"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Sean Hayes

This episode of Who Do You Think You Are? was about Sean Hayes, whose name I vaguely recognized.  The teaser said that he would learn about dark mysteries connected to his father's lineage, an estranged ancestor living in squalor, and patterns of dysfunction going back generations.  Sounds like one happy family, doesn't it?

In the introduction, we hear that Hayes is an Emmy-winning actor known for his role on Will & Grace (at least I've heard of that, though I've never watched it).  He was nominated for a Tony award for his performance in Promises, Promises.  He also has been a producer of Hollywood Game Night and Grimm (now there's a show I watch!).  He lives in Los Angeles with his husband, music producer Scott Icenogle.

Hayes tells us his full name is Sean Patrick Hayes and that he is "named after no one I know of."  He was born in Illinois and at the age of 1 his family moved from Chicago to the suburbs (known to many as Chicagoland).  He is the youngest of five children.  He had a rather tumultous life growing up, as his mother worked all the time and his father was mostly not present.  He concedes that his father probably has some good qualities, but he doesn't know any of them.  He's never had a relationship with his father, as the man left when Hayes was 5 years old.  He doesn't know anything about his father's side of the family.

Hayes has always been drawn to comedy, probably as an escape.  It's a way of enjoying life without dealing with the real world.  Now that he's older, he has started to wonder about his family history and wants to learn about his father's side.  He knew his grandmother and was told that his father was in an orphanage at one time.  His parents met when his father had just come out of the Army.

We get some more information about the family through a letter from Hayes' brother, Dennis, which Hayes reads to Icenogle.  As background, Hayes doesn't know his grandfather's name, but his sister told him that the grandfather died literally in the gutter.  Hayes comments that his family history has been mostly full of bad luck.

From Dennis' letter we learn that the father (whose name is never used in the entire episode) was born in Chicago in 1936 and that his parents were William and Barbara.  Hayes notes that Dennis' middle name is William, so that appears to be a connection.  In 1947 the four children in the family were placed in an orphanage.  At some point Barbara broke both of her hips and was in the hospital; it wasn't clear to me if this was the same time that the children were in the orphanage (and therefore maybe the cause of the latter).  Dennis doesn't know if William was around, though it appears he was out of the picture.  He says their father's grandfather was from Ireland but doesn't know his name.  He ends by saying that he has run into lots of dead ends and hopes that Hayes has better luck than he did.

Included with the letter is a photograph of Hayes' grandparents, and it's actually labeled!  The photo is of four people; the person on the left is unknown, and then come William Hayes, Aunt Sally, and Barbara Hayes.  The photo is supposed to be from 1941.  Hayes has never seen a photograph of his grandfather before.  Going by the year, this was taken six years before the children were placed in the orphanage.  There is also a photo of Barbara in the hospital (just how did she break both of her hips, anyway?).  Hayes hypothesizes that maybe William wasn't able to take care of the children with Barbara laid up but then also says that "we know" he was out of the picture at that point.  Um, how do we know that?

The Hayes family in the 1940 census:
William, Barbara, Patricia, Ronald, and Kathleen

We go straight from the letter to "Let's see what we can find out about William on Ancestry.com!"  For someone who has had little to no interest in his family history, that was a fast turn-around.  He apparently even has an account, because he's logged in.  He has also already figured out how to do searches and looks for William Hayes with a wife's name of Barbara, then finds them in the 1940 census.  The image shown on screen carefully does not include Hayes' father's name.  William is listed as a photo engineer (at an engineering company, though that was not stated), with an income of $3,400.  Hayes comments that his own father was also a photographer, and then that William was the richest guy on the block (well, actually just this one census page), so what happened?  That segues directly into how it seems that everything happened in Chicago, so he should go there.  (Boy, when he decides to do something, he jumps right on it, doesn't he?)  In the outro he wonders whether his grandfather was alive or dead when the children were in the orphanage.

Two things struck me with the census page showing the family.  The first is that Hayes' father, he of no name, must be Ronald, as he is not only the correct age but also the only boy in the family.  The second is that Aunt Sally does not appear to have been born yet (unless Sally is an unusual family nickname for Patricia or Kathleen).  With the family photo dated 1941, that would mean Sally shouldn't be more than 2 years old.  Admittedly, we didn't get the world's greatest view of the photo, but she didn't look that young to me.

Moving on to Chicago (I love Chicago!), Hayes heads to the Chicago History Museum to meet historian Mark Largent (an associate professor of social relations and policy at Michigan State University), whom Hayes has asked for "anything he can find out" about his grandfather.  Largent tells Hayes that he has found a document, and right before they cut away to a commercial, we hear Hayes exclaim, "Oh my god!  That's really, really sad."  When they come back to the program, we learn that Largent found the death certificate for William Hayes, who died November 16, 1951 in Chicago.

