Daily Prompt: Modern Families

If one of your late ancestors were to come back from the dead and join you for dinner, what things about your family would this person find the most shocking?

“Dinner is ready, but wait a moment who are you.”

“We are today’s WordPress contribution to dinner. Don’t you recognise us, it’s your great grandmother Emily and great grandfather Jason.”

“But I never even met you, you died at the beginning of the 20th century. Dead people do not eat.”

“Yes, that’s the problem, we don’t get food where we are now, don’t need it, but for a day our digestive system has been renewed. We are hungry. By the way we hope you don’t mind but there will be a few others arriving.”

“Huh, but I only cooked for me, Mr. Swiss and my son, although I probably have enough for you both. Who else is coming?”

“Oh, just the family. We were so closely knit in those days.”

“Did you invite all your children Emily?”

“Yes, they should be arriving any time now.  We couldn’t impose on you too much and judging by the size of this place, they wouldn’t have room.”

“But great grandma Emily, you had 16 children.”

“Oh yes, they believed in big families in those days. Of course the twins died when they were still babies, so just a bottle of warm milk will do for them and perhaps some sort of soft food. They never got all their teeth. Here they are.”

“Yes, I can see that, all of the sons and two daughters, my grandmother and a baby daughter..”

“No, that’s Isabel, she died when she was two years old.

“Is that dinner?”

“I was just preparing it, afraid it is just cooked beef with vegetables today.”

“No problem. All local produce of course. A cow from the farmer and the vegetables from your garden?

“Not exactly grandfather Jason, we buy it all in the supermarket.”

“In what?”

“Supermarket. It’s like a big shop where everything is on shelves and you can choose what you need. All nicely packed and hygenic. I don’t know where the cow originated, but it is probably a cow from our country. The vegetables are also from our area.”

“Just a moment, you mean you did not know the cow before it arrived in your cooking pot and the vegetables did not come from your garden.”

“No great grandmother, things are not done like that today.”

“Well I don’t know. What do you think Jason, is that food safe?”

“Let’s ask the others. They have just arrived.”

“Hello Emily, Jason, we arrived, although the guy that was organising the journey said we would have to share wings, so it was an cramped flight. Any nappies for the twins here great niece, they didn’t need them where we were residing.”

“Just a moment I will have a look. Yes I have a few disposable nappies in a plastic bag.”

“But that is paper.”

“They are special, you can throw them away after they have been used.”

“You throw away the babies as well.”

“No, just the nappies.”

“Strange customs. So let’s eat.”

“I will have to stretch the food a little as we are so many.”

“No problem, where we come from they fed a few thousand with a couple of fish and a few slices of bread.”

“You mean that the story was true.”

“What story is she talking about Jason?”

“No idea. That cow is a bit tough, not like our Betsy. She was a lovely tender piece of meat.”

“So Jason, no good talking about the old times, they do things differently today.”

“Well thanks for the meal, it wasn’t too bad just didn’t have the good old rich flavours that we had down in the country.”

“I have some mango ice cream as a desert. Hello, they have all gone. Perhaps they don’t like mangos or didn’t grow it on the farm. Things were done differently in the Sussex countryside I suppose.”

WordPress Daily Prompt: Childlike

Explain your biggest regret — as though to a small child. 

Photographers, artists, poets: show us CHILDLIKE.




“Dad, was gran the youngest in her family?”

“In those days things were different. People just had a lot of kids, your gran had 11 brothers.

“Is that man my great grandad?”

“Yes.”

“He looks old”

“Yes he was, in those days they were having children all the time, until they were too old.”

The wise words of a father-daughter discussion, dad putting me in the picture about my background. So I bored further.

“Did you know her brothers?”

“Oh yes, I spent a holiday with her brother’s family in the country when I was a kid. They had a lot of children as well. They were all farm hands.”

And so the story went as I was a child, learning about my roots. Unfortunately my dad did not indulge so much in his roots, so I had a lot of catching up to do on my computer records, although I did have basic information from dad. One of my grandmother’s brothers liked his drink, the other one liked a good gamble and one was a bus driver. What a wonderful source of information.

So let us visit my mother’s side of the family to see what interesting people formed my basis. Actually I would move to my Aunt Lil, mum’s older sister. She was a quell of information, although somehow she seemed to get the wrong end of the stick.

“Oh yes, your grandfather’s family were quite rich you know.”

My eyes lit up, imaging a future of wealth and fame. Then came the next line.”

“Unfortunately the deeds to the property got burnt in a church fire.”

Disappointment took over my expression.

“But Aunt Lil, where did the money come from?”

“They were wealthy wine merchants.”

“But we English do not have any wine.”

“Yes, I know, the one with most money was French and they all have wine. His name was Ferdinand de lu Cameru.”

Aunt Lil seemed to only know the half, and the rest she heard from her mother, who was no longer alive to confirm this interesting piece of history. Something was wrong somewhere. Although Aunt Lil was not so far away from the truth, her French knowledge was just a little lacking.

