Going back to the beginning

I've always been curious about family history, but foolishly, I'd always thought that it was something to be done 'later'. The sort of thing that old people did - people who were settled and mature (conveniently ignoring the fact that I'm never, ever, ever going to be under 30 again......).

It was only when my paternal grandmother died, followed less than a year later by my father, that I realised that I'd now lost all links to my paternal family. And it made me wonder what the history was. Where did the family come from? What was the background? Where were my roots? How come my siblings and I are musical, but my mother (bless her) struggles to hold a tune of more than three notes? How come we all three wear glasses or contact lenses (like my father) but all my mother's family are proud of their ability be able to read very small font at 1500 meters (well, maybe not - but close...).

So at Easter this year, I gathered up everything I knew about my father's family, sat down in front of the computer, took a deep breath - and set off.

At the time, my paternal family tree looked like the picture above -pretty sparse - actually, there were 7 names in TOTAL.

Now, don't ask me why - but for some reason, we all thought that my grandfather, Thomas, was Lincolnshire born and bred. We knew that he never really knew his father - he was born in 1913 and his father was killed in the battle of the Somme, (1st July 1916). We knew that he'd been brought up by his mother in a very rural village in Lincolnshire, and had had a very impoverished childhood. And that was about it. He never spoke about it - and neither did my father ever refer to it. We knew the name of his father - Harry - and that was about it. My sisblings and I had assumed that the family must have been farm labourers, on the rare occasions that we idly speculated about our family history. My father was proud of his Lincolnshire roots, and would often refer to them.

I looked at the 1911 census - there was Harry - a farm labourer. So no shock there.

But I was somewhat surprised, after getting a marriage certificate for Harry - to find that while he was listed as being a carter, his father was listed as being, not a farm worker, or carter, or groom,

but

a theatre conductor and musician

in Newport, Wales

which is about as far as you can get from Lincolnshire, East to West across the UK.

So how did the youngest son of the family end up right the other side of the country, married at 23 to an 18 year old girl in a registry office with no family present, with a child born 6 months after the wedding, and killed 3 years later?

I posted some of the family details on genesreunited - and was contacted by 2 distant cousins - both of whom had been researching the family tree, but who had always been told that Harry had never married or had children. His name is on the War Memorial of the small village that he came from - but there is no info about family or background. His name is recorded on the Commonwealth Monument at Thiepval, in France - and again, there is no information about parents.

There is a mystery here - and I don't think it will ever get solved. Was there an estrangement? A falling out?

Since starting this, I've gone on to track down over 500 names of ancestors for the family tree - but it's this puzzle that I keep coming back to.

And it does make you try to be thankful for the family that you have - however irritating or annoying they may be at times - and to actually talk to them about what you're doing.I always find that falling out with family is more distressing than anything else.