I have to admit I was pretty impressed with the way that Hayes appeared to be reading all the details on the certificate.  He noted that William was 40 years old when he died and said that he had to go back to his makeshift timeline.  His big question had been whether William was alive when the children went to the orphanage, and the answer is definitely yes.  Now he knows that his father and his grandfather were living in the same city but with very different lives.  William's address at the time of his death was 66 West Van Buren, which is now totally different but at the time was a slum. 

Cook County Hospital facade

Largent explains that in 1951 it was populated mostly by single men, a lot of whom were unemployed and/or suffered from mental illness.  William didn't die in the gutter, as Hayes' sister had claimed, but in Cook County Hospital.  He died from advanced pulmonary tuberculosis.  Of all things, Hayes asks if the hospital is still around.  (Is that something you would think of?)  Largent says it was shut down but the facade still remains, and that's where they go next, to look at what remains of the hospital.  (On the other side of the facade there is now a sports field, of all things.)

Hayes sees powerful parallels between his father's and his own experiences.  He says he was the same age when his father left as his father was when his grandfather left (though I don't know how he knows his grandfather left when his father was 5).  He doesn't understand how his grandfather could have gone from seemingly being the richest man in his neighborhood to skid row.  After the thrill of seeing the hospital facade, he asks how he can learn more about his grandfather's final days, and Largent says they can go to the medical library.

At the library (I couldn't figure out where exactly they went for this segment) Largent has a file folder with the police department report on finding Hayes' grandfather.  The page shows the report was for dealing with sick or injured persons.  Dated November 1, 1951, it shows that an officer went to 66 West Van Buren, found William, and took him to the hospital.  Hayes notices that nothing is entered in the field for relatives or friends.  Elsewhere on the report the officer noted that William could answer his questions intelligently, so apparently William simply had nothing to say in response to the question about relatives.

William's hospital admission record (I wish these types of records were available and accessible for more locations!) says that his father's name was Patrick, which Hayes seems surprised to realize is also his middle name, indicating he was likely named for his great-grandfather.  (It also seems to indicate that Hayes' father still had some feelings for his own father.)  Since an address was given for Patrick, he must have been alive at the time, but he does not appear to have been at the hospital.  (And now we have Patrick, William, and Ronald, all living in Chicago but apparently totally disconnected from each other.)  The doctor's synopsis says that William was suffering from anorexia; he hadn't been eating regularly for four to five months.  The report also says that William's liver was 3FB, meaning three fingers below median, a possible indication of alcohol abuse.  Largent is quick to emphasize it's only one piece of evidence that could support that.  William was noted as being extremely emaciated, pale, and having a red nose — another possible indicator of alcoholism.

Hayes wants to know if Patrick was an absentee father or if he just didn't know what was going on with William, but Largent says there's no way to know from the records they have.  Hayes then asks if Patrick was an immigrant.  Largent tells him that information about immigrants is in the Cook County court archives, so that's where he should look next.

As he leaves, Hayes talks about how this is the end of William's story.  He feels sorry for William and how he must have felt alone, and that his story was sad and frightening.  He now sympathizes more with his own father and what he must have gone through with William.  He wonders if some of the same issues were at play with Patrick.  He also wonders about a pattern of absentee fathers.

Still in Chicago, Hayes goes to the Cook County Clerk of the Circuit Court archives.  There he meets Margaret Garb, an urban historian from Washington University.  He says he had sent her the information he had and asked her to look for his great-grandfather.  Garb begins by showing him the 1930 census page which has William living with his father Patrick; Patrick's wife is Jennie.  William, at the age of 18, is already a photography engineer (which is what, exactly?).  Patrick is 48 years old, meaning he was born about 1882.  He owned his home and was a motorman for the street railway.  Garb explains he worked on the streetcars, which was a good, stable job, so during the Depression (or at least the beginning of it), he was working and the family was doing well.  (The program didn't show Patrick in the 1940 census, but he was at the same address, widowed, and the census taker gave the extra information that he was from County Kerry.)

