General Chat

Agree with Christine thought it very odd to thank her son for visiting, felt they did not have a good relationship, may explain a lot! I then fell asleep, found it quite boring compared to last week. Carol

I thought it was the most boring so far. J. Paxman was the most interesting in the series so far. It almost seemed that after Julian found out he had German reletives on both sides of the family he didn't want to go on. Watched FamilyTies on BBC4 after and found it far better. Would like to see WDYTYR do some programmes for non famous people.

My wife's grandfather was a Police Constable in Lincolnshire. In a record book that we have in our possession, is an entry :- 1916. 7th Sept. Took Ernest Schwenayer a German to the Isle of Man. (Knockaloe Camp). There is no comment on why, so presumably he was being interned, because of his nationality.

Didn't have it on here. It was supposed to come on at 9.30, but football or something on before it overran and they cancelled it. Probably won't show it at all now, not fair. M.

was disappointed with family ties as it ended without tracing his brother. He had quite a few shocks to find out there were a couple of sisters but one had committed suicide in 1995. I wonder if he finds his brother will they announce it to the viewer? Gloria

My mother was always going on about the Irish side of Dads family, she'd have had a fit if she'd seen her side of the family tree, guess what??? Irish! name of Costello, poor old Mum, I'm glad she never found out before she passed away. Me I'm quite fascinated by the connections, just sorry I cant trace any of them. Len

I saw the first half then went to sleep. Either it was not as interesting as the others or I was knackered!! It's on tape so I will catch up with it later. I thought the 91 year old was very with-it.

Paxman programme was the best in this series BUT J C last night just goes to show that we haven't all got such interesting histories and majority of us have ag labs going back centuries and you have to be good scriptwriter to make a series on any of them. Also note how these programmes appear to go back to about mid-1800s and I wonder how interesting they were in early centuries. In the meantime we are all trying to find names that take us back centuries - I wonder why ? I notice that one person tried to compare the Trier research room with any of ours. Problem with German histoiry is that unless you know the origin of the family you just can't get started and there is no central place where you can see what happens generation by generation to German ancestors; Karl born Frankfurt, married in Frankfurt, children born Frankfurt, died Frankfurt is easy to follow but if Karl had moved to Berlin and then on to Dresden then you would have to know each movement and go to three areas to research. Thank Heaven that the 'alien' papers that my gran had to complete when she came here gave the name of her mother and where she was born otherwise I would never have got the family history - and that now goes back in Germany (maternal side) to 1620. Others I am trying to help do not know in which German state their rellies were born and so we are having terrible time trying to find answers. Anyone who has relatives knlkwn to have been born in the Hunsruck area of Prussia ( between Trier and Mainz) are welcome to see if I have their ancestors on disc.

The one fault with last night's programme was that they showed Julian getting the train up to Ryde pierhead, where the passenger catamaran goes from, and THEN showed him travelling back to the mainland on the CAR FERRY which leaves from Fishbourne, a couple of miles away! Do they think we can be fooled! Who do they think they are!!!!!! Allie

I'm glad I didn't watch it. I would have been so angry with her!! And she's only an old lady! My nana was German, she went through hell after they emigrated here (before WW1). One incident was a man banging on the door, she opening it, being young at the time, and him brandishing a gun at her calling her all types of filthy names! I'm proud of my German heritage, even though I can't trace it back! lol. There's also this gentleman in our village who was a German POW. He never went back. He was Polish and made to fight for the Nazis but didn't want to. Taken as a POW, married an English woman and never looked back (family all died in the war).