Part 1 – What is a secret?
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what I find so compelling about researching my own family history and helping others research theirs. It’s not only to do with completing the jigsaw of my genealogical story. There is more to it. But it’s hard to place my finger on exactly what drives me on – past the raw material of people, dates and places to another dimension where context and social history lie. It’s like an almost misplaced fascination about what secrets, and the reasons behind them, lie lurking beneath the surface.
But what is a secret and why are secrets in my ancestry a drawcard for me when secrecy is not usually something viewed in a positive light? A secret is defined as a piece of information that is only known by one person or a few people and should not be told to others (Cambridge Dictionary). Synonyms include confidence, covert, undercover, conundrum, enigma, mystery, puzzle, riddle and hush-hush. Secrets are, by definition, meant to stay hidden. But where is the time limit in that definition?
Recent research into my own family tree has uncovered a couple of ‘twists’ in my family history narrative. You can read more about those discoveries here. My great-great-grandfather, John Garland, not only married and sired 12 children with his father’s 16-year-old housekeeper (who was 26 years his junior) but, thanks to the advent of DNA testing, I now know he also fathered at least four illegitimate children to four other women.
The other surprise, once again revealed through DNA evidence, was finding out that John Garland’s son James, who was my great-grandfather, fathered a child at age 60 – this illegitimate child was not only born to a twice-widowed woman 22 years his junior, but his sixth child arrived 22 years after the birth of my grandfather and while he was still married to my great-grandmother. I suspect my great-grandfather didn’t even know he’d fathered another child; the daughter, called June, was absorbed into her mother’s existing brood of children and was never told who her father was. Only recently have I connected with June’s grandson and been able to confirm what to he and his father had always been a mystery – the identity of June’s father.
Both of these recent family findings were secrets at the time they were ‘conceived’ – but are they still secrets now? To answer that question, I need to take a look at the motivations behind secret-keeping. And you’ll need to wait for Part 2 of this article – Why do we keep secrets?
Want to unearth or explore some family secrets? Contact us and we’ll help you delve into your family’s past.