New Channel 4 series "My Family Secrets Revealed"

[kiterunner]

Starts next Monday (3rd Dec) at 1:05 p.m.

"Using a team of genealogical and historical experts, this brand new series helps the British public connect directly with their family history."

There is a feature in the new Radio Times which is supposed to be about it, but is really just family history tips and nothing about the programme. Bit different from the spoilers they usually give for WDYTYA!

[Margaret in Burton]

I see it’s on every weekday at that time.

[kiterunner]

Oh dear, it's one of those programmes where they spend half the time telling you what's going to happen or what already happened. And as it was the first episode, they had two introductions. There wasn't much actual content, and most of the "unexpected surprises" (what other kind of surprise is there?!) seemed to be just confirming what the subjects had already been told. ("I was always told that my great-uncle was involved in the "Whisky Galore" incident" - surprise, he was!) And I didn't understand why Julie's family didn't already know that her great-grandfather had gone to work in the mine in Cuba if it said so in the letter that was sent to her great-grandmother? But glad that she got an answer to the question of where he went.

When they said that the son of the Malaysian man had a hitherto unknown half-sister, perhaps in Australia, I was expecting them to bring her in to meet him! Not just to say that he was starting to try to trace her.

A big disappointment.

[JBee]

Just saw the end of it and the summary.

Disappointing

[kiterunner]

I have to say, I would have more faith in their "experts" if they knew how to pronounce words - Onyeka came out with "vic-tew-lier" for "victualler" in an earlier episode, and today he kept talking about the "Royal Army Medical Corpse", while Tessa said "loo-tenant" instead of "leff-tenant". (And no, she is not American; she has an English accent.)

[kiterunner]

In today's episode, I was surprised that Onyeka said that the surname Da Costa suggested that the Indian family had Portuguese ancestors, since we heard on the "Coronation Street's DNA Secrets" programme a couple of months ago that the Portuguese colonists gave many Indians Portuguese surnames when they converted them to Christianity! I guess he didn't know that, and didn't check into it.

At least Tessa managed to pronounce the word "victualler" correctly though.

[JBee]

This programme seems to be trying to get their own message across instead of looking at the facts properly.

[Olde Crone]

Today's blooper was "S on the census stands for son" - er, no it doesn't, it stands for single!

OC

[kiterunner]

I was just about to post that, OC! Also, why didn't they show us what it said for father's name on Henry Richards' and Monica Blackwood's marriage certificates? And Clarice Richards's, come to that.

In case anyone is wondering, Monica is on the 1939 Register but doesn't seem to be with family, and because her date of birth is 5 Nov 1913, she wouldn't be on the 1911 census:
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/interactive/61596/tna_r39_0623_0623a_013?pid=9325038&treeid=&personid=&rc=&usePUB=true&_phsrc=Ctf10940&_phstart=successSource
She is on some electoral registers in the 1930's but again, not with any other Blackwoods.

[kiterunner]

In today's episode, what did Onyeka mean when he said it was unusual to have a death certificate rather than a burial record? :confused:

[JBee]

Are they really genealogists in that programme or actors playing the role?

[Olde Crone]

Julie

According to the blurb, it's one genealogist, one historian and one law lecturer and historian, who "had to absorb a great deal of knowledge in a short time". One cannot help wondering why they didn't just use THREE qualified genealogists.

OC

[kiterunner]

Surely Tess was wrong to say that they had proved that the woman wasn't related to Kate Middleton? She should just have said that they hadn't been able to find any relationship.