Day 136

Writing exercise – drag them into the story

…

I wanted answers.

I mean, don’t we all?

They were not difficult questions.  Where are my grandparents?  Why haven’t we seen them?  Are they still alive?

The single answer was that they died not long after my older sister was born.  But it was not the answer that bothered me. It was the delay my mother took to reply, and even more telling was her expression.

I’d seen that expression before, and it was clear to me that she was lying, or more to the point, not telling us the truth.

I had tried, over the years, to discover the truth, but each time, there was always a variation of the same answer: that they were no longer around.

And, because we were not old enough to go out and investigate, that was sufficient to quell any sort of investigation that I or my older sister, Kayla, might have instituted.

Until now.

In a totally unexpected moment in time, my first year at university, and a simple assignment, one that required us to discover who our ancestors were and what impact they may have had on our lives. 

It was a simple matter, and to my astonishment, most of the kids knew of and/or frequently interacted with their grandparents and also knew of their forebears further back.

I had nothing.

…

So, here’s the thing…

I had a document that told me exactly how to investigate my family history.

First step: How to get birth certificates for my parents.  All I had to do was prove who I was; if I wanted a certified copy, and thinking that might cause them to alert my mother, I opted for just the bare bones report.

Finally, I had two names: my mother’s father, William Westbrook, mother, Vanessa Westbrook, nee Cartager.  In other words, my grandmother was Vanessa Cartager, and she was from Dorchester.  My grandfather came from Dorchester.

Second step:  Once I knew their names, I looked for any other children, provided they were born in Dorchester.  My guideline document said that, going back in time, people didn’t really move around unless significant events forced them to.

Armed with their names, I went online and found the outline records for births, marriages, and deaths and searched for the names.

I found Vanessa Cartger.  Born 1936.  Married in 1958 to William Westbrook, both from Dorchester.  Checking parents William and Vanessa Wentworth, 1959, my mother Jennifer, 1961, a boy William, 1963, a girl, Kayla, and 1965, another boy, John.  I had an aunt and two uncles.

None of the names turned up in the deaths, but they could have died in any one of a hundred or so little villages or somewhere else.  It was beginning to look like the proverbial needle in a haystack type search.

It was possible to go further back one generation to find my great-great-grandparents’ names, but I had enough to start with.

I was not going to go home and ask.  I was going to Dorchester to do what I wasn’t sure, but it seemed a good starting point.

…

I booked into a small hotel on Saturday afternoon, after driving up from London. It was not as if I was the sort of person to drop everything on a whim, but it was rather close.  Kayla asked me where I was going, and given her close connection to our mother, I thought it best not to tell her, except I was going away for a few days.  Cornwall, perhaps.  She knew I was interested in the tin mines of old

I deliberately hadn’t told her my interest in our forebears, at least not this time. The last time she had blabbed to mother and caused a ruckus.  It made me wonder what it was my mother had to hide.

I went to the Deanery, which was simply a church and churchyard and thought it odd that people called it home, and for one of the siblings, it had been home for a few years, according to census records.

There, I was able to discover death records for the cemetery, and it held one Jennifer Westbrook, born 1861, died 1861.  Not possible, or it was not the same Jennifer, or did Vanessa give birth to two Jennifers in the same year, one dying at birth?

And a grave location

The graveyard was a very solemn place, bordering one scary, and I guess if I delved deeper, I would find that I had forebears buried here.  They could have gone to the church and sat in the same pews I had.

Just the thought of it sent a shiver down my spine.

It was peaceful, and for a long time, I was alone.  Until I neared the grave of the infant Jennifer.

And discovered an elderly woman at the same location, standing in front of a rather ornate gravestone.

She looked up as I approached.

“I haven’t seen you before.”  It wasn’t a reproach but curiosity.

“I’m looking for a Jennifer Westbrook, though it appears it is not this one.  I’m sorry.” I could see now that it was a family grave with the daughter and the father, William Westbrook’s name on it, with today’s date, a year before.  “You would not be Vanessa Westbrook?”

A stern expression, “Who are you?”

“A person who is chasing the white rabbit.  My studies require me to search for ancestors.  My name is Peter Davies. My mother, Jennifer Westbrook, married Robert Davies in one of the villages around here, and she said her mother had died before I was born.  I’ve been searching the parish records and stumbled upon several Jennifers.  I can see this is the wrong one.”

“You’re mother is deceased.”

“I thought so.  Her mother’s name was Vanessa Cartager, and later, Westbrook.  Or that’s what it says on the birth certificate.

“Then the confusion is not confusion.  You just have the wrong birth certificate.  It’s a simple mistake.  There’s a half dozen Vanessa Cartagers in various parts of Dorset, it’s a common enough name.  Back to the drawing board, as they say.”

“Yes.  You’re right, of course.  I’m sorry if I have caused you any distress.  This must be a difficult time for you.”

“William.  Yes.  But he’s the lucky one.  He’s with her now.”

And that was the end of the conversation.

I thanked her and started walking away.  I only had one issue: little Jennifer’s birthdate was exactly the same as my mother’s, and my mind had just gone to a very dark place.

My mother had created a fake ID. I’d read about it recently in a thriller novel, and had thought at the time it was simply an author’s imagination.

It was not.

My mother had to be a spy.

And then I laughed out loud at the thought.  I was even further away from ever finding out who she was.

…

©  Charles Heath  2025