Patrick and Jennie were both born in Ireland (the census actually says Irish Free State, meaning the Republic of Ireland, as opposed to Northern Ireland), and all the children were born in Illinois.  Hayes is excited to identify his great-grandfather as the first person in the Hayes family to come to the U.S.  The census says he came in 1900.  Hayes reads the naturalization column as "no", and Garb corrects him, saying that it actually says "na" for "naturalized."  Hayes asks about finding those records, and Garb tells him they are in the same building, so that's the next search.  They look through index cards for men named Patrick Hayes.  Hayes uses a magnifying glass to read the cards on the microfilm reader.  He finds one Patrick with a birth year of 1879 and arrival year of 1901; Garb explains that the years could be off a little bit and tells him to write down the certificate number, 54916 (gee, I guess it must be the right guy).

From the microfilm reader the two walk to a shelving area with lots of stacked books.  It reminds Hayes of the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark (what a great analogy!).  They walk down the aisle looking at the spines of the books, and Hayes spots the one that has 548–553.  They bring it to a table, and Hayes pages through until he finds 54916.  He almost sounds in awe when he's told that this is the original paper, with his great-grandfather's actual signature on it.  It shows that Patrick Francis Hayes, a streetcar operator, was from Ballylongford, Ireland.  His wife's name was Jennie.  Hayes declares this "has to be the guy!"  He had brown hair and blue eyes, just like Hayes.  He came to the United States on the Umbria, arriving in New York about April 1901.  He signed his Declaration of Intention on February 11, 1918.  (I have to wonder why they didn't show his Petition.  Maybe it didn't have as much information, or wasn't as accurate?)

Hayes is thrilled to see all this information and wants to know how he can learn more about Patrick's life in Ireland.  Garb, of course, tells him that he should go there.  Hayes responds, "I'll go to Ireland!  Thanks, Maggie!"  He sounds genuinely enthusiastic.

As he leaves the archives Hayes says he feels as though he has now met Patrick.  He's enamored of Patrick's drive and ambition.  He finds it inspiring that Patrick wanted a better life for his family.  It's a contrast with William's story, which was a great tragedy.  (On the other hand, he didn't follow Patrick all the way to his demise, so we don't know what happened to him later.)  Patrick seems to be the opposite of Hayes' own father.  He wants to go to Ireland to learn more about Patrick's surroundings and why he would have wanted to leave.

In Ireland, Hayes says he had a bizarre feeling when he landed that he was connected to the country.  (Maybe he's very suggestible.)  He's going to the National Archives of Ireland (in Dublin, which is where I thought he was, though they don't tell us that for quite a while) to speak with historian Shane Kilcommins (head of the School of Law at the University of Limerick).  Of course, Hayes has "asked" Kilcommins to look into Patrick's life before he left Ireland.  The first document Kilcommins has for Hayes is a 1901 census page.  It's for a prison in County Kerry, which causes Hayes to say that "my great-grandfather wasn't as great as we thought."  The page doesn't show full names but only initials, so Hayes looks for PH, whom he finds on line 12.  That person is from Ballylongford and is the right age.  His crime was assault.

Hayes asks if there's any more beyond that, and Kilcommins brings out a book and has Hayes put on conservator gloves.  The book is for Tralee Prison records for 1901–1905.  Patrick shows up on page 1.  His entry shows he was 21 years old and from Ballylongford.  He was sentenced on January 30 to hard labor for three counts of assault.  The sentencing options were a fine, bail, or hard labor.  The narrator pops in at this point to explain that prisons in Great Britain and Ireland commonly used hard labor as a punishment.  Examples were to repeatedly carry a cannonball around, turn a crank, or walk on a treadmill endlessly.  The labor was exhausting, monotonous, and deliberately unproductive.  (Obviously, there was no concept of rehabilitation at this time.)  Kilcommins continues to explain Patrick's record, which shows that he was "entered into recognizance" on March 1, 1901, which meant that he promised to behave himself.  He accomplished that by leaving the next month for New York.

Now Hayes appears a little confused.  He had thought his great-grandfather was ambitious and driven, but it seems he may have just been running away from trouble.  He asks Kilcommins if there's more.  Kilcommins says that they can go back to previous criminal records.

The general register for Tarbert(?) Prison for 1896 shows that Patrick Jr.—which Hayes realizes implies that his father was Patrick Sr., so now he knows his great-great-grandfather's name—was 17 years old when accused of assault.  Right above Patrick's entry is one for a William Hayes, also accused of assault.  Both Patrick and William were from Ballylongford and posted bail on the same day.  Were they related?  It looks like they probably were, but right now they don't know how.  Kilcommins says that the Tarbert petty session records can probably shed more light on the subject.  Tarbert is a small town in northern County Kerry.  Hayes asks if the courthouse is still there, and Kilcommins tells him that the building is.  They arrange to meet the next day at the old courthouse.

