Have you ever wondered if one of your ancestors was somebody famous? I’ve never had any illusions that my ancestors were anything but common stock but I have still found finding out who they were and where they lived to be an absorbing hobby.

Don’t be put off by thinking you will have to trawl through mounds of old documents – you may choose to but you can also find out a lot of information using the internet.

I’ve done most of my research using the internet and have managed to trace both sides of my family back at least 5 generations to the early 1800s. I was born in Surrey as was my Mum and Dad, but back in 1835 my ancestors were spread around the country in Kent, Gloucester, Somerset, Surrey and Sussex which surprised me as I had a picture of people in those days living and working in the same village all their life. They were mainly agricultural labourers, some were carmen, ie they drove horse drawn carts, one family were bakers and one family butchers, there’s also an odd miller and bootmaker but nobody famous or distinguished.

They must have lived hard lives. The largest family I’ve found sound far had 14 children and families of 7 or 8 are common. Often the husband died young leaving a wife with small children to look after. Many children died before their 3rd birthday. Take my great grandfather, Charles William Dewfall and his wife Sarah, for example. They lived in south London, not a very affluent part of the country, between 1882 and 1918. Charles was a carman so probably didn’t earn much. They were only married for 15 years but managed to have 13 children. Unfortunately 4 of the children died before they were a year old. I can’t imagine the pain of losing one child let alone 4. Neither can I imagine what it was like trying to bring up the other 9, especially after Charles died aged only 51 leaving Sarah with 5 children under the age of 15 and the youngest only 18 months old. Presumably the elder children would have had to support the family, I hope so or poor Sarah would have had a really tough time of it. It’s not really surprising that she died 10 years later aged only 58. The hard life they had as children may have also contributed to my grandmother’s early death in 1936 aged only 46.