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Family History
Hi, Stephen, how are you? "Weird and wonderful" sounds good to me!
I have a great interest in the subject of Family History, probably inherited from my father who was the family historian and 'story-teller'. He had an amazing memory for the family stories & anecdotes he heard throughout his life, and over the years he passed them on to me.
My father & I were eventually able to develop what seemed to be very minor and scattered bits of genealogical information into detailed family trees.
Often the "clue" which pointed us in the right direction was an old family story, or even a single tantalizing remark that was still recalled but whose meaning had been lost.
For instance, when my Dad was a very small boy his Irish Grandmother told him her Great-Great-something-Grandfather had been "a French military officer". My father remembered this his whole life but was baffled as to how it could possibly be true, as the family was definitely Irish. He always regretted that he hadn't found out the details while his Grandma was still alive, so after he retired he took up genealogy and went in search of the answer to this riddle. What he found out was that our ancestor was one of the Irish Catholic Rebel soldiers called 'The Wild Geese' who fled Ireland in the 1690's, went to France, and entered the French Army. He became a respected General and led the famous Dillon regiment of the French Army's 'Irish Brigade'- my Dad's Grandma was right!
The reason I'm telling this story is that my Dad was the only one in his family who remembered his Grandma's unlikely sounding story, took it seriously, and bothered to research it. Everyone else in the family said, "We're not French, so that can't be right; either Grandma was mixed up or you heard her wrong."
It's true, sometimes the details of a family's oral history are garbled a bit in the retelling, but oftentimes real gems are passed down which can be illuminated by subsequent research.
I don't expect Ms. Kendall's story to "finally solve" the Ripper Murders, but I'm sure it will be an interesting story and food for thought, and who knows what else it might lead to?
Best regards, Archaic
Hi, Stephen, how are you? "Weird and wonderful" sounds good to me!
I have a great interest in the subject of Family History, probably inherited from my father who was the family historian and 'story-teller'. He had an amazing memory for the family stories & anecdotes he heard throughout his life, and over the years he passed them on to me.
My father & I were eventually able to develop what seemed to be very minor and scattered bits of genealogical information into detailed family trees.
Often the "clue" which pointed us in the right direction was an old family story, or even a single tantalizing remark that was still recalled but whose meaning had been lost.
For instance, when my Dad was a very small boy his Irish Grandmother told him her Great-Great-something-Grandfather had been "a French military officer". My father remembered this his whole life but was baffled as to how it could possibly be true, as the family was definitely Irish. He always regretted that he hadn't found out the details while his Grandma was still alive, so after he retired he took up genealogy and went in search of the answer to this riddle. What he found out was that our ancestor was one of the Irish Catholic Rebel soldiers called 'The Wild Geese' who fled Ireland in the 1690's, went to France, and entered the French Army. He became a respected General and led the famous Dillon regiment of the French Army's 'Irish Brigade'- my Dad's Grandma was right!
The reason I'm telling this story is that my Dad was the only one in his family who remembered his Grandma's unlikely sounding story, took it seriously, and bothered to research it. Everyone else in the family said, "We're not French, so that can't be right; either Grandma was mixed up or you heard her wrong."
It's true, sometimes the details of a family's oral history are garbled a bit in the retelling, but oftentimes real gems are passed down which can be illuminated by subsequent research.
I don't expect Ms. Kendall's story to "finally solve" the Ripper Murders, but I'm sure it will be an interesting story and food for thought, and who knows what else it might lead to?
Best regards, Archaic
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