If only I had bothered as a child to delve further into this mysterious story of the French line losing a fortune in a church fire. Today this is no problem; we have ancestry sites on the computer, each one doing their best with the genuine records. If this fails the Mormon church seems to have a complete history of the world in their online records.

So here is the truth. Yes there was a French bloke, and the family name was Camroux. One of them was swimming in money. He invested in about everything. No records were burnt in a church fire. His branch was just not our branch. The only connection was my great grandmother who was a Camroux. I delved into her records and traced it all to the mid 17^th century in a little village somewhere in France. They had to flee from France being protestant Huguenots and eventually arrived in London, with a detour somewhere in Mannheim Germany.

I forgot to mention the photo of Uncle Sam with grandad. I never did find out who Uncle Sam was. Grandad had a few brothers (also from my research) but there was no Sam amongst them; another regret and an unanswered question. It was mum that told me it was Uncle Sam. I still wonder today who Uncle Sam was, just another family mystery.

Basically Je ne regrette rien, in the words of the Edith Piaf song, but it would have been nice to have a little more authentic information. Oh, if only digital cameras and computers existed one hundred years ago, so I suppose that is my biggest regret, although I have a strange feeling that Aunt Lil, mum and dad would have felt a little lost in the cyber digital world.


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Who do you think you are?

I suppose everyone has a similar photo somewhere in the attic, or perhaps even in a frame on the dresser. I have quite a few inherited from my grandmother. She seemed to belong to one of those families that were always visiting the photographers for a studio picture. The picture above shows my great grandfather Jason and his wife Emily. I am one of those people who has discovered genealogy. I started about five years ago and on my way have found over a thousand relatives that I didn't know existed. This part of the family always fascinated me. Jason lived 1841-1907 and Emily 1838-1908. They got married in 1858 and although it does seem quite young today, at that time it was quite normal. They were married on Christmas Day, this being the only day off they had. Jason was a farm labourer and came from Ticehurst, East Sussex, England. Emily came from the village of Burwash, just down the road so they had probably known each other since they were kids. Their first home was in Etchingham, which was the third village in the area. Their first son was born in January 1859 so they didn't waste any time I suppose.

During their marriage they had 12 children, my grandmother Emily (another Emily) being No. 11 and the youngest surviving daughter, as a matter of fact the only daughter. There were twins born two years before she was born, but they died at the age of one and two years. Then after her there was another daughter but also died at the age of one year. As great grandmother Emily was already over 40 years old when the last children were born, I can imagine that the children had very little chance of survival. It was normal at the end of the 19th century that families were large.

I remember surfing around once on the Internet and found my great grandfather's name mentioned as a witness in an inquest on the death of his second son George. He drowned at the age of six in a pond. I inquired and received all the documents in connection with this tragic accident in 1866

They seemed to have moved around a bit and eventually in 1875 were living at Sissinghurst Castle in the Priest's house.

My dad always told me about his mother growing up in a castle, but things got mixed up a bit. They didn't actually live in the castle, but in a large house in the grounds of the castle. The priest's house still exists today, although it is now in the possession of the National Trust, as the rest of the castle. Sissinghurst castle is today in Kent near the small market town of Cranbrook. At the time when Jason and Emily lived there with some of their children, it was in private ownership. It was before the time of Vita Sackville West who made the famous gardens what they are today. It was then purely agricultural and Jason and his family were employed as farm labourers. I noticed that when the sons got married and moved away they were still employed in the agricultural trades.

What did my grandmother do? That was interesting. About two years ago I was on my annual trip to London and made an excursion to Sissinghurst to do some hunting. I got into conversation with one of the ladies running the National Trust shop and she told me that a group had been formed to show what was in Sissinghurst castle before the Sackville West takeover. She took some particulars and I eventually got a letter. I sent some copies of letters and documents I had, including one signed by Vita Sackville West to my grandmother, and they afterwards informed that my grandmother was actually employed at the diary on the farm. There is actually a small exhibition at the castle this year showing some of the articles they got from various places, and most probably there are some copies of some of the details I sent.

Over the years I have naturally been bothering my dad (who is now 92) about his mother's family. He has some memories of visiting his many uncles for the summer holidays. They were all living in the country and it was a cheap holiday for him and his brother. I remember my grandmother very well. She was a small neat lady and one thing I remember particularly was that she was a perfect pastry cook. She had a recipe for making tartlets with a creamy filling flavoured with lemon juice. I don't know how she made them, and no-one has the recipe. It was just one of her secrets she took with her. She eventually married my grandfather, a 100% cockney from East London. It seems he was also a descendent from a family in Cranbrook and had been on holiday visiting relations when he met my grandmother. I often felt sorry for my grandmother moving to the East End of London after such a sheltered life in the Kent countryside. I found another photo of greatgrandfather Jason and great grandmother Emily with my grandmother when she was a toddler. Note that Jason and Emily seem to have put on some weight over the years. I just love old family photos - wonder if my descendents will be talking about photos of me one day?