Genealogy Chat

My cousin in Australia asking about our Grandparents - neither of us knew them. Well, I knew their names, but did she really want me going back so far and giving so much information? Just can't stop now and my family tell me I am wasting my time - but although do nothing to help are eager to know what I have found this week, don't you just love them! Suzanne

I started due to time on my hands and house bound through a motor bike accident 2.5 yrs ago. It was going well at first then you needed to asked relatives questions which, in hind sight, have left it too late as all my older relations are no longer with me. It's very interesting and also time consuming, found a few skeletons to my amusement, but i'm still looking. This is a very good site and very helpful people. Good searching Phil

i found this link through friends reunited which i was told about by an old school friend after a chance meeting. (actually she was my best friend from the age of 4!) after filling in my details for my family tree i started asking my mum questions. initially they were about an adopted brother of hers,ROGER KERSHAW (who we are still looking for but are now stuck cos we don't know how to find his adopted name or date of adoption. anyway) my grandma has been married 5 times so we've got a lot of 'branches' on our tree. i think what really made me 'wow' was when i first entered a family surname a message had been posted by someone searching for info on my mum's dad! same name. dob everything. i thought that was pretty spooky. i contacted the lady & her husband is a half bro of my mum! amazing.we are now in constant contact and are trying to arrange a meeting before christmas. she only lives a bit further down the M1! i find it very addictive & it's so easy to wander off from one bit to another & then find yourself 'lost' i am enjoying it all very much. and arn't you all a friendly lot :)))))) gina

I started with a lot of research already done on my husband's family who wanted to trace their Maori heritage so it went back to Abraham Bennett White of English and Dutch descent born 1818 in Ceylon who had come to New Zealand and married a Maori woman. The family always said that Abraham was descended on his Dutch side from Abel Tasman. I was also given a lot of information re baptisms from the Dutch Reformed Church in Sri Lanka - there are still a few missing links but it seems possible. So I then turned to my own family - 3 grandparents English and 1 Danish and have had a lot of fun and map reading to see where they were born. Christine - New Zealand

My father died in 2002 and we moved my mother into a home. She had always brushed off questions about her family name of OGAN, so when we cleared their house I began to find various papers etc and went from there. I hope you folk have sense of humour? She was worried that she might be Irish, but it turns out that her father kept his history quiet because his brother & sister were disinclined to admit that they were born in Uruguay. But by the time he was born, the family had returned to their roots in Hackney. I doubt my mother would like that either, but although still alive, she is past being able to understand. Anyway, I keep going because I like being a web detective!

A missing grandfather, the cause of much sadness in my mother's life. It was like a piece of jigsaw puzzle missing. One day, out of the blue, I found a genealogy chat room on the internet and straightaway someone found me the person I had been looking for for years. Sadly Mum died many years ago and I now know more about her father than she ever did. She would have loved to have known the true story instead of thinking she (as a child ) was to blame. As someone said earlier, it's very sad.

hi i got started because i was adopted in 1965. i had been to the local family services for my adoption file which contained nothing only birth mothers name and address at the time. i tried for 8 years to find more with no results. i bought my pc in september and came across gc. i thought it would be a good idea to try and constuct a family tree. with the help of people on this site and the site itself i now know my mothers name her sisters name my gran and grandads name. addresses where they lived and a couple of occupations. i am so excited because even though i have never met them i now have some info about my past and it is really wonderful. thanks to you all for your help. gill xxx

I've always been interested since I was little. My maternal grandfather is one of 13 children and my maternal grandmother is one of 9. My mother had too many cousins to count and the family is basically HUGE!!! I suppose my interest was sparked by all the stories about them. My father's family has a war hero (he got a British Empire Medal), a suicide, a medical weirdo (she never went through puberty?!?!) a cousin who was missing in action in WW2 for 6 months and he came home to find his wife had sold the business and moved in with another man. My mother's family has a casualty from WW1, a dispatch rider in WW2, a commando who was at the battle of Casino and a woman who was in the SAS (although to be honest she did work in the canteen?!?!) and this is just a small example of all the stories. I guess I just wanted to know more about these people.

its quite scary to know that so many of my acsendants died young of the same thing. My mum was 46 breast cancer, her sister 48 ovarian cancer. My maternal nan both at 52. two of her sisters of ovarian at 41 and 46 and my g gran of cancer of the uterus. My nan had 2 more sisters but for the life of me i cant find their deaths. I know years when they were def still alive but have gone thru the records for years after and cant find anything. One im almost positive never remarried but I suppose the other one could and im looking under the wrong name. I will have to get to the records office and spend some time there.

