Well, that's how it started; a family legend which became a childhood memory. It was this story which kindled my interest in family history, just like similar stories have done for so many others.

Unfortunately, like so many such legends, it now appears to be unfounded. Using census records and the national registers I was delighted to find that my great great grandfather, John Hedley, had been born in Newburn, William Hedley's birthplace - I just needed to account for the interval of 54 years between their respective births. After countless hours checking indexes, censuses etc as well as help from other researchers, I have concluded that the most likely relationship is that William Hedley was the half-brother to my 4x great grandfather, Richard Hedley.

I was inevitably disappointed when the legend proved to be inaccurate, but the path to identifying the real relationship history has been challenging; it has revealed fascinating insights into 19th century England as well as kindling an interest in social history which never previously existed.

Although the Hedley legend was one focus of my genealogical research, it certainly was not the only one. To date and including my wife's family, I have found links to more than 500 individuals. To provide a tool for exploring the significant amount of information which has been collected, I am slowly putting together family 'genealograms'. Each genealogram includes a chart identifying the family members and their relationship and this is supplemented by research notes, document references and other facts which have come to my attention. A major challenge has been researching events prior to the commencement of the national indexes in 1837 and the first national census of 1841. With each preceding decade, records become fewer and less detailed and the level of proof for relationships becomes increasingly less rigorous and has to rely more and more on assumptions and supposition. The basis for the assumptions are openly recorded on this site and comments about them are always welcome, whether positive, or negative. The list of published genealograms, sorted by surname, is available to help navigate the various families and a list of surname interests identifying those families for which I have yet to publish details or which involve relatives born after 1901 (families where the head was born after this date will not be published on this site (for more details please see the site's Confidentiality Policy).

This site aims to give a little back to all those who have posted information about their family history or other historical records which have helped me in my research. Having spent hundreds if not thousands of hours trawling the web for family related information and having gleaned many nuggets of valuable information, it is now payback time.

If you have comments or information you would like to share with others, I hope you will use the guestbook but if you prefer to send a personal message, please use the contact form and I will reply as soon as possible.

Ken, January 2008