Hayes has found this information on Patrick to be enlightening (to say the least!).  Patrick served his time, then left Ireland.  (But what happened to William?)  It does look as though he made a good life for himself in the U.S.  Now Hayes is going to Tarbert, where he can stand where his great-grandfather stood when he was sentenced—a very proud moment!

Tarbert, County Kerry, is about 150 miles west of Dublin.  Hayes and Kilcommins meet outside the old courthouse, which Kilcommins points out was also the jail (is it "gaol" in Ireland?), or "House of Corrections."  We see a statue of a guard as they go in.  Hayes admits it's weird to be excited to see where Patrick met his judgment.  (Some books were on the judge's bench, but they were not used during the segment, so they may have been only window dressing.)  Hayes stands in the dock and says it doesn't feel very comfortable.  Kilcommins tells him that since it was an assault case, he would have been only two feet away from the person who was accusing him.  Patrick might have been there with William, possibly his brother.

Moving on to the research, Hayes asks if Kilcommins has been able to glean more information, which of course he has.  And of course, he also has the records.  He takes some large printouts from the bench and brings them to a table to show Hayes.  The records show that two complaints were registered by Patrick Hayes, Sr. against defendants William and Patrick Jr., both for assault  (William and Patrick Jr. were laborers; Patrick Sr. looked like a farm something, but I couldn't read it, even after multiple attempts.  They lived on Kilcolgan Lane.)  Hayes is astonished to learn that a father filed assault charges against his sons and says, "This is one f-ed up family," but admits it's consistent with the other information he's been learning.

Specifically, on August 11, 1896, the record says that William "did unlawfully assault said complainant by attempting to stab him with a knife."  The complaint against Patrick Jr., filed the same day, says that he assaulted his father "by throwing a stone at him."  These revelations engender a "Holy <pause> moley!" and "This is crazy!" from Hayes, who asks what the fight was about.  Kilcommins says "another <something>" that I did not understand.

Then we learn about Patrick Sr., not exactly an upstanding citizen himself.  Kilcommins has compiled a list of his criminal infractions from the petty sessions from 1864–1914.  There was a crime of some sort almost every year, but Hayes notices that from 1878–1888 there was nothing.  After that most of the crimes were drunk and disorderly.  He wonders what changed, and Kilcommins produces a death certificate for Patrick Sr.'s wife, Bridgett, dated May 22, 1888.  Apparently the ten years Patrick Sr. was married (we didn't actually get to see anything that said when he and Bridgett married) were happy ones, and everything fell apart when Bridgett died.  It affected the children as much as it affected their father.  Patrick Jr. was born about 1879, so that would have been the beginning of the good years for Patrick Sr.  He had about ten years of a calm environment, and then his mother died.  Hayes says, "No one knew how to deal with it, they just drunk about it."

Hayes asks if there's anything more about Patrick Sr., but Kilcommins says that was all he could find.  (He couldn't find the death?)  He suggests that Hayes can go to Ballylongford to see the area, which hasn't changed much. As he leaves the courthouse, Hayes says he's been fortunate to learn this information.  It's proven that history repeats itself, and his family has had an endless chain of chaos.

Hayes goes to Ballylongford (Beál Atha Longfoirt) and simply walks around.  It's special to walk in the footsteps of his ancestors, but he hopes he doesn't follow their later paths.  He recognizes more connections now to his family.  His name, Sean Patrick Hayes, has new meaning now that he knows his great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather were named Patrick.  Patrick Jr. left Ireland at the age of 21 because he couldn't take it anymore, looking for something better.  Hayes himself left home at 24 because he had to get away, and went to Los Angeles.  He feels a kind of camaraderie with Patrick Jr.

Hayes realizes the knowledge of his ancestry he's been given is a great gift.  His family has a clear cycle of leaving, albeit for different reasons.  He can't excuse his own father but what he's learned has maybe helped him understand a little better.  He can't forget what his father did, but he can forgive him.

And just to prove how obsessive I can be, I watched and rewatched the scenes with the list of Patrick Sr.'s infractions until I could construct this list.  I'm sure I still missed a couple.

