Blog - family history and ancestor stories.
March 19, 2017
In recent years, programme’s like Who Do You Think You Are have made us more familiar with the ancestry of famous people. Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), the only US President to serve more than 8 years, has a fascinating background. Most people would guess that Roosevelt originates from Holland. Less well known, is that Delano comes from his mother’s side. Philippe de Lannoy arrived in New England […]
March 15, 2017
A natural question when someone first thinks about finding out more about their ancestors is “what will I get out of it?” It fascinates us how many different answers there can be to that question. Those who have watched “Who Do You Think You Are?” will know how varied people’s ancestors can be – rich or poor, from home or abroad, lucky or unlucky. Here […]
April 19, 2013
Every day, there is an ever-increasing volume of family research projects launched, and the media is now full of adverts promoting various ancestry programmes. Researching your family history can become lost in a sea of information, so how do you go about tackling the insurmountable, and what are your chances of success? Success in researching family history depends on the ancestors having done something that […]
April 18, 2013
Among the pleasures of family history are that it gives us a better understanding of the history of the times when our ancestors lived. It also makes the world a smaller place. Many of us have relatives who went abroad; or live overseas but have ancestors from the British Isles. Australia and New Zealand are, of course, two countries with very close connections with Britain. People have […]
April 11, 2013
Something that we frequently come across in family history research is ancestors who have left Great Britain to go abroad; and others who have left their homeland to come to Great Britain. This can be for reasons of push or pull. In other words, did they leave home because of factors such as persecution or famine; or go seeking a brave new world? Britons have […]
March 20, 2013
The Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries had profound effects on the social, economic and cultural conditions of Britain – and on family history research. We saw it represented in the Opening Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympics. Britain led the world in improvements in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology during the Industrial Revolution. By 1851, Britain had 40 % of the […]