Connections to the Past

One of the amazing things I've learned by my (so far) 35 years of family history and local history research, is that my family has many interesting - and surprising - connections with other early settlers. As I have said here many times, my mother's claim that we were related to almost everyone in the county, is not far from the truth. And it is not only on my mother's side of the family, who emigrated directly to St. Vincent, but also on my father's side, whose connection to the area is more indirect initially, but as deep in the end...

For example, my father's brother, my uncle Robert Short, married a local area girl by the name of Frances Gooselaw.

I didn't realize until recently, when I entered her information in the family tree, that her line traces back to the long-lived Angelica Zaste Gooselaw (Gosselin).

On my mother's side of the family, my uncle John married a local girl named Lena Paul. Aunt Lena was a direct descendant of Cuthbert Grant, an early prominent Metis leader.