I began looking into Vijay Krishna's genealogy. Francos had recommended me to him this, and actually it turned out Vijay's brother had researched much himself, but yes, more could be done, like bringing these names and dates to life with old newspaper stories. Vijay's brother had also tested his dna and what a grand mix was there, mostly Irish, English, and especially the midlands, Scottish and Swedish, and then, because Vijay's absentee granddad, Tim Forde, was a black man from Barbados, there comes up African amounts of Benin and Togo, Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Ghana, as also there being Welsh, German and even 1% Indian. It's that small Indian part that Vijay tunes into so much with his passion for Vaishavism and kirtan. It was on Vijay's mothers side, Karen being her name and she having died a couple of years back, that I began looking at her Dahl ancestors, a lineage originating from Sweden, back to a Moses, alias Maurice Dahl, who came to England with his Irish wife. Very soon I was uncovering skeletons in the family closets. Karens grandfather, Andrew Victor Dahl, was in the newspapers a few times, once for receiving a stolen motorbike, for which he got ten months in prison, and earlier than that there was a story about him having left his family house after his fathers death due to his mother having got herself married to another man. Some great rift was there, maybe between him and the new man of the house, and one time calling round, and being refused entry, he broke into the house and stole away with some clothes and cutlery. For this the family got the police after him, in consequence of which he tried to commit suicide, twice, once while in the police station, trying to cut his own throat, and the other time in the cell, attempting to hang himself. As Vijay said, on hearing this from me, he was sure not even his mother knew such stories. Andrew Victors Dahls father, William Dahl, was traumatised already in his own life, due to his mother having died when he was tiny. His mother, Mary Dahl, was addicted to drink and one night on coming home drunk she fell down some steps, thereby severely injuring her head. She was removed to the workhouse and there died. Researching more of Vijay's family history I saw that one of his relatives was a harmonium maker, 18 year old Joseph Wilson, in Birmingham back in 1881, which was naturally interesting considering that Vijay was such an adept of the harmonium now, the drum, harmonium and his singing voice being what his musical career was all about.
0 Comments
![]() I looked up newspaper articles for my friend Guy's family and found one about his ancestor, George Henry Ballard, a bank manager, who committed suicide. He blew his brains out, literally. Though a competent man, he'd suffered mentally with worries and insomnia. Guy's grandfather made great wealth out in America, with his discovery of coal in a canyon, he being the son of the banker who shot himself. And so it was that when Guy came to visit I read aloud to him newspaper accounts about these ancestors. Of the great grandfather who had shot himself in the head, there were quite grizzly details, and although Guys family had explained this away as being due to his embezzlement of the bank which he managed, this looks to have been but their cover up, better a thief than a man with mental problems. The papers quite clearly state that nothing was amiss with finances, and do reveal that he had a history of mental torment, for which previously a doctor had sent him to Madeira to recover, which had done the trick for a while. Not for ever, as ultimately he shot himself through one eye with the same gun that he used to hunt rabbits. His son, Harry, Guy's grandfather, was already far away in America herding cattle and prospecting canyons. I read out a-plenty on his life too, not all of which was known to Guy. AuthorSusie Harrison and her hobby of genealogy, always looking into her own and her friends family trees. ![]() Back to some good work with breakthroughs on Rosie's genealogy. One of her ancestral couples never married, regardless that they had many children, and they were removed from one parish for being dysfunctional, said to be as 'dirty' as the pigstyes on their lane which they'd been complaining about. So why did this lady, Jane Wiseman, not marry the father of her children, James Atkinson? Detective work was needed here. And I found the answer, because she was not really a Wiseman but a Taylor. But she was already married to a Wiseman. Pretty soon after the marriage she'd left him for James, for which twice her husband John Henry Wiseman posted notices in the Barnsley Chronicle saying he would take no responsibility for his wife's debts. Their one daughter, John kept with him. His family were in the papers for drunkenness. Deaths were happening around that time, not treated as suspicious. Though how can one be sure of that. Like with another of Rosie's ancestors falling off a railway aqueduct, previous to which some harassment had been perpetrated against him, with two of his horses just having gone missing, and the yearly blocking of his wines and spirit license. And yet no one appears to have regarded this as suspicious. John Henry Wiseman's very sister had been found dead in the local canal. Both Johns and Jane's fathers had been watermen. On Quarry Lane, where Jane and her lover James lived, in a pig stye one local man had been found hanging from the rafters. One of Jane's and James's sons was crippled and handicapped and was forever making problems in the neighbourhood, in the papers for stealing and killing a neighbours pigeons. Jane admitted that he was an uncontrollable child, for which people were always knocking on her door with some complaint. History as always coming alive, through our very own ancestors. How can it not be fascinating? AuthorSusie Harrison and her hobby of genealogy, always looking into her own and her friends family trees. ![]() Frustratingly, much of Rosie's genealogy, which I know I'd done before, had disappeared. Still, I persisted, and made a breakthrough, a Mr Hall, dying falling off a railway viaduct; a little suspicious I'd say, seeing as he was yearly trying for a wine and spirits license for his inn, the Cromwell View in Sheffield, which another bar owner on the same street, of the Merry Heart, kept opposing and stopping going through. And as for Mr Hall's son, Reuben William, he ended up in back in those days what was called a lunatic asylum. There are plenty of stories to uncover, as always. AuthorSusie Harrison and her hobby of genealogy, always looking into her own and her friends family trees. |
AuthorSusie Harrison and her hobby of genealogy, always looking into her own and her friends family trees. Categories
All
|