere in the Census, so it does look as if they were living apart. 

Perhaps it did happen, probably after 1901, and he begged from his married children.  And perhaps my great grandmother wanted support from the Church just for her youngest son and herself.  Perhaps he didn't go to the US but somewhere outside London.

And the whole family does seem to have moved away from Catholicism - my great grandparents' marriage was definitely in a Catholic church, but none of the other children remained Catholic so far as I know. Indeed for my mother the Catholic faith was something quite alien (quite a common attitude for non-Catholics of her generation).

Why didn't I ask more questions when the relevant relations were alive?   

[Harlem]

Aghadowey - I am sorry I misunderstood your earlier message. I still think it is interesting what does and does not get passed down, and I am enjoying everybody's stories.

harlemswife

[ambers]

An aunt mentioned in her journal some gossip her mum (born 1878) had passed on to her about an uncle born 1845 being married but his wife had left him.
Each census year noted this uncle as single and lodging with different people, even at one time with this aunts mum and she still noted him as single

It wasn't until the 1911 census that I could find a possible wife for him , the certificate proving all along that he was a married man.

Ambers

[stonechat]

One of the more amusing tales is that you hear of an ancestor/relative who has 'done' the family tree

In my case, my dad's uncle Bert who lived in Rhodesia and South Africa, retired quite young was supposed to have done this, however there was never any sign of a tree, and I recently met his only grandson who also had no details.

When you think in that era when most parish registers were still at the churches, it would've been a mighty difficult job.

I found a few scribbled trees that my paternal grandfather outlined, this had the same error on as what I was told (maiden name of my 3 x gt grandmother)

I was told that one of the Douglas watchmakers came from Scotland

well I am back to James Douglass born about 1730-1733 - don't know where he was born, I know his father was John.

It does not look likely that I will identify his father and get further back. Judging by the tree, my grandfather did not know.

Bob Douglas