1900 Drunk and disorderly on the public highway
1900 Refusing to pay the poor rate
1899 Refusing to pay the poor rate
1899 Trespassing cows
1899 Refusing to pay debts
1898 Refusing to pay the poor rate collector
1898 Refusing to pay the poor rate collector
1898 Refusing to repair boundary fence
1898 Unpaid debts
1897 Drunk on the public highway
1897 Refusing to pay debts
1896 Assault
1896 Assault
1896 Assault
1896 Unpaid debts
1895 Trespassing cows
1895 Unpaid debt for trespassing cows
1895 Drunk on the public highway
1895 Drunk on the public highway
1895 Drunk on the public highway
1895 Drunk on the public highway
1894 Drunk on the public highway
1894 Drunk on the public highway
1894 Drunk on the public highway
1894 Unpaid debt
1892 Assault
1892 Unpaid debt
1891 Assault
1891 Assault
1891 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1891 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1891 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1890 Assault
1890 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1890 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1890 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1890 Unpaid debts
1889 Cruelty and torture toward someone's donkey
1889 Violent threats
1889 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1889 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1889 Drunk and disorderly on the public street
1889 Refusing to pay the poor rate
1888 Drunk and disorderly
1888 Drunk and disorderly
1888 Drunk and disorderly
1888 Drunk and disorderly
1878 Dog off leash
1875 Trespassing donkey
1874 Cow and goat trespassing
1873 Dog off of leash
1871 Assault
1865 Drunk and disorderly
1864 Assault
1864 Attemped assault with an iron bar

"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Trisha Yearwood

The commercial that advertised this episode of Who Do You Think You Are? was probably the most entertaining one I've seen for the program.  Trisha Yearwood said she didn't know what she might find — murder, intrigue, or circus performers.  She sounded like a person with a good sense of humor, so I had been looking forward to seeing how the episode turned out.  The opening monologue from the narrator mentioned loss, criminals, and perseverance, so it appeared it was going to lean toward the murder and intrigue angle rather than the circus.

The overview of Yearwood explains she is from a small town in Georgia and is a successful country music artist.  She has had nine #1 hits and has won three Grammy Awards.  In 2008 she published her first cookbook and in 2012 began a program on Food Network called Trisha's Southern Kitchen.  Her husband is country singer Garth Brooks, she has three stepdaughters, and the family has two homes, one in Oklahoma and one in Nashville.

Yearwood begins her narrative by saying she is from Monticello, Georgia.  Her father was a banker and her mother was a schoolteacher.  In a small town everyone knows everyone and looks out for everyone (I know about that, having lived in Niceville, Florida), which she didn't appreciate until she moved.  Then she learned how special that was.  At five years old she already knew she wanted to be a singer, and her parents encouraged her dream.  Both of her parents have passed away; she knows about her mother's side of the family, but not so much about her father's.

Yearwood's father was an only child.  His mother, Grandma Elizabeth Winslett, lived with the family since Yearwood was a teenager but wouldn't tell stories about her side of the family.  Now Yearwood wants to learn more about her father's side of the family and particularly wants to find her first immigrant ancestor.  That's actually kind of a vague goal — any line of the family?  the earliest from all family lines? — but because the only ancestor mentioned had been her grandmother, it was a good guess it would be from that side.  Then we got the quote from the commercial:  "There could be murder, there could be intrigue, there could be circus performers. . . . I have no idea what to expect."  It's a great line.

Yearwood does not start off talking with a family member or even making the almost obligatory personal foray onto Ancestry.com.  She goes to the Nashville Public Library and meets genealogist Kyle Betit (an Ancestry.com employee, who apparently actually specializes in Irish research), pronounced "Beatty."  She tells him her grandmother was from Eatonton, Georgia.  He says he has built a tree he wants her to look at it on (of course) Ancestry.com.  Yearwood is very human; she says she needs her glasses to read the screen.

The Winslett family tree shows that Elizabeth was born March 17, 1908 in Putnam County, Georgia.  The tree continues with Yearwood's great-grandfather Cary Winslett — Yearwood says that her grandmother had mentioned him — great-great-grandfather Thomas Jefferson Winslett, third great-grandfather Seaborn Winslett, fourth great-grandfather Jonathan Winslett, and fifth great-grandfather Samuel Winslett, who was born in 1744 in Binsted, Hampshire, England and died in 1829 in Georgia.  During all of this, Yearwood is shown writing notes, which was nice to see.  But we've already reached the immigrant ancestor!  What will we do to fill the rest of the hour?

Betit has Yearwood click on Samuel's name.  His entry shows that he was baptized on December 28, 1744 in Hampshire.  Yearwood asks why Samuel would have migrated, what kind of trade the family practiced, and how he ended up where he did.  Betit says that now that Yearwood knows where in England her ancestor was from she should go to England and find out why.  (Why not, it isn't coming out of his pocket.)  Yearwood is very excited "to find out on the first day of my journey" her immigrant ancestor (as with Cindy Crawford, a journey that was months in the making; could the behind-the-scenes research team get just a little on-screen acknowledgment here?).

