Why Trace My Family History?

• My father often told, when we were young, the story of how his Grandfather 'Percy' Pearson' had driven the first motor car into Stourbridge (then Worcestershire, now West Midlands.)

• Also, my father often used to tell us stories of how the family used to own Brickworks - often pointing out to us where they had been whenever we passed through the town of Brierley Hill (we lived in Dudley, just a couple of miles away.)

• I recall reading, around 1972/3 an article in an 'Annual' (we always had one of these among our Christmas presents) entitled 'Did Your Forefather Fight With Nelson'  : this set out how seemingly insignificant people often stepped onto the pages of history - I was already hooked! Shortly afterwards (I was still at Primary School) we did a 'project' about ancestry (I can't remember why) and so, my research began....... It was at this point that I learned that the person I thought of as my Grandmother was really my Great Grandmother. Curiously, no-one seemed to know the name of my Grandmother............!

• My Great Grandmother, Ethel, lived to be 97 years of age. Fortunately, by this time (I was twelve years old - this was 1976) I had begun to take a keen interest in Genealogy and had been able to ask her a little about the family history - if only I had known what I know now there are countless questions I could have asked!!

• Shortly after Ethel's death I was asked by my older relatives if I would like to see if there was anything I would like from among the things she had left behind. This is how I managed to salvage many photographs and documents from her effects (she had saved everything and I now possess many precious things.)

• Going through Ethel's papers etc. made me recall how when my grandfather, Jack, had died my older relatives were clearing out his house (the one he had shared for many years with his mother (Ethel) in Blowers Green Crescent, my father had produced a picture which had been hanging on a wall saying ' would you like to see a picture of my grandfather in a 'Rolls Royce.' I vividly recall the picture, the car was yellow (this couldn't have been a photograph, unless it had been painted over afterwards) with a number of people in it - from memory the car did look remarkably like a 'Rolls Royce' 'Silver Ghost' : but many cars of this period look like this, and remember I was only six years old!. Sadly the frame had 'woodworm' - it turned out the house was riddled with it - and the picture was immediately consigned to the bin! I have always regretted not saving this - but what can you do when you are six!

• I also recall seeing photographs of Percy in various cars with a man walking in front with a flag (these would have been taken prior to 1896 when the 'Red Flag Act' was repealed.

After many years research I now know that the majority of my ancestors came from the 'Black Country', in what is now part of the industrial West Midlands. If fact most of them lived in the ancient parishes of Dudley and Kingswinford, with a few from the neighbouring parishes of Old Swinford, Halesowen, Rowley Regis and Tipton. These are all in either North Worcestershire or South Staffordshire.

These were:

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Pearson/Rowley/Parrish/Batham/Gauden

Shakespeare/Hickman/Rollason

Steve Pearson

PO Box 2483, Dudley, West Midlands, England, DY2 0YH

Tel: +44 (0)1384 241010  E-mail: Steve Pearson

©S Pearson 2002