Family legends that turn out to be nonsense

[jaybelnz]

  According to my strictly Scottish grandparents, both their families from way way back were as white as the driven snow!! Pillars of the church!  No divorces, no alcohol, no scandalous doings whatever - perfect Protestant Christians!

 My generation (and me in particular) was the first in history to pluck eyebrows, wear eyeshadow, drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes ("if the Lord had meant you to smoke you would have had a reeky lum on your heid"); first to have Catholic friends, to wear miniskirts, go dancing, go  to a Youth Club (and on a Sunday!) stayed out past 9pm, and played sport on a Sunday!  A sinner no less! And I believed them too!  Yet Robbie Burns was their hero!!

Talk about piling coals on the head! And filling up young heads with guilt!!  (All though, tempered by the fact that they were wonderful grandparents and I loved them very much).

Then while doing my FH, I found that my maternal great grandfather, the revered head of our Scottish family in NZ, married twice.  His first wife, my ggmother, died and six months after that, he made an "Irregular Marriage" in Scotland.  He also "took to the drink"!  My other maternal great grandmother had a child before she married my great grandfather, and 4 of their daughters also appear in OPR's - yep -up on the cutty stool!!  All farm servants!    Luv it!!

Jeanne

Just adding a newly found first child for my great grandparents, mentioned above. This wee girl was born just 6 months after they married.  Sadly though, she only lived for about 7 weeks, " debility from birth".  She was named Elizabeth, and when my grandmother was born a few years later, one of 7 more chn, she was named after this first little one.

[mirl]

When I started looking into my family’s history I vaguely remembered a comment my grandmother Ethel had made to me when I was a small boy, about there being an Italian in her family, the Tasker’s.

As Ethel had died half a dozen or so years earlier, I asked my mother about this, as Ethel was her mother, but she had no recollection of there being any Italian in the family.

As I slowly got back through the generations I found that Ethel’s grandfather had a sister, Charlotte Tasker, who was a talented pianist and her stage name was Madame Carlotta Tasca.  Here was the “Italian” in the family.

[jaybelnz]

On the reverse side of the coin, isn't it amazing when an old family story becomes an understandable truth, proving that there is usually an element of truth buried somewhere in the stories.  These stories are wee bit like Chinese Whispers 😄😄

A cousin once told me years ago, when I first started with the family research,  that our Grandpa had told him that our paternal great grandfather had been a Ship's Captain who had gone down on a sinking ship.  I had never heard this story before, in fact, I knew that our great grandfather had been a passenger agent with The Grand Trunk Railway in Boston, then Montreal, where he died in 1886 in Montreal General Hospital, cause of death was Rheumatism!

My cousin wasn't having a bar of that, but a year or so ago, a Rootschatter found an entry in an Australian Gazette, which referred to my Great Grandfather having died at sea, later another Rootchatter very kindly found a death record for my 2 X great grandfather - he found him on a Deaths At Sea Record, when he had died of Inflammation of the Brain caused by sunstroke!  He died on a ship just 10 days out of England en route to Melbourne, where his sister was living at the time!

So never discount those little stories, there's substance in them somewhere!  . My cousin was simply a generation out, and he wasn't a ship's captain, but a passenger! But he did die at sea!

[BumbleB]

I agree, jaybelnz.

My father would very often say "when we were back at the Castle" to which my mother responded "you mean, when you were on your barge".  My right my mother was - my paternal great grandmother was the daughter of a Waterman on the Yorkshire canals. 

[Andrew Tarr]

Nothing on quite this lavish scale in my family (that I know of) but a piece of folklore from my mother said that her grandfather, manager of a quarry at Penmon in Anglesey, had died in some way connected with the Penmon lifeboat.  His death certificate (aged 36, late in 1877) said typhoid.  I later came across a news item reporting that he and a friend had been rescued when the rising tide threatened to drown the small island where they had been fishing during that summer.

The consequence was that his widow returned to her family in Liverpool, having waited two months for her ninth child to arrive.  Luckily her parents' house managed to accommodate them.

[coombs]

My nan said her mum's father was Irish. The mother Ellen, was from Oxford, and I thought OK maybe she was born there to an Irish dad. But I found Ellen's father was born in Oxford and none of his ancestors so far can be traced to Ireland. Unless there is some distant Irish ancestors and the grain of truth may be there in an old family tale. Ellen's paternal grandfather was illegitimate and her paternal gran's father died in 1849 but was not born in Oxon, as stated in 1841. I was pleased really to find no Irish ancestors (at least after 1800) due to knowing how hard it can be tracing Irish rellies esp if you have a close Irish rellie such as great grandparent.

[jaybelnz]

Yes Coombs, I have an Irish great great grandmother, no approx 1818 birth found for her, no maiden name on the marriage cert, nor is her mother named. Her husband's the same, born approx 1818, no birth info, on the 1845 Irish marriage cert. Only their fathers are named.  Later Census info in England for both of bride and groom gives their birthplaces as Portarlington Ireland and Newry Ireland.

I since found out that the groom's mother was Sarah Annie, but still no maiden name!
I also found out from his military notes, that he was actually born in Moate, County Westmeath, again, but again only his father's name. This bridegroom is the same man in my earlier post, that died at sea in 1873, en route to Melbourne.  By now widowed, but I still haven't been able to locate a death record for his wife.   Ireland Grrrr!

[coombs]

Also that dad said there was a weightlifter in the family. Never come across a weightlifter but a cricketer.

[3sillydogs]

Family legend has it that there is minor royalty on my maternal grandfather's side, the story goes my ancestor was the proverbial "black sheep" and was dispatched to the Colonies for his transgressions.  Can't find any trace (yet) but with my lot it's more likely to have been the "wrong side of the blanket".  Have found quite a bit of that on both sides