And Yearwood flies to England, knowing only her immigrant ancestor's birth year and hometown.  At the Hampshire Records Office she finds genealogist Les Mitchinson, who tells her that for 1744 they will need to look in parish registers to find more information.  He sits her down in front of a laptop computer and puts in a CD.  The screen shows a search page and says Hampshire Genealogical Society.  Yearwood types in Samuel, but instead of letting her type Winslett for the last name, Mitchinson says that names could be spelled in different ways and suggests she type only "Wins" (gee, maybe he's already done this search ...).  And amazingly enough, up pops an entry for the baptism of Samuel "Winslut" on December 28, 1744 in Binsted.  His parents were John and Mary Winslut, which Yearwood astutely deduces are her sixth great-grandparents.

Mitchinson then has Yearwood search for other children by using the Winslut spelling and Binsted as the search terms.  Mitchinson says he will look for more information in marriage and burial registers.  Yearwood finds three more children, all boys older than Samuel — James, William, and John Winslut.  When Mitchinson returns Yearwood announces her discovery and says she can assume that the boys are all siblings, but Mitchinson says only that it is more than likely that is the case, which is more accurate.

Mitchinson returned with registers, where he has found an entry.  The books are the original records, which go back to the 18th century, and they do not use gloves.  (I'm definitely starting to think the gloves versus no gloves is based on the individual repository's rules.)  In a register of burials, for the year running from Easter of 1753 to Easter of 1754, there is an entry for Mary "Winslat", wife of John, on May 3, 1753.  Yearwood says that Samuel would have been 7 to 8 years old.  Apparently they teach math differently in Georgia, because the way I do it, 1753 – 1744 is 9, possibly 8 years old.

Mitchinson then shows another burial.  This one is for John "Winslat", on April 3, 1759.  This time Yearwood says that Samuel would have been about 14 years old, which is a little better.  So the four boys were orphaned after the death of their father in 1759.  Yearwood comments that they were just "young boys", but John, the oldest, would have been about 20, which was probably considered an adult at the time.  Mitchinson says that no other events are listed for the family in the county, so they must have moved out of the parish.  The next logical step is to search in other counties for them.  Surrey and Sussex are nearby, so he suggests checking them.

Searching for Winslett in the West Sussex Records Office online database produces a hit on Shilinglee for MSS 3/29:  "Action in the King's Bench, concerning Deer stealing at Shillinglee" by Samuel, James, and John Winslet.  (Where did brother William go?)  Yearwood comments, "I think we can pretty much rule out that I'm going to find royalty" but that it's more interesting this way (she really does have a sense of humor).  Mitchinson tells her that Shilinglee still stands and that he will call a colleague to look at records there.  As she leaves, Yearwood says she has so much information in her head she doesn't know where to start.  (Heaven knows how she would handle it if she were actually doing the research.)  She can empathize with the Winslett boys on losing their parents.  She lost her parents as an adult and found it devastating; they lost theirs as children, so they had to grow up fast.

The Deer Tower

Yearwood meets Dr. Emma Griffin, a professor of 18th-century English history at the University of East Anglia, at the Shillinglee Estate in West Sussex, in "The Deer Tower."  Yearwood says she wants to know what happened with her ancestor.  Griffin points out that where they are sitting has been converted but was the original Deer Tower, which was at the center of the hunting area for the estate.

Griffin has pulled several documents from the Sussex Records Office.  The first states that the deer-stealing incident took place on Lord Winterton's property on June 18, 1765.  Yearwood says that Samuel was about 19 years old; by my math, he was 20 or 21.  Two brace and a half of fat bucks were killed (a brace is a pair of deer, so that's five total) and they were looking for the thieves.  A reward of 30 guineas and a complete pardon were offered by Lord Winterton.  It must have been a serious crime, because the reward is equivalent to a year's wages.

Griffin explains that deer had significant symbolic importance at the time.  People couldn't buy venison at the market.  Deer were owned only by wealthy, elite landowners and were protected under the Black Act.  Poaching deer was punishable by death.  Going out to the commercial, we see a different document that has in the margin, "Let them be severally hanged by the neck until they be dead."  We know Samuel survived, because he died in Georgia, but it isn't looking good.

The second document Griffin has is dated June 22, 1765 (which Yearwood says is "a couple weeks" after the first one; time must fly for her, because by my count it was four days).  Thomas and James White confessed to poaching the deer and implicated the three Winslett brothers and another young man.  Thomas and James were both illiterate, as evidenced by the X's they made as their marks on the confession.  They apparently came forward only to claim the reward and the pardon, and blamed the worst parts of the crime on the others.

