I have been researching our family lineage for some time now, prompted to do so by the discovery of a very carefully hand-drawn family tree put together by my late Grandmother. I use the on line package 'Ancestry' for much of my research and our tree is stored on the system, and last week some further research opened up a fantastic discovery. I had struggled to find the maiden name of my Great Great Grandmother but somehow it all came together last Wednesday and I was able to confirm that she had been 'Hartnell' before she married. As soon as I entered this detail into the records a whole family opened up before me, as did the discovery that 2 of her brothers had been part of the fated Franklin expedition and that one of them, John, was buried on Beechy Island. The picture shows his grave, and 2 others. Today I've found more links and joined a Facebook group which relates to the expedition. I've made new contacts with other researchers and a family member who works at Cambridge University is going to do some more research there. I have one abiding sadness - I have no living relatives that I know of on this side of the family to share the discovery with. There is a sense of loneliness about this which I feel is echoed in the picture above. Now for more digging and delving and ancestral research!
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