My mother is now in her 60s. She had me when she was 46. Bit of a shock for her when she gave birth to me. Just like my father when he was younger, she had jet black hair, fair white skin, and blue eyes to match (dark blue - like the sea. my fathers were light like the sky). Of all her older children, she had only one with fair blonde hair, the rest had dark. And then i was born, with bright red. Apparently the nurse said to her once i was born"you've got a red head here!", and my mother, shocked, didn't believe her. Mum always loves to tell people the story- about how her (only) sister had red hair, and how she had always wanted a child with red hair. After her first four she thought that was it, it would never happen, then she had my brother (no luck), and then came me - lucky last she likes to say.
Bleh that story always gets me feeling embarrassed. But as the first memory, it may as well be one of me.
In our kitchen there are two old photos. One of my great great nana, and one of her husband, my great great grandfather. They are buried in the local cemetery, a ten minute walk away. My mother would always take me and my brother down to visit the graves, put flowers in a jar for them, then take a walk with my father along the beach. We started talking about them today, and my mother relayed to me a old story that Ive heard many times, but can never seem to remember the final details. It goes like this.
Mary.
Rosetta (my great great nana) was born on the second ship coming out to NZ. Her mother, Mary, was a Aristocrat, and as one, was arranged to be married to another rich (and old) Aristocrat. But she did not love him, instead, she had fallen in love with the stable boy. So, they eloped, and came out to NZ to start a new life, away from the glare of the British Aristocracy.
One day, as she was doing some baking at home, she realised she was out of flour. So she went to the market to buy some. While there she hears a familiar voice "Mary?" She turns to the voice and finds it belongs to a young man of aristocratic lineage of whom she knew back in Ireland. It turns out he was here in NZ as a Captain of some ship(my mum knows, ill ask later), and he asks her what she is doing here. She tells him she lives here now, and that she married the stable boy - who is now a Fencible. Without another word he turns around and rides away on his white horse without a glance back.
All because she married under her social status.
A few years later Mary was baking at home, apparently she had flour everywhere, on her petticoat, in her hair and on her face. Then she hears a knock at the door. Its her father, he has travelled all the way to NZ to beg her to return home. He says if she leaves with him and returns to Ireland he will forgive her. But she says to him "I'm happy here." She is married now, with a family.
I would like to imagine that he at least stayed, and had a cup of tea or something, but it seems no one in my family ever asked my great great great nana - what happened after that? Most likely he didn't. Most likely he left.
But he's my ancestor. I love him for no apparent reason. I can only hope he still loved and forgave his daughter. But if he did, our family would not have forgotten. If he did, that connection probably would not have been lost.
We have one other old picture in our kitchen. Its not a original like the other two though, instead it is a clipping from a magazine. Just a couple of months ago, my mothers friend was looking through the magazine - and she sees a picture from the town that my mother comes from. Its the picture of the first motorbike in that town - with the date circa 1900-1909. She thinks my mum might like to see it - so she shows it to me - and i scream!!! My mums granddad!!! I know this photo! Ive seen it as a wee kid. Its in that towns local museum. My mum was visiting family in another town at that moment - so i called her to let her know. And frustratingly, while I'm trying to tell them over the phone - "its great grandad! Hes in the magazine! Really!" They don't believe me. I must be mixed up they think. So mum looks in the magazine at the next dairy they stop at - and there he is! Next to a whole lot of other men looking all serious while standing behind a douglas. So she tells my uncle when she gets to his house - and he doesn't believe her - she tells my oldest brother and he tells my cousins, and soon the whole family is ringing each other up to check that everybody gets a copy!
But the funny thing is - we know when the exact year that photo was taken. It says 1900-1909, but my great granddad was Australian. He moved to NZ in 1909. So there you go :)
My great granddad was a barber. Mum says as a little girl she remembers a old Maori man telling her he always remembered seeing her granddad for the first time. The man was only a boy at the time, but he remembered her granddad as he was getting off the ship -his red hair was waving in the wind. He had never seen red hair before, so it stuck with him the rest of his life.
My granddad (my mums father), was born here in NZ. My great granddad (his father) brought him up in the trade (of barbering), as did his father before him and so on. He married my nana and had ten children in total, so occasionally my mum would be looked after by her grandparents.
Mum says she can only remember glimpses of her granddad, which i can understand, its the same with me of my nana. Mum says she always remembers him taking scones out of flour bags for breakfast - there was no flour in it but they used the bags for everything in those days and he liked to keep the scones in them. She says she wasn't sitting at the table, but she remembers him sitting at the table and taking one out and giving it to her. She remembers she hated stale scones as a kid, but she would always take it and eat it.
Mum also remembers when her grandad (on her fathers side) died. She was 5 years old and she didn't know the meaning of death. Her older brothers Pat and ~~?~~ told her, and she didn't believe them. She said he was just sleeping! She also remembers when her other grandad (on her mothers side) died. He used to visit them and stay with them when he was a alive, same with his wife. Mum was 7 when he died, an d by then she knew the meaning of "dead". That time, she cried.
And she remembers one other thing. Great granddad walking her from his house to the beginning of the great road (not its real name, but basically it was a road that started from the village at the bottom of the hill, then went up through the hill and into the deep bush. Mums house was quarter way up it, but that was a 40 min walk for a kid. It was safe for kids though in those days. Even though she was only about 4 and her brother 6). He would do this early in the morning every day he had her and her brothers over, and he would look her in the eyes, shake his finger at her then say "and tell your father- don't be late!!"
lol
sounds like granddad was always late xD
Ill leave it there, but tomorrow i must record down Great granddads and great nanas story, of why they moved to NZ from Australia. Grandad never knew it himself, the family secret, but mum did some detective work last year, and figured it out. Bloody hell we didn't have a clue!
Poor grandad always said nobody ever told him anything.
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