Darran
Roger Freestone
I know a local family named Blight who researched their famly tree and discovered they were related to Captain Bligh of Mutiny on the Bounty fame and somewhere along the line somebody had added a T to Bligh.
I have now got in touch with relatives who live in New Zealand (the time difference is mad) Australia Chepstow Canada and USA. The advice and little stories I have gathered is fascinating. My grandfather's sister ended up getting married to a guy from New Zealand after short changing him in a pub in Chepstow that my Grandfather's brother ran during the war.
Got some great "new" photo's and been able to go back a hundred years further just because another relative came back to Swansea in the 1980's and wrote down their findings.
Down side, I ended up watching the Chief's versus the Blues this morning
I also went to Alltwen to find my great grandparent's grave (yes, a little bit morbid). Clearly hasn't had a visitor in about 40 years. Cleared it up a bit and can see it needs more than a bit of TLC.
Thank you DarranIt’s not morbid it’s fantastic.
Does that type of theory drive you to take it further, or have you stopped at what is absolutely a dead end?I looked into a bit of this on a free Ancestry trial. My dad died in 1989 and we lost touch with his mother so I've always been interested in his side of the family. My mum's side is all quite well known within the family.
He was born in 1942 in Chepping Norton and there is no entry for father on his birth certificate. Given that's the location of a US airbase in the war it's quite easy to put two and two together. Especially as his younger sister's father was an American. I did find out that he returned to the States and his family out there had no idea about his family over here.
Didn't get any further than that. I only knew four relatives on his side, his mum (my nan), her sister and husband, and his niece. His niece was quite a bit younger but from ancestry it looks like she died in 2008.
All really interesting stuff.
One of my updates is that I have managed to dig up, pardon the pun, so much info I have even managed to get two second cousins who have lived their entire lives in Sydney not knowing and are about to meet up. One of them is visiting Pontardawe at the end of this month.
I have also found a book about old characters of a village that wrote about my great and great great great grandparents and the conditions they had to deal with.
Also another great great grandfather was Irish and his dad left him in Pembroke when he sailed to Canada where he is written about in some museum.
What date did you get back to? Early to mid 1800s is my guess. Very interesting, but why does it always seem to struggle prior 1800s, bout 20 years back, distant relative was asking information from family, but they couldn’t go back further than 1850.One of my updates is that I have managed to dig up, pardon the pun, so much info I have even managed to get two second cousins who have lived their entire lives in Sydney not knowing and are about to meet up. One of them is visiting Pontardawe at the end of this month.
I have also found a book about old characters of a village that wrote about my great and great great great grandparents and the conditions they had to deal with.
Also another great great grandfather was Irish and his dad left him in Pembroke when he sailed to Canada where he is written about in some museum.