Most content on this site is in the form of stories, one for each couple from whom I am descended.
'The Immigrants' tab starts with the first pair to arrive in Tasmania (then Van Diemen’s Land) in 1819 and works forward in time by date of arrival. 'Home Grown' will contain stories of the couples born in Tasmania in more or less chronological order.
For some couples there is additional content, called ‘Extras’ where I have provided detail about particular topics that would have bogged down the main narrative.
In many cases the Extras include a small number of ‘Fiction Bites’ where I have given a fictional treatment to real or probable episodes from my ancestor’s lives. I have allowed myself a bit of poetic licence in these mini-fictions but in no case do they contradict known factual information. They won’t be to everyone’s taste but writing them helped in reflecting on the motivations of individuals and inject more life into the bare facts.
For each couple there is [or will be once we work out how to present it] a simplified family tree showing their parents and the names of their children but I haven’t tried to follow every branch of every tree. The approach is one of family history, not genealogy.
Apologies to any footnote haters – there are lots and lots of footnotes. In the test version of the site footnote numbers show in really tiny font in the main text. If you click on the number it will take you to the end of the story where the footnote content is displayed. Once you’ve read a note, just click on its number in the list (or use the back button) to get back to where you came from in the main text. We are working on a better way of managing this.
The idea is that anyone who wants to should be able to consult the original sources and make up their own mind about a subject. I don’t claim my interpretation of history will always be the ‘right’ or the only one. Where would be the fun in that?
Finally, for anyone who hates reading great wodges of text on screens there's a PDF button at the end of each story so it can be printed or saved.