When a wife says, ‘we need to talk’, the husband knows he’s in trouble.
But this isn’t one of those talks.
I need to talk to John Spencer, my Great-Great-Grandfather. But sadly, John Spencer died in 1897, so the conversation is going to be very one-sided.
“Great-Great-Grandfather, how many siblings did you have?”.
I’ve discovered cousins in Canada and America who are descended from your father, Thomas Spencer. My DNA matches my new-found Canadian and American cousins, and some of those cousins have shared documents that verify their ancestral heritage, but nothing suggests how many brothers and sisters you had or what happened to them.
“Great-Great-Grandfather, you married Catherine Grainger on the 16th May 1855 in Tipperary, Ireland. Why did you move to South Australia so soon after the marriage?”.
Your son, William Thomas Spencer, was born on the 14th March, 1856 in Kooringa, South Australia, ten months after your marriage to Catherine. Your daughter, and my Great-Grandmother, Patience Ellen (or Ellen Patience) was born on the 27th November 1866 in Burra, South Australia. I was twelve years old when Patience died, but I remember her. I visited her on her 94th Birthday, and for a few minutes we had to be very quiet while she listened to a horse race that she obviously had a bet on. It seems I come from a long-line of gamblers. Since Aussies will (supposedly) bet on two flies climbing up the wall, perhaps your choice of country was well-planned. My American cousin reports that her Spencers liked a drop or two of the brown ale, so I’m guessing they got the drinkers. My Canadian cousins are descended from your sister, Margaret, and it seems she may have escaped the clutches of either vice.
Were conditions so harsh in Ireland that the Spencer family left Tipperary for foreign shores?
Were you the only one who came to Australia?
Did you keep in touch with your siblings on the other side of the world, or your family in Ireland?
If only you had left a diary or a few breadcrumbs for us to follow, but alas, we are left to wonder.
The Family History Vault 