​“To understand today,   you have to search  yesterday."                             
​ Pearl Buck

                                                                     

Using genealogical and creative writing skills I can  bring your ancestors to life through story. I uncover the essence of the story in a certain time and place, integrating historical research to honour the person in the fullness of their life. Interesting tidbits and even salacious details may come to light but this is the stuff that makes our ancestors ​human and compelling.

$200 per page (500 words)   
​Extra research $60/hour​

​“If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton you may as well make it dance."
                                                        George  Bernard Shaw

    

Here are two examples of my writing.  The first one is more imaginative while the second is a more traditional piece. Both of my ancestors have a few skeletons!

EDNA’S DILEMMA
       Stirring in her sleep, Edna heard the door slam.  She rolled over in the bed and felt the empty warmth next to her.  Damn him, she thought to herself pulling the blanket up under her chin.  The fight they’d had that evening had been the worst yet.    The kitchen pantry was empty of food and the three children had gone to bed hungry again.  Robert had promised to bring his pay home this week but had sauntered in late Friday night reeking of alcohol, his pockets empty.  
           Edna drifted back to sleep.  Hours later she opened her eyes to see the empty wardrobe gaping at her, the door ajar.  She sat bolt upright.  All his shirts were gone!  Jumping out of bed Edna looked around the room.  There was nothing left of Roberts, save a pair of slippers tucked under the bed.   She rushed to the kitchen, reaching up for the biscuit tin on top of the fridge.  She knew already it was empty.  He’d taken the rent money.  Robert was gone for good this time.
           Edna made a cup of tea and sat on the back step in her dressing gown. The house was quiet, the three children sleeping soundly.  She put her head in her hands. What now?  How could she possibly provide for her children?  Life had always been hard with Robert.  More often than not his pay was squandered on drink and greyhounds. She suspected there were other women too.  She’d scrubbed coloured smears of lipstick from his collar more than once.  Even so she lived in hope each week that he’d finally come to his senses and care for his family.   Now he was gone and the future looked bleaker than ever.
           Edna lit a cigarette and took a sip of her tea.  She had to come up with a plan and fast.  The rent had to be paid.    The thought of joining the long winding queues for food stamps made her terrified.  They would end up in a tent along with all the other poor bastards if she didn’t act quickly.  Right! She thought. I’ll ask Leslie to help.  Her younger brother had really made something of himself, studying hard and qualifying as an architect.  He’d gradually distanced himself from his family, determined to leave their mess and hopelessness behind and Edna hadn’t seen him for a couple of years now.   She groaned at the thought of fronting up to his grand house in the leafy Northern suburb, his stuck up wife Marjory opening the door.  She’d swallow her pride if it meant avoiding homelessness and hunger.   She thought back to their childhood when they’d been inseparable.  Edna had always looked out for Leslie, protecting him from the wrath of their angry father.  She hoped he still had a soft spot for her. 
         Opening the gate, she looked around at the manicured lawn and the neatly trimmed hedge, the golden elm casting a dappled shade across the path.  The three children hung back in an anxious cluster.  Her heart ached for them, they looked so solemn.  What would their future be? She smiled at them reassuringly then stepped up onto the wide tiled porch and pulled back the brass door knocker. 
         There was the sound of footsteps and Leslie’s wife Marjory appeared, her face falling as she saw the ragged group on her doorstep.
 

