Discover Your Ancestors
Issue 001
Family history has always been a significant hobby and surveys now regularly show that it’s the number one leisure interest for people. This is partly thanks to the success of TV shows about tracing one’s family and to the ease with which one can find records of our forebears’ lives on the internet. Perhaps, in our rapidly changing times, it’s also a call to slow down a little and remember our roots, and to reflect on our sense of identity.
Whatever the motives, I believe family history should always be centred on people, which lies very consciously behind the refreshing approach we’ve taken in this publication.
It’s a certainty that every few months a newspaper somewhere around the country will run one of two stories: “Local man finds 12,000 people in his family tree” or “Local woman descended from royalty”. Many of us can join one of the genealogy social networking websites, hook up family trees with other people and rack up a large ancestor count – but what does that really tell you about your roots? As for royalty – while we’d all like to find a lost estate or hidden family treasure, the maths suggests that pretty much everyone would have some sort of royal connection back to the time of Edward I. The challenge would be to find it.
A far more interesting challenge, though, is to learn about some of our individual ancestors’ lives. What sort of place did they live in? What did they do for a living? How would they have experienced the things that we do today, from childhood to death, from medical care to leisure pursuits? Even if you only discover 12 ancestors rather than 12,000, every one of them has a story to tell, and one which might add something to your own sense of history and identity. However humble people were, they all went through the turmoils and joys of life. That’s where the headlines should be.
In this edition we’ve focused on learning about your ancestors from the 17th century onwards, because more recent centuries offer the best records for getting started. Throughout these pages you’ll find extensive features exploring what life was like for people in the past, helping to inspire you in learning about your individual family members. I’ve asked the writers to tell you about ancestors of their own, to show they’ve enjoyed exploring their own families – and that they know what they’re talking about! Interspersed with these are related tutorials, which present the types of record you may encounter in straightforward, non-technical language, along with suggestions for further research when you’re ready.
L P Hartley wrote that “the past is a foreign country”. Let Discover Your Ancestors be your passport – and enjoy your trip!
Andrew Chapman, Editor