Last week, while on holiday in Yorkshire, my wife and I spent a day with a distant relative of my great grandmother Annie Eaves, touring the towns and dale's of Lancashire where our family of old originated, lived and worked. 

David Eaves, it turns out, is a seventh cousin, twice removed, which is closer than I had actually expected.  He has done considerable research into the Eaves branch of the family and is extremely knowledgeable concerning the origins and movements of the clan.  It was quite an experience, both meeting David and his family, and seeing the area where our ancestors came from.  It meant more than visiting locations in the US where past generations settled, not only because it's in another country, but because it's so old. 

The Harling family has been in America for merely the last 100 or so years; the lands David introduced me to have been inhabited by portions of the Eaves family for the past 8 centuries, and it's difficult to describe how the weight of those years sink into you when you stand on a footpath that was there when the Norman's invaded and was, likely as not, walked on by people you're descended from.

I feel like I've come full circle now, having grown up in the States, researching the family tree and wondering what it was like back in the 'old' country, and now I'm here, not as a tourist but a resident.  It's something I think about nearly every day. 

Without getting too philosophical over it, I think great grand-father John and his wife, Annie, made a good decision in immigrating to the States.  At that time, there really wasn't much for them in Lancashire.  Their working class existence involved constant moving from town to town in an effort to keep in work, which made their lives, and our genealogy tour, a bit difficult.  In searching out places to visit, we had to narrow the options down to a reasonable few that were near enough to each other to avoid lengthy car trips.  Then, as often as not, the visits involved little more than standing on non-descript main streets of tiny, timeless towns where John and/or Annie were likely to have lived for only a few months. 

In America, their opportunities were probably more varied and it was certainly less crowded.  Over this past century, our branch of the family has expanded to cover an area larger than Britain itself, so, even though none of us appear to have become millionaires, I'd say it's worked out fairly well. 

Speaking for myself, life surely would have been different had I grown up there, yet I was continually struck by the similarities between Lancashire and my boyhood home in Columbia County, NY.  From my childhood, I recall rolling hills, fields, water and woodlands criss-crossed with walls made of stone.  The beauty of that land is mirrored and magnified in Lancashire and I could see myself growing up here, impecunious perhaps, but nonetheless happily roaming the moors, walking the ancient footpaths, scaling dry stone walls and fishing the becks. 

As usual, I've posted some photos of my trip in my Photo Album pages for your enjoyment:

Yorkshire 
Digging up Roots in Lancashire 
The Bontë Experience

Enjoy!

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