Handing it over

(r) Edwin Thomson - Civil War

“ Have I got something for you!” My mom exclaimed as my dad carried in the big, heavy cardboard crate. Lifting each item and holding it out to me, recollecting all they knew about it, or simply wondering about its origin. My dad has always been the historian in our family. He has spent over 40 years researching his family from Christchurch, England to Botwood, NF. He dragged us to archives and cemeteries, trying to draw out in us a love for all things family- the histories and the mysteries. I recall sitting in the archives in St. John’s, NF when he discovered the Slade Ledgers - and showed me how the items Richard Elliott had purchased “on his account” in October of 1820 proved that he had a child! 6 yards of black cotton, 2 yards of ribbon, and swanskin! He was some excited. 

I’d love to say I got bit by the ancestry bug during those summer vacations. But no. It took him handing over that crate. Handing over the keys, if you will. He entrusted me with the task of continuing that search - only I would be doing a different branch - my mom’s. 

My husband and I have spent years now scouring over documents, revisiting old hand-written family stories to find a new detail that may have been over-looked, and celebrating that detail as it finally makes a solid connection that had eluded us to that point. 

H L Thomson - 1910

There are a number of treasures in the crate. Medals from WW2 that belonged to my grandfather. A pair of opera glasses that belonged to ... someone in my family. A photo album with dozens of cabinet cards - most unidentified, but a few that warmed my heart as I turned them over to see a scribbled name in pencil. And a pair of faded pink, leather, baby shoes that had belonged to the tiny feet of my mother. Letters, hand-drawn family trees, a tin-type photo of my 3rd great-grandfather during the Civil War. Treasures.

For some, this “treasure” ends up in the garbage. For others, it finds itself on a table at someone’s estate sale. But for me, that crate holds secrets, offers surprises and whispers of a life that made mine what it is.