The Family
Hi, my name is Christopher Carr. I was born in Uganda in 1959 to British parents and now live in Australia with my wife and four children. I first became interested in my family history about 20 years ago and have delved into it, on and off, since then. Right now I’m “on”.
My grandparents’ surnames were Carr, Marsh, O’Donnell and Fisher. My wife’s are O’Sullivan, Green, Greene and Rowell.
Philosophy of This Site
No doubt this is not the first genealogy-related web site you’ve been to. You will have seen that most sites list individuals one at a time with as many relevant dates as possible (e.g. birth, marriage, censuses, death, burial, etc.). In some cases there are many thousands of names. I find that layout very dry and uninspiring. Don’t misunderstand me – I am forever grateful to those sites for filling in the blanks for me. And, as anyone who does genealogy knows, thousands of hours of work have gone into their research. But people are not dates or even places. They didn’t (don’t) live in isolation.
I am far more interested in the historical, social, economic, religious, scientific, etc period that each individual found themselves living in. Therefore, this site is laid out rather differently.
We start with the place or the date, build a visual picture of everyday life and then “drop” our ancestors into that picture to see what outside influences made them who they were. Of course, there is a fair degree of guess work involved – these people are long dead and very few left a personal diary or journal. But, I think we can make some sort of start. I hope you find this site interesting.
So, let’s begin . . . in the village of Ashdon, Essex, England
. . . with the Domesday Book in 1086 