I've always been intrigued about the things my family won't talk about or things they change the subject for when bought up but took the family line of don't ask, don't tell. I spent a great deal of time having cancer tests recently in which they ask about similar family history and was shocked by how little I knew about them. I was thankful I eventually plucked up the courage to ask for the truth as I discovered my grandparents were actually my mum's aunt and uncle and her real mother died aged 41 of the same cancer I was having tests for. Zoe

I started because of a family history of cancer in my mums side and had to get 2 death certs to qualify me for medical screening. I have been having this for 6 years now and am fine. After finding the certs I got really interested in finding out more about my ancestors. Through this site I have been in touch with 2 distant cousins who have helped a lot with their sides of the families.

I got started on this because I decided I wanted to know who my dad was. He left before I was born and has only visited once when I was 13 months old. Have spoken to Joan Allan and Unfortunatly I just don't know enough about him to be able to trace him. But the tree is growing nicely and so is my circle of freinds Shelli

I was bored when I was 16 (1993) so I decided to do a family tree. It was very basic and just had immediate family on - no maiden names or anything technical like that and the only information I had was what I got from sitting on the floor in front of my Mum whilst I was drawing my tree, asking questions as I got to each next bit!! I was bored again in 2001 so I was going through my drawers and found the tree drawing rolled up in a kitchen paper tube. I took it out and updated it with all the new marriages, divorces, new babies etc then ran out of information so gave it up again. And then 5th of November last year I was on Friends Reunited and saw the link for the new sister site - and that has been me ever since! I have still only managed just over 260 people though so... I guess I have got a few more years work ahead of me!!

Finding an obituary at my grans house for a man who was allegedley the fattest man in England. I didn't recognise the surname, so started tracing the tree backwards. I had moved around a lot as a child, and never really knew where I came from. Researching this man, I realised I had strong 'roots' in Hampshire, so I started doing the rest of my tree. Now I realise I also have strong roots in Suffolk, Norfolk, Buckinghamshire, Cornwall etc etc... Still can't say exactly where I came from!!!!

When I was in college I enrolled in a Black History class, as I was tired of hearing about Christopher Columbus, and wanted to learn something new. The movie "Roots" had recently been released, and we spent class time watching the film and writing about it. I started researching my own family after watching Roots and (off and on) have done so every since.

It was something I always thought about doing, but never got round to doing. Even when the wife bought me the Generations Grandsuite Delux Edition 20 disc box set for Christmas, it just sat on the shelf gathering dust for a year and a half. What got me really started was Genesconnected. I put in a few details going up to my grandparents, then I made a few phone calls, did a quick check on the 1881 Census and found three Generations all living in the same house only 15 minutes away from where I lived. I could not resist a drive up the road to see what the place looked like. And here I am six months later - with a 1000 names in my tree. I've met up with relatives I never knew I had. I now have photos that are 140 years old. I know more about the history of where I live and appreciate family more than ever. It's been quite a journey. Mind you, I am sure it will grind to a halt 20 weeks time when my first descendant arrives! Paul (son of Shaun, son of Frank, son of William, son of William, son of John son of Samuel Baker)

I became hooked after my Dad mentioned one afternoon a note he had in his diary about a marriage in 1825 between a John Kightley and a Sophie (the same name as my daughter). That same evening I did a search on Google for my surname....and I found details of the couple Dad had mentioned in someone else's family. Now I have a one-name database with over 2000 entries, most of which are accessible on the web.

Think I've secretly always wanted to be a detective.............. This hobby fulfills my ambition without me getting into any bother.

Same as you Mel. I always wanted to do my family tree, but didn't know how to go about it. I heard that one of my old school friends had registered with Friendsreunited, saw the link for GC and was soon hooked. So far I have got back to about 1750 on a couple of branches and have also found 2 second cousins on GC. Not bad for someone who didn't know much about her family! I have also had plenty of help from people on this site, thanks to everyone who has helped me and are still helping me. Maggy, West Yorkshire

My mum always talked about doing it but never got round to it. Then I saw GC advertised on Friends Reunited and decided to give it a go. I had some information already from my mum and was surprised how easy it was to find my great grandparents on the 1881 census. I have found it more difficult since then to get additional information but also really interesting. Mel