The
Guardian, Letters, Saturday, November 11, 2006
http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,,1945177,00.html
The hidden history that lies in our local archives
After tracing their own roots, some ordinary folks find celebrities on their
family tree (Who do they think they are? November 9).
After spending 10
years doing my family's genealogy, finding records of Scottish nobles and
African slaves who settled on plantations in colonial
Church of England records of nobles, slaves and free women who had children
together, I was granted a coat of arms in 2006, by the court of the Lord
Lyon, by authority of the Queen. Coat of arms in hand, I wrote to three of
the British lords who are my cousins, related to an ancestor who emigrated
to
One of the lords, a leader in parliament, telephoned me and we talked
ancestry. I also wrote to Louis Auchincloss, the
upper-class American
novelist, and we discussed how our mutual ancestors, some from Paisley and
some from
When I was growing up, a black child in a poor section of
idea that my family was related to one of
clans. Genealogy changes what we know about ourselves and each other.
Pearl Duncan
Author of the upcoming book, "DNA, Courage
& Ordinary Folks,"