http://www.iampjblack.com/costumes-jigsaw/
Writing a Family History From Basic Information by Rosamunde Bott
Genealogy research is exciting, and in the process we accumulate numerous documents, files, photographs and notes. But I sometimes wonder what the point of having all this information is unless we have some way of telling the story, the ‘what happened’, that will interest and inspire the future generations. How do you go from researching your family history to writing a family history?
Most of us will have researched beyond the basic birth, marriage and death details, beyond the census, and tried to find the ‘deeper’ history of our ancestors’ lives. However, we all know that this is not always possible. With the best will in the world, sometimes all we have are some dates and places, an occupation, and not much else.
How can you construct a life story from such basic details? If you are writing up your family history, perhaps for your children, or as a gift for members of your family, how can you make an ancestor’s life sound interesting when all you know is his birth, marriage and death details?
Like putting together a jigsaw, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Learn a bit of background history and things begin to fall into place.
Let us take my own family as an example. I do not have much information about most of them except the usual baptisms, census details, marriages and deaths. However, by piecing together the known facts, and by researching history and using pictorial resources, I have written a biography of my ancestor John Walker Bott.
The key point is in getting to know the times your ancestor lived in. A book I find invaluable is the Chronicle of Britain and Ireland which details all the main news items of each year in Britain’s history. The internet is also full of useful information, maps and pictorial images that you could use to illustrate your story (be careful about the copyright on images and if in doubt, ask permission from the webmaster if you are going to make your work public). Museums, libraries and churches are also a good source for local parish history.
Here is a small extract from my ancestor’s biography:
When John Walker Bott and his sister were born in 1814, the nation was celebrating the downfall of Napoleon, Jane Austen had just published Mansfield Park, and the actor Edmund Kean had made his debut as Shylock at Drury Lane Theatre.
While these bits of information have nothing to do with my ancestor personally, they set the context for the world into which he was born.
Books about the history of costume or housing are also very useful, and again you can find websites about fashion through the ages, which can help you to get an idea of how your ancestor dressed.
Find out about the history of the places where your ancestors were born and lived, to provide a setting for their lives. Here, I have found out about what was life was like where John was born:
By the time of JWB’s birth, Newcastle-under-Lyme was a well appointed town, with good paving, gas lighting and a supply of good water. It had two churches, the main one being St. Giles where John was later to be marriedâ