The Importance of Family Trees!

queenjuliana (47)in #life • 6 years ago

Beautiful Steemit Darlings I would like to share a little story with you all!

Family is important. I started thinking about that as Mother’s Day just ended.

In my life I have only had three large Family Reunions! It’s so sad when one loses touch with family when you move to another country (moving from South Africa to the USA). So many stories that get lost along the way!

I have been trying to work on our family tree which becomes very difficult when you are in your 70’s, because most of the family that lived in your era have all gone to the ‘Happy Hunting Grounds’. And those still here, cannot help you as they do not remember.

I really want to advise younger people to work on Family Trees, as my experience is you always regret that you did not do it when you were younger. Sometimes you come across photos that you do not recognize because you did not make note of them earlier in your life.

What I regret most was not paying attention to my Aunt’s stories about the Boer War in South Africa, which ended in 1902. (Three years before my father’s birth.) I so wish I knew more!

I remember my Aunt Sophie telling me that during the war the young girls had to take care of the cattle (as the boys were all fighting the British) and that there were huge caves in the area where they could actually hide with the cattle and evade the British. From there they could see the British march by at a distance. So I always wondered what it felt like for them living that life, having to protect themselves and the cattle from wild animals and the enemy. They did carry rifles, but anything could have gone wrong.

All I remember about my Uncle (we called him Oom Boetie) was that he was captured and sent to Ceylon as a (POW) prisoner of war. He was only 16 years old when he joined the war! He told me: All the way to the ship that would take him to Ceylon, he shat in his trousers (dysentery). He was forced to march down the main road in Durban, South Africa while his bowels were having their own war.

When he was an old man he still hated the British with a vengeance and refused to speak English all his life. In my mind’s eye I can still see this old man sitting at the kitchen table angrily telling these stories. I really wish I knew more about him. What I do remember when we visited him, was he snored so loudly that none of us could sleep the whole night!