'I suspect my father lived with my mother all their married life in ignorance of her origins'
The respectable wife of a Northern industrialist, Anne Zouroudi’s mother went to extraordinary lengths to conceal a 'shameful’ secret.
Anne Zouroudi’s Romany ancestors hawking china
The days between my mother’s death and her funeral were dark and difficult. There were undertakers and paperwork to be dealt with, and unexpectedly acrimonious debates with my sisters over hymns and flowers. But most memorable from those days was a discovery unconnected to the burial and the wake.
Almost as soon as she was gone from her post as its sentinel, a secret my mother had guarded her whole life began to emerge.
The relatives had been summoned, and first to arrive was affable Uncle Jim, my mother’s brother. Over dinner, he made tentative enquiries as to how much my sisters and I knew. We knew nothing, but persuaded him to tell, and over a few glasses of wine, the story unfolded, shattering a facade of middle-class respectability maintained for half a century.
My mother’s secret was her breeding. Her father - my grandfather - was a full-blooded Romany gypsy, born like all his seven siblings in a wagon on common ground. When she married my grandfather, my grandmother was ostracised by her family, and after her wedding-day never again crossed the threshold of the house that had been her childhood home.
I knew about that rift, but my grandfather was a kindly old man, and what had caused such rancour against him had been a mystery. Now it turned out my mother knew, but had never told.
Did my mother suffer those taunts too?
My father was already a decade dead, and we speculated on how much he’d known. It’s my suspicion he lived with my mother all their married life in ignorance of what she saw as her shameful origins.
My uncle’s information was relatively new, uncovered by him on visits back home, where he’d been introduced to a branch of the family he had, remarkably, never met. He showed us a sepia photograph of my great-grandmother, Jemima, smoking a pipe.
I pictured my mother, a graceful consort to my father as they drank cocktails and dined with the upper echelons of northern industrialist society. To her, a pipe-smoking woman would have been anathema. Yet this gypsy heritage intrigued me, and my Romany roots seemed to explain the wanderlust that has always plagued me.
My ancestors were gypsy royalty, horse-breeders and members of what is still today one of the country’s most important clans. My grandfather had tricks to trap rabbits and was an excellent shot, with a gun or a well-aimed stick. In a Lincolnshire museum, there’s a traditional, round-topped caravan that belonged to my family which makes an annual journey to Appleby Fair, and I’m keen to see it.
I went to meet one of our newly discovered relatives, a cousin of my mother’s I never knew she had. He was a pleasure to talk to, and told tales of his life as a poacher, showing me the shotgun pocket sewn inside his coat and how to make a catapult. The cousin was old and ailing, and enjoyed regular visits from the local gamekeeper, who brought him the odd brace of pheasants, a rabbit or hare.
But when I delved deeper into our family history, I discovered scallywags and drunkards. There was a story of an expensive horse bought at a fair, and left behind because my great-grandfather was so drunk; he was such a good customer of the local pub, the landlord asked to be buried next to him.
My great-grandmother used to lock the doors and hide his shoes and socks to stop him going out drinking, but my great-grandfather used to sneak out through the window, barefoot.
And what interested me, troubled my sisters. The stigma of gypsy blood my mother felt, they felt too. My younger sister, especially, worried our branch of the family might become known to the clan, and undesirables would come knocking at the door. Living in a part of the world which takes all gypsies to be troublemakers and thieves, she feared problems for her children. She might be right.
Have attitudes changed at all, since my uncle was called *diddicoy* in the playground? We’ve explored my mother’s secret, and now it seems most likely we’ll quietly rebury it.
Snobbery, or self-protection? Call it what you will, it’s what my mother would have wanted.
Fuente: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/10139557/I-suspect-my-father-lived-with-my-mother-all-their-married-life-in-ignorance-of-her-origins.html
My father was already a decade dead, and we speculated on how much he’d known. It’s my suspicion he lived with my mother all their married life in ignorance of what she saw as her shameful origins.
My uncle’s information was relatively new, uncovered by him on visits back home, where he’d been introduced to a branch of the family he had, remarkably, never met. He showed us a sepia photograph of my great-grandmother, Jemima, smoking a pipe.
I pictured my mother, a graceful consort to my father as they drank cocktails and dined with the upper echelons of northern industrialist society. To her, a pipe-smoking woman would have been anathema. Yet this gypsy heritage intrigued me, and my Romany roots seemed to explain the wanderlust that has always plagued me.
My ancestors were gypsy royalty, horse-breeders and members of what is still today one of the country’s most important clans. My grandfather had tricks to trap rabbits and was an excellent shot, with a gun or a well-aimed stick. In a Lincolnshire museum, there’s a traditional, round-topped caravan that belonged to my family which makes an annual journey to Appleby Fair, and I’m keen to see it.
I went to meet one of our newly discovered relatives, a cousin of my mother’s I never knew she had. He was a pleasure to talk to, and told tales of his life as a poacher, showing me the shotgun pocket sewn inside his coat and how to make a catapult. The cousin was old and ailing, and enjoyed regular visits from the local gamekeeper, who brought him the odd brace of pheasants, a rabbit or hare.
But when I delved deeper into our family history, I discovered scallywags and drunkards. There was a story of an expensive horse bought at a fair, and left behind because my great-grandfather was so drunk; he was such a good customer of the local pub, the landlord asked to be buried next to him.
My great-grandmother used to lock the doors and hide his shoes and socks to stop him going out drinking, but my great-grandfather used to sneak out through the window, barefoot.
And what interested me, troubled my sisters. The stigma of gypsy blood my mother felt, they felt too. My younger sister, especially, worried our branch of the family might become known to the clan, and undesirables would come knocking at the door. Living in a part of the world which takes all gypsies to be troublemakers and thieves, she feared problems for her children. She might be right.
Have attitudes changed at all, since my uncle was called *diddicoy* in the playground? We’ve explored my mother’s secret, and now it seems most likely we’ll quietly rebury it.
Snobbery, or self-protection? Call it what you will, it’s what my mother would have wanted.
Fuente: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/10139557/I-suspect-my-father-lived-with-my-mother-all-their-married-life-in-ignorance-of-her-origins.html