The third document is undated.  John Newman took the Winsletts to Horsham Gaol and was supposed to listen to anything they said.  Samuel said he hoped that he would not be hanged but if he was he had no wife, child, father, or mother to cry for him, so it didn't matter.  Yearwood is struck by the despair and desolation Samuel felt.  She feels sorry for him, even though he had committed a crime.  She knows he survived, but wants to know how and asks Griffin if there are more documents.  Griffin replies that no more are in Sussex; Yearwood will have to go to the National Archives (I refuse to capitalize "the" for them; it's just too pretentious) because it was a serious crime.

Yearwood says that if she didn't know his history, she would think of Samuel as a common criminal.  What she knows of her family is that they were people of good character and that it had to come from something good.  She really wants to believe that Samuel changed at some point.

Yearwood's next stop is the National Archives in Kew.  There, they use the conservator's gloves.  The researcher is James Horn, a historian with the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.  He shows Yearwood records from the Assizes, which were the highest courts, presided over by the highest justices.  Twice a year they went on circuit around the country to handle cases; he has found a record from the summer circuit.  I didn't see a date, but now we see the document with the marginal note of "Let them be severally hanged by the neck until they be dead."  But in another place on the document is a note of "Reprieved" for Samuel and John.  (What happened to James?)  Quite reaonably, Yearwood wants to know why.

Horn has another record, this one from February 19, 1766 in Whitehall.  James and Samuel had been given royal mercy and were to be transported to the colonies and plantations in the Americas, with a sentence of 14 years.  The sentences of all the convicted prisoners that day were changed to transportation.  The Transportation Act of 1718 made it common for criminals to be sent to the Americas, where a cheap manual labor force was needed.  (After the American Revolution, criminals were transported to Australia.  And apparently the act was not repealed until 1993!)  They would have been transported in chains and auctioned off to businessmen and plantation owners when they arrived in North America.  They would then have become the property of the winning bidders.  Yearwood laments that Samuel would have been merely a 20-year-old boy; my math says 21 or 22.

Horn discusses what kind of owners they would have had when they arrived.  Many owners were harsh, and the transportees had no rights.  Their alternatives weren't that great, though — it was transportation or hanging.  So it did give Samuel a new life.

Yearwood wants to know where Samuel landed.  Horn explains that convicts are hard to trace and that her best course may be to go where he ended up:  Georgia.  Yearwood goes back home to Georgia to learn where her family started in North America.  In her voiceover as she leaves she says she is rooting for Samuel.  He had had obstacle after obstacle since he had been born but then got a reprieve.  (A little exaggerated perhaps; nothing was said about his life before his mother passed away, or at least not that survived the editing process.)  Being transported saved him.

In Georgia Yearwood goes to the Georgia State Archives, which seems to share a building with the National Archives at Atlanta (which is actually in Morrow), because the sign lists both of them.  Joshua Haynes, a researcher of early Georgia history (his dissertation was "Patrolling the Border: Theft and Violence on the Creek-Georgia Frontier, 1770–1796", which was appropriate for this segment) is on hand to assist Yearwood.  He says the first step in researching records from the period is to look at registered land grants.  In November 1770, four years after Samuel had arrived, George III granted him 100 acres of land in Riceboro, in Liberty County.  It doesn't look as though Samuel served his complete 14-year sentence; convicts couldn't own land.  Haynes can't tell Yearwood what happened, but it's unlikely his sentence was commuted, so maybe Samuel had escaped from his owner.  However he did it, Samuel went from being a convicted poacher about to be hung to a landowner a mere four years later.  And James, the third brother, now drops out — no more mention is made of him.

Yearwood asks why the king was giving away land.  Georgian settlers had recently forced the Creek Indians to give up their land and pushed them out of the area, and people were needed to make the land productive.  The king was handing out land to just about anyone who asked for it.  It was a great way to make a new start and escape one's past, because no one was checking credentials.

1748 map of Georgia,
by Emanuel Bowen

Yearwood wants to know if there's anything after that, and Haynes says there is one more document, from May 17, 1784.   (Yearwood's math has improved; she says Samuel was about 40 years old.) Samuel acquired 287 1/2 acres in Washington County.  Yearwood comments that Samuel then had almost 400 acres, which is a big assumption; it's 14 years after the first grant, and there's nothing said as to whether he still owned it.  She also says there has to be a catch, becuase it's Samuel.  Haynes shows her a 1748 map of the area (see map on the left) and says it's close to the landscape Samuel would have recognized (36 years later?  I would have guessed there would be significant changes during those 36 years, but it must have been the closest map to the right time they could find).  Haynes explains that between the Oconee and Ogeechee rivers was Creek country.  The Creeks had tried to stay neutral but the colonists forced them out.  They didn't want to let go of the land, so the land was contested.  Samuel had just acquired land in the "Wild West" of Georgia.  The Creeks looked at Samuel and his neighbors as threats, border jumpers, and squatters on the land.

