Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

Do you know anything about your family tree?

Options
13»

Comments

  • Options
    #62
    Rufeo
    Closed Accounts Posts: 503 ✭✭✭Rufeo


    Graces7 wrote: »
    Thank you for this thread. I have been thinking a great deal about my maternal grandmother of late. Only met her once that I remember as she died when I was very small. And I have realised when I started work on the book that she was then on her death bed. ( I was maybe four ?)

    She lived her girlhood well over a hundred years ago. ( MY mother was born in 1915) In Lancashire when coal mining and cotton mills were the only real sources of employment. Like others of sturdy soul, she chose to work outdoors, avoiding the lung diseases rife in the mills. Women were not allowed down the mines; but she and others fought the system to forge a career as " Pit brow lasses" . Like the Cornish "Bal maidens" they did a man's work at the pit head. They had to fight tooth and nail in those times and became a special set apart group, even with a practical uniform that included HEAVEN FORBID … trousers . In Victorian days!

    She was a strong individual. Came from a back street 2 up 2 down terrace with no running water etc then caught the eye of an engineer at the pit and married into a big detached house. Then baby after baby and most of her children dying one after the other.

    I think of her genes and her tough and very individual character when things get tough for me,

    Oh she was a Riley when she married; that was the Irish connection I was originally chasing up, but we got as far as 1700 plus then could get no further and no hint of when that family came from here to England.
    Then the other connection came up

    I think of her genes when things get tough for me.

    I wish I could get back as far as that even. I would love to go back to the time of the Vikings or ancient Ireland and see what our lot were doing.


  • Options
    #63
    RobertKK
    Registered Users Posts: 33,729 ✭✭✭✭RobertKK


    Recent ancestry, nothing interesting.
    According to mytrueancestry, I have DNA matches to Danish Vikings, Icelandic Vikings, Merovingian nobles, Celts, Saxons and gladiators. 23andme say I am from the same maternal line as King Richard III.
    But that is all so ancient, just interesting from a personal level and nothing more.


  • Options
    #64
    pinkypinky
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 6,617 Mod ✭✭✭✭pinkypinky


    Visit us in the Genealogy forum and let us give you hand!

    Genealogy Forum Mod



  • Options
    #65
    Ipso
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,995 ✭✭✭Ipso


    RobertKK wrote: »
    Recent ancestry, nothing interesting.
    According to mytrueancestry, I have DNA matches to Danish Vikings, Icelandic Vikings, Merovingian nobles, Celts, Saxons and gladiators. 23andme say I am from the same maternal line as King Richard III.
    But that is all so ancient, just interesting from a personal level and nothing more.

    The other way of looking at it is that both you and Dickie come from the same maternal line but that probably doesn’t sell as many kits.
    It’s like Family Tree DNA’s badge telling people They descend from Niall of the Nine hostages, sounds nice but there’s a chance he didn’t exist and there’s the chance the dynasty that claimed descent from him were bull sh1tting.


  • Options
    #66
    eviltwin
    Registered Users Posts: 17,495 ✭✭✭✭eviltwin


    Have traced it back to the Normans. My dad's side of the family kept meticulously detailed family trees.


  • Advertisement
  • Options
    #67
    Russell D. Woodcock
    Registered Users Posts: 6 ✭Russell D. Woodcock


    Readers,

    I've reached the twilight of my years, and I've found myself becoming somewhat introspective, ruminating over my own life and the choices I've made. I've committed some downright roguish acts over the years and while I don't regret a single one of them, it did make me wonder if a predisposition for dishonorable behaviour was somewhat ingrained in my human spirit?

    My dear wife Abigail not generally known her deep thoughts did suggest the rather capital idea that I look back through my family tree to try discover a bit about the fine genes that made Russel D. Woodcock. It wasn't long before a clear pattern began to emerge as I tore through whatever documents I could find on the extended family.

    I've traced the roots on my father's side all the way back to the mid 17th century - well By Gad! if I didn't find the greatest collections of cads, rogues, scoundrels, rascals and reprobates. I mean on the surface they all appear quite respectable - traders, empire civil servants, sailors and military officers - but you only need to scratch the surface and look to some of the personal letters and secondary accounts to see men who sold black flesh to the American plantations, massacred brown Indians and Moslems and others heavily involved in the privateer business. Ghastly business.

    They were a lecherous bunch as well - couldn't seem to keep their damn sausage in their pants and I don't doubt there's distant relations of Woodcocks sprinkled throughout the world, anywhere a Union Jack has flown over the past few hundred years.

    I briefly looked in to my mother's side (Maloney's) but she seems to have hailed from a long line of Irish farmers, labourers, basket weavers, cotton-spinners and generally uninteresting sorts. The odd fusilier or guardsman that piqued my interest, but there's not much written material given I suspect most were illiterate at best and more likely dull-witted simpletons. I do have a sort of wily cunning and craftiness in my character that can most likely be ascribed to the Maloney side of the house. It has served me very well when in some tight spots during my years of travel.

    Anyway, just thought I'd share some of my initial findings on this blog. I'm considering putting together a memoir of sorts so might record a few of the anecdotes here.

    Your faithfully,

    Russell


  • Options
    #68
    Hoop66
    Registered Users Posts: 2,297 ✭✭✭Hoop66


    Witchie wrote: »
    Donnelly?
    corner of hells wrote: »
    I'll guess , Donaghy.

    Nope. Hood.


  • Options
    #69
    _Brian
    Registered Users Posts: 18,476 ✭✭✭✭_Brian


    Years ago spent some time on the family tree.

    Found unknown relatives which was interesting.

    It’s a good exercise for a family but be ready it does uncover some things people would rather remained unknown.


  • Options
    #70
    branie2
    Registered Users Posts: 10,292 ✭✭✭✭branie2


    My grandfather fought in the war of independence and the Civil War


  • Options
    #71
    Edgware
    Registered Users Posts: 5,875 ✭✭✭Edgware


    branie2 wrote: »
    My grandfather fought in the war of independence and the Civil War
    And?


  • Advertisement
  • Options
    #72
    branie2
    Registered Users Posts: 10,292 ✭✭✭✭branie2


    Edgware wrote: »
    And?

    That's in my family tree


  • Options
    #73
    Brendan Bendar
    Registered Users Posts: 19,070 ✭✭✭✭Brendan Bendar


    Nothing good anyway!!


Advertisement