I’ve been spending a lot of time recently researching my genealogical roots, which mainly consist of English people emigrating to colonial America. I started this venture in 2017 and have around 9,000 ancestors slotted nicely into my family tree. As I go through the possible hints offered to me by one of the genealogical sites I subscribe to, I often wonder how much the archival facts (births, deaths, marriages) about an ancestor, the tales of their acquisitions of land, and the census reports recording their locations at any one time, actually reflect on the lives they led. How many of the young women died in childbirth? How many young men perished defending their lands from native American attacks? And how many native Americans died defending their countryside from the ever-encroaching European settlers?
I’ve also discovered that I descend from far too many women (and men) who were victims of the insanity that overcame New England in the 1690s, causing the hanging of people accused of witchcraft, mainly in Salem, Massachusetts.
A century later, the soldier-farmers who took on the British Empire to attain independence from the tyranny of King George III are also represented in my roll of ancestors. Afterwards, those same sturdy pioneers ventured farther west, searching for land to farm to carve out a living in the vastness of the North American continent. How much heartache did they suffer, leaving family behind in the east, knowing they might never see them again? How much strength and courage did it take to scratch out an existence on virgin land, build homes, and establish new towns and villages out of nothing?
Sounds to me like this kind of research is fertile territory to look for protagonists – and villains. Think about your own family’s history, if you know a bit of it (if not, why not? It’s fascinating to study!). Each one of us has genealogy going back to Adam and Eve, well, actually further! And from every corner of the world.
Who would make a good hero, who a super baddie? And their conflicts? History has already written them for us. But the parts that history doesn’t tell us about them, that’s where your story lies, and your imagination takes over to fill in the blanks, according to Hillary Mantel, that great diva of the historical novel. There’s plenty of room for triumphs and tragedies. So, dig in and write your own version!
All photos are the property of D C Hubbard