We know that Samuel was 85 when he died, so he survived being in Indian territory.  Yearwood asks the obvious question of how.  Haynes doesn't answer but says he has found the land that Samuel got in 1784.  They're going to take a road trip.

In her voiceover Yearwood says how it's ironic that Samuel became a big landowner and was lord of his own manor.  Since he had been oppressed when he was poor, she hopes that he didn't oppress the Creeks.  Samuel had a knack for going from one volatile situation to another.  (Has she considered that the common factor in all of this was him?)

Yearwood drives herself and Haynes to Washington County.  The land where Samuel settled is only about 30 miles from Monticello, where Yearwood grew up.  The family apparently didn't stray far.

Then Haynes tells Yearwood he actually has one more document.  This one is from September 3, 1831 in Greene County.  Samuel made a deposition in court for a deprivation claim, which was done when property had been taken.  Samuel stated one of his mares had been stolen by Creeks about June or July of 1778.  (The transcription which Yearwood is reading actually says 1878, which Haynes explains is incorrect.  Why in the world did they not edit that out?)  In March 1779 the Creeks took and destroyed food and furniture.  From October 1787 to April 1788 he lost cattle and other livestock to them.  His claim was for thefts over about 10 years.  The question of why he was making this claim in 1821, more than 30 years after the last theft, wasn't brought up, though I'm certainly curious about it.  He died a few years later, in 1829.

I noticed that Samuel signed the deposition with his mark, an X; he had remained illiterate.  Haynes brings this to the attention of Yearwood.  Even though Samuel never learned to read or write, he became a wealthy landowner anyway.

Yearwood acknowledges the irony that Samuel had been caught and tried for stealing and then swore out a deposition about the Creek thefts.  Haynes says that while Samuel's property was taken, it was not his entire estate.  He was kind of on the cusp of being an elite planter.  (That statement to me implied that Samuel had owned slaves, so I looked; in the 1820 census for Greene County, a Samuel Winslett has 22 slaves.  Not a topic for this episode, apparently.)

Samuel Winslett in Greene County, Georgia, 1820 census; enumerated slaves are in the red box

Yearwood wants to know how long Samuel lived on the land in Washington County.  Haynes tells her he was there up to a few years before he died.  One of his last transactions was selling the land and moving to Eatonton in Putnam County, where Grandma Elizabeth had been from.

In her closing comments, Yearwood talks about how we draw strength and character from what comes before us.  In Samuel she sees resilience, strength, and courage.  He did what he had to out of necessity and was a man who made the most of his opportunities.  (Well, that's certainly putting a good spin on it.)  She hasn't done anything remotely as dangerous as what Samuel did, but feels it was brave of her to dream to be a singer when she didn't know anyone who had done anything like that.  She feels that the inner desire to make that happen she got mostly from her parents, but a little probably came from Samuel.

Yearwood must be a very forgiving person, because even though she kept learning about questionable things that Samuel Winslett had done, she was able to view them in a positive light.  I can see excusing the poaching, but then he apparently escaped from his owner after transportation, had to have lied to get land, and became an oppressive landowner like Lord Winterton.  And they didn't even address the slave-owning issue on air.  Yearwood said she wanted to believe that Samuel had changed, but I didn't see evidence of it.  Even taking into account that he was a man of his time, I question whether he did everything out of necessity.

One thing that particularly struck me was why Samuel would have filed the deprivations claim in 1821, so many years after the events in question.  Perhaps it had something to do with efforts to move the Creeks and other Indians west, but having no context for it makes Samuel look like a grasping, petty individual.  Another possibility is that he was desperate for money at the time, but were people able to collect on judgments made against the Creeks?  Or did compensation come from a governmental body?

I also found it interesting that Yearwood's unanswered questions were kept in the episode.  She asked about where Samuel arrived in North America, what happened to his 14-year sentence, and how he survived being in the contested Creek territory.  It would be nice to think it was done deliberately to show that answers can't always be found, but I doubt it, because that wasn't brought up.  It was more like the questions were just glossed over.  It's also possible that the questions were answered but those parts didn't make it on air.  Who knows?  Kind of like what happened to Samuel's three brothers, those of us on this side of the television are simply left wondering about the rest of the story.

Finally, Yearwood didn't bring any family members into the experience with her.  She started and ended alone, and there was no discussion about sharing the information with others.  Was that because Samuel wasn't quite the model of an upstanding citizen?