MY BLOG

Hello! Thank you for visiting my website.

I decided to set up my service after several years of researching my own family tree turned into an addiction. It was prompted by my husband, who, after reading a book on my mother's ancestors that I had put together for her for Christmas, said he thought this was something I could do to help other people.

I started on my own tree 18 years ago, just after I got married. My maiden name (Puxty) is unusual, and I married a man with another unusual surname (Shiner), so I thought I would see who else was out there, sharing our surnames. Little did I know, that 18 years later, this hobby would have turned into an addiction I spent most evenings on. I am a carer for our two children, both of whom have autism, and my family history research enables me to disappear into my own world for a while, and brings my stress levels down to a reasonable level. (Apart from when Uncle Ernest disappears and he’s not on the census, or the death registers, or in the newspapers, or absolutely anywhere else I have looked for him – at that point I have to stop and research someone else for a while!).

After a few years, I had a long list of names and dates, and an equally long list of mysteries and brick walls. I wanted to know more – for example, my great great grandmother left her home in one county (and also left her baby behind with her mother), moved to another county and moved in with a man who was married to someone who lived a few doors away. My great great grandparents then had lots of children together, and didn’t marry until they were in their 60s, when his first wife had passed away. What was going on there? I wanted to know more than the dates they were born, married, and died. I started looking further than baptism records and burial records (although these can be very informative, depending on how much the minister wanted to write in his registers). I wanted to build a picture of who these people really were. Were they like me? Were they hardworking or lazy? Good, law abiding folk, or petty criminals (or worse)? Did they get involved in their local communities?

I started to write up their individual stories (some of which are published in the Stories section of my website) which helps then to give you a different view of them, and take another look at information you have added to the tree without really understanding what it was you were adding. For example, my husband’s great great grandfather was very involved in the local community whether he lived, and he moved around a few times, working on the railways. He was on the parish council in towns in Devon, Surrey, and Somerset. You can find little snippets of information in newspaper archives which can build into a bigger picture of what this person was like.

Please keep my site bookmarked as I will be adding items and articles, etc, regularly!

Lesley Shiner

10 January 2018