My family background:

On my mother's side. Her father was a USian who came to Australia as a merchant seaman. His background was a combination of Irish and Hungarian Jew who have fled to the US during the 1840's pogroms. My maternal grandmother's family had come to Australia from Ireland in the late 19th century and settled around Maitland. Interestingly, the Irish on that side lived in a village that was a mere 20 miles from the village my maternal grandfather's family came from. So after being neighbours, one group went to the US, one to Australia and were then re-united a century later in my grandparents.

On my father's side, we had a combination of Irish and Spanish. The Irish ancestors came here around 1820 and settled in Cooma. Unfortunately, not convicts, just free settlers. It seems the elder brother came first and convinced two more brothers to come out and farm. Around 1850 one brother married a Spanish women who we assume was a mail-order bride. I'm still trying to track that side down - records aren't great. Things get a little murky around 1880 when, it seems, my great-great grandfather divorced and then married his sister-in-law and then his divorced wife married another brother. Tracking who was actually descended from who gets messy.

So mainly Irish, some Welsh, a pinch of Spanish and a smattering of Hungarian Jew. I'm currently concentrating on the Hungarian side to try to nail down their background. It seems they came to Hungry via Russia.

cont

Constance mother Adel had her when she was 16, being her second child, her father was either her plantation owner or the husband of the woman who later accused her of attempted murder, or even a third unknown person they were all Frenchmen in their late 40's, early 50'. According to an uncle, another slave, the second Frenchman had a particular liking for Adel and was the father of Constance. Mauritius had been a French colony but ceded to the British after the Napoleonic war. Slave owners and their male friends constantly raped slave girls as young as 10 years old. It was common practice for a slave owner to invite a male guest to "inspect" his property, particularly the young slave girls, as many times as he liked. Any offspring from those inspections were a bonus for the slave owner, this practice was common knowledge, but never spoken of by white women. It is believed, at least by my cousin, that the second Frenchman had developed a keen interest in both Constance (8) and her cousin Elizabeth (12) and was borrowing them as house servants too often for the liking of his wife, thus the attempted murder charge. In her statement she said "The girls served me tea with a bitter taste and I was poorly for three days, before I had doctor attend me." then she recovered. That's enough to get two very young slave girls transported for life. BTW cousin Elizabeth died in her 50's in The Rocks of Sydney living in abject poverty. It seems their owner was very angary that such chargers had been brought, and was eventually compensated for his loss.

Dear Paul,

What an amazing background you've got.
Reading your posts was fascinating. No
wonder you are the person that you are today.
Truly amazing.

Dear mhaze,

Gosh there's so much more to you than I would have
ever guessed. Wow! Thank You for sharing.

My grandmothe's people came from a small village near
the river Viga in Russia. Mum told me that were
merchants who made mocassins out of fur. I
remember that she was an excellent seamstress and
very beautiful. Grandfather adored her. I remember the
old songs she used to sing. She died at a young age
near Cessnock in NSW.

Paul1405,
Yes, your ancestors had it rough in the extreme. Mine did it tough too but nowhere near as bad.
That's one evil trait the European power mongers learnt rather quickly to adopt from the Arabs.

Speaking about ancestry - something I'll share with you all, though somewhat crude? In company with another detective, we were in the process of interviewing our prize suspect, our only and strongest suspect.

I put to him a series of questions and one of which must've hit the mark! He arose from the table very angrily and attempted to tip it over in the process and yelled at me with spittle spraying from his mouth and said, '...you Mr.....are nothing but a * and you were not born of a woman's womb but came out of the arse of a dog...'!

So as you all can see, I have a fascinating ancestry (pedigree), part Cattle or Kelpie Dog, or perhaps German Shepherd, even Labrador, or a mix of 'em all...?

Dear O Sung Wu,

You've got the traits of a German Schnauzer - intelligent,
affectionate, loyal, alert, good natured, and
good-looking.

Nothing to sneeze at. Lots to love.