 'Edna!  Children!  How lovely.  It’s been so long!  What are you doing here?’ 
‘Is Leslie home?  I need to talk to him.’    
       Edna peered over Marjory’s shoulder into the house.  The hallway floor gleamed and on the hall table stood a large vase of pink roses.  There was an aroma of pine, flowers and something delicious wafting from down the hall.  What a life they have. She couldn’t help feeling bitter, thinking of her empty biscuit tin and bare cupboards. ​
‘ Leslie’s rather busy at the moment.  He has an important project to finish and he’s under a lot of pressure.’  Marjory blocked the door.
‘I need to see him.  It will only take a minute.  Can we please come in?’ Edna stared at Marjory determinedly.
Marjory sighed. ‘Wait here.’  She closed the door    
           Edna set her mouth firmly. She felt her foot nudge something and glancing down saw a large Grecian urn abundant with petunias.  Throwing the children a sly smile, she yanked the plants from the earth and tossed them gleefully onto the lawn.  Audrey gasped and the boys began to giggle.  ‘Shhhh..’  She whispered, pressing her forefinger to her lips.
         The door opened and there was Leslie, Marjory scowling over his shoulder.  He peered at Edna through his glasses, his face softening into a smile.  He hugged her tightly and bent to kiss each of the children. 
‘I wouldn’t have come Leslie, but we are desperate. Robert has gone. He took the rent money and we have nothing left to eat.’
‘Oh Edna.  I’m sorry.  Of course I’ll help you. Come.  Come in.’  
​        He ushered the family through the front door.     They huddled awkwardly in the entrance under Marjorie’s steely gaze while Leslie disappeared into a room, returning shortly with a cheque in hand.   Edna gaped at the amount.  This would pay the rent and feed them for the next month if she was careful.  She looked at Leslie with tears in her eyes, ‘Leslie, thank you. You are a good man.‘
             Over the next week Edna thought long and hard about what she could do next.  No matter how much she tried she couldn’t come up with another plan.  There really was no alternative. She needed another man; one with a steady job and a house. She couldn’t do it on her own. Herbert Hewitt! She had seen him eyeing her up and down appreciatively when he’d come to visit Robert.  
            Edna began her preparations for the night ahead with Herbert.  When she’d popped over to see him the day before, he had suggested eagerly she come back tonight.  She pulled her skirt snuggly over her hips and wriggled into the pink jumper. It really was getting a bit small but made her breasts look full and round.  Her hair secured in a French roll, she dug out the last nugget of lipstick from the cylinder and coloured her lips. She looked at herself in the fly spotted mirror hanging in the bathroom.   I don’t scrub up too bad at all!
           Edna stood at the bedroom door looking at her sleeping children, their bodies wrapped snuggly together.  This is for you my darling ones.  She picked up her purse from the hall table, and closed the door softly behind her.

The facts behind the story:
​
       Edna was my Grandmother’s sister, my Great Aunt.   I came across a divorce notice (see below).  Edna was named as sleeping with a Herbert Hewitt at two different properties.   She claimed it was after Robert had deserted her.  The court ruled in Robert’s favour and dismissed Edna’s claim.  I found this very disquieting as Edna’s liaisons were described in detail and yet her claim of desertion dismissed.  She was blamed for the end of her marriage. This was not unusual for women during this era, to be treated so unjustly by the legal processes.        
       Also, there were only two children mentioned but Edna had three children.  There is another article which states that Robert didn’t believe the smallest boy was his.  Again the legal system was on his side.   Four years later Robert went back to court to reduce his maintenance payments. He was a musician and blamed the advent of the Talkies for his request as he was now reduced to playing music on the ferries for a pittance.  Needless to say his maintenance payments were substantially reduced!
      I had heard some bits and pieces of Edna’s life from a distant family member. She had been very close to her brother Leslie who was a successful architect. He did in fact estrange himself from his family. Edna eventually married a policeman, Frank, and had two more children. Sadly her two boys were put into an orphanage as Frank refused to care for them. Her daughter stayed. As an old man, Frank told his son that Edna had trapped him into marrying her. He claimed that she had fallen pregnant to him and threatened to front up at the police station to name and shame him if he didn’t marry her. I can only imagine my poor Aunt was absolutely desperate as a single mother with three children in the Depression. It obviously didn’t work out with Herbert.

Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), Wednesday 4 July 1928, page 12

           The Sun (Sydney, NSW : 1910 - 1954)
                  Friday 26 February 1932 ,page 9

   HENRY & ELIZABETH
 
          Henry and Elizabeth Peard were alive in the time that the potato famine devastated Ireland, beginning in 1845.  Around a million people starved or died of disease and as many fled for other lands, often perishing on the journey. It was the Catholic population who suffered the most as they were poor tenant farmers whose main source of sustenance was obliterated.1   Henry and Elizabeth were Protestant wealthy landowners and had little sympathy for their Catholic country men.  At a submission to a Parliamentary Inquiry about the poor in 1936, Henry said, ‘the devoutness of many Catholic labourers prevents them from earning more money as they observe too many church holidays and attending stations to confess, [which] take a good deal from what a labourer could earn. There are 11 holidays kept.’ 2   In contrast, Henry’s family were seen as ‘northerners, protestants, well educated, industrious. They are a credit to the country.’ 3
          Henry Hawke Peard married Elizabeth Cathrow, (whose family was of similar ilk),4 on June 26th, 1826 in Great Amwell, Hertfordshire, England.5   Shockingly for the time Elizabeth was already pregnant as their daughter Elizabeth Kathryn was born only six months later on December 12th, 1826 in Calverton, Nottinghamshire, England.6 They put 113 odd miles between Elizabeth’s family and the birth place of baby Elizabeth, taking their time to wander onto Ireland. 7
          By mid 1827 the family were living in Coole Abbey, Fermoy, Cork County.8 Henry had inherited this substantial family home on 157 acres plus many other parcels of land and houses.9  The Peards had 10 more healthy children in quick succession all born at Coole Abbey between 1829 and 1843; Richard McCullough,  William Henry, Anne Mary, Marion Cotton, Alberta Disney, George Spotwood, Henry Turner, Emma Fanny, Charles Harte and Augusta Maria. 10

