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Archiver > SOUTH-AFRICA > 2002-05 > 1020700941


From: "Gerda" <>
Subject: Re: [ZA] 1820 and all that ...
Date: Mon, 6 May 2002 18:02:21 +0200
References: <3CD6866E.4732.1E4EB6D0@localhost>


Hi Dave,

It is a question that I have often asked myself, but from a Dutch
(Netherlandic) perspective. Mentioned it on a couple of lists over there and
ever so slowly people are becoming aware that they may be able to fill
insome gaps in their collections.

Since the descendants of these absent persons don't live in the country of
origin they are not particularly missed, don't crop up in registers and are
most likely presumed to have died young and not worth following up. I
always thought that this was particular to the poorer people who only got
their birth, marriage and christenings of children in the registers, but
recently I read a letter about a whole bunch of important Prentices that
suddenly disappeared from the British registers. Since there were too many
missing all of a sudden, they were located fairly quickly - in America.

The second reason that missing people are not followed up is that many
people only do research in the direct line, and won't miss anybody who is
not directly related.

You have to put the thought in the right places, though. Start advertising
short lists of the names of people who settled in South Africa on the
English lists, and pretty soon the idea may catch on.

Gerda



> Hello everyone
>
> I have a silly question for the real Historians ...
>
> I have had the opportunity (not one that I relish), of re-entering all
> my records onto a brand new computer with a brand new
> programme - goodbye to my old and incompatible Apple IIe which
> has handled my thousands of entries (in bits and pieces), for nearly
> 15 years. As a result, I am now more aware of a broader picture -
> quite humbling to learn something from one's own forgotten records!
>
> A thought for you all - some of us have 1820 British Settler
> ancestry, which is fairly well documented in older and more recent
> publications, not to mention the CO records. Why is it that so little
> seems to be known further back about the families of these
> Settlers ... or why should 'my' history start in 1820? Sure, there
> are exceptions but they are few. We strive so hard to push the
> boundaries back from this end, so why do we seldom hear from our
> British counterparts, striving to find a missing family member who
> came to SA in 1820? Were those few thousand who arrived just a
> drop in the ocean at that time ... an insignificant event in history?
>
> Pleased if someone would set me right ...
>
> Dave


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