Rewritten History

Today I went to Haigh Hall. It was one of my “goodbye” days out with friends. We sat by the Hall and had a picnic and chatted. A man approached...

He had a camera on a tripod and said he was filming himself and doing a panorama. He asked if we minded us being in the shot and we said it was okay. He returned later just to follow up briefly. We asked him more. He’s documenting some of his family history for his own use.

A history that isn’t very well known. A local man who made his fortune from slavery, though apparently history says it came from coal. According to Google the coal fortune came from money he made from slavery. The man went to Jamaica, where the man we met, and his family, are from. He met a woman, this man’s great great great great grandmother. They had two children. He was already married to a woman in the UK. Yet his actions produced, after a few generations, this man.

It was an interesting story to hear, and one which I haven’t gone into as much detail as he told me because I don’t know enough about it, but also because he talked about historians writing about his family history and getting it wrong. He wants to be able to tell his own family history. I hope one day we get to hear more.

It’s amazing how much history is missing facts, especially facts that are connected to more controversial issues, like slavery, and children out of wedlock.

The photo is of some very strange looking insects we saw on our walk around the park.