Remembering

120 years ago today, 17th May 1887, my greatgrandparents, Tom Carr and Ellen Fennell, got married. I never got the chance to meet them - they both died the year before Mum was born - I'd like to remember them today and celebrate their lives in my own way.

Like anybody interested in genealogy, I wonder endlessly about WHO they were ... what their lives were like, why they did the things they did etc. One thing I recently discovered was that Ellen was about four months pregnant when they got married! In some ways that really surprised me, because it never occurred to me that that would be likely to happen. That of course leads me to wonder whether they would have got married if Ellen hadn't been pregnant - were they in love, or were they forced to marry? Nevertheless, get married they did, and they were together for nearly 50 years before they passed away within a couple of months of each other.

We all take things for granted these days, I think ... back in Tom and Ellen's day it wasn't uncommon to lose your children - and they lost three of theirs - Nellie, their eldest daughter, died aged 15 in 1902 (from rheumatic fever); then their youngest son, Frank, died in 1929 from influenza (after surviving the first World War unscathed); and then their other daughter, Gladys, died on 1st January 1935 - just four days before Ellen herself passed away, followed a couple of months later by Tom. Such tragedies were commonplace then, but incomprehensible nowadays. It's unlikely that I will ever find out much more about them (we do know that Tom was a butler/chauffeur), but at least I have this photograph and a few others to look at and wonder.

So, to my greatgrandparents on their 120th wedding anniversary - I sincerely hope that yours was a true love, and not a shotgun wedding forced upon you. I hope that your married life was indeed happy, despite the untimely deaths of three of your children, and I hope that you would be glad that I wanted to know more about you.

Footnote: Mum recently tracked down Tom and Ellen's grave. She says she doesn't remember ever being taken to visit it as a child - but her Mum (my Grandma) wasn't an openly sentimental woman like we are, so I suppose that's understandable. Anyway, Mum and Dad have cleaned the gravestone up a bit and planted some bulbs, and I think she has intentions of visiting once in a while. I find it comforting that although they are long since gone, they are certainly not forgotten.

So, a milestone in the history of our family, and one that I will certainly try and scrap when I have time.