---

COOLE ABBEY, FERMOY CORK COUNTY             11

  ​        In early 1843 the Peards moved to the Channel Islands.12 It could be that little Augusta was becoming sickly and they were seeking a healthier climate for her recovery.  They settled in St Helier on Jersey13 and were part of an influx of wealthy British immigrants attracted by the sun, sea and low taxes in the 1840s.14 The family lived in a house on Royal Crescent15 'inhabited chiefly by the English .... considerably improved in its appearance by the Theatre, which forms the centre of the arch, and whose pretty Greek porticos an agreeable relief to the plainness of the buildings that flank it.’ 16

       ​ROYAL CRESCENT, ST HELIER, JERSEY                         17

        ​Unfortunately Augusta Mary died of the ‘bloody flux’ (dysentery) in May of that year at 91/2 months old. She is buried at St Helier. 18  One baby dies and another is born. In 1844 my Great, Great Grandfather St Helier was born on March 25th.18  Known fondly as Sainty, he was born into privilege the year before the Great Hunger took hold in Ireland.  Sainty’s family as part of the landed gentry were directly implicated in the atrocities of this famine.  Their tenants who were already impoverished and paying unaffordable rents were now starving. 20 At the Poor Law Inquiry of 1836 Henry had described his tenants’ diet as ‘potatoes with milk in summer, which is very cheap and in winter those that can afford it, the addition of bacon, salt fish etc.’   He also gave details about the rent and quality of their dwellings, ‘The usual rent was ‘with a small patch of garden … from £1 10s to £2’. Their dwellings were ‘composed of mud walls, thatched [and] in almost all you will find good bed and bedding’. 21  
          Although Henry’s descriptions were given in glowing terms, the conditions were of course very grim and only 9 years later the blight destroyed the tenant farmers only food source.  During these years of starvation, unbelievably Ireland’s food exports increased. 22  The Peards along with other wealthy expats continued to enjoy quality Irish fare such as peas, beans, rabbits, fish, butter and honey. 23
         In 1836 Henry went back to Ireland to attend several hearings regarding the starving masses24 and he did subscribe ongoing sums of money to the Poor Fund in his Parish. 25 However in December of that year his brother in law Richard Campion, attended another Parish hearing on Henry’s behalf.  Richard described Henry’s rents as fair with no small tenants, (a direct contradiction to Henry’s 1836 description of holdings with ‘a small patch of garden’.) A man named Eugene Byrne disputed this strongly stating that ‘rent was too dear’ and ‘tenants were leaving fast.’ He continued on stating that when Henry ‘was home up to 40 people were employed and now these were all unemployed.’26
         By 1848 the Peard family left the Channel Islands and moved to Cornwall.  Elizabeth was pregnant again and probably unwell so perhaps they relocated for better health care.  Baby Alice Cathrow was born in Marazion on May 2nd 1848. 27   It must have been apparent that Elizabeth did not have long to live, for despite the horrors of the Potato famine still unfolding, the family returned to Ireland.  Elizabeth died at Coole Abbey on July 11th, 1848. 28 Henry’s brother Richard had previously migrated to Australia and placed a notice in the Maitland Mercury and Hunter Valley Advertiser on December 30th, 1848 attesting to Elizabeth’s death and the twelve children left ‘to deplore her loss.' 29   Henry lived for another ten years, leaving his Estate to their eldest son Richard McCullough Peard.30
 

²⁴ Henry’s brother Richard had previously migrated to Australia and placed a notice in the Maitland Mercury and Hunter Valley Advertiser on December 30th, 1848 attesting to Elizabeth’s death and the twelve children left ‘to deplore her loss.’ Henry lived for another ten years, leaving his Estate to their eldest son Richard McCullough Peard.