not wanting to offend

Recently, I posted a general query about a family on a mailing list, hoping that someone else out there might have a connection with the same family. I got a reply back within days - the person did have a connection, albeit a very small one, but I did get a death date for a person I had no further info on out of it.

I almost didn't get it, because the person who responded was unsure as to how I would react to being contacted about the person in question. Seems someone in her line was the second wife of a person in my query, and she thought that there might be some resentment because of the marriage. If anything, any ill will from the marriage would probably have come from her side. Because her person died first and then my person died within weeks after that, all the possessions from her person passed on members of the family I was tracing and not back to members of her family.

Now, the family I was inquiring about is a distant one from my line but with a distinctive surname that I was tripping over in my research. Neither I nor anyone in my immediate family benefited from these possessions, but it was clear that the mother of the person who answered my query wished to have something that was promised all those years ago.

I'm still not sure as to why she thought that I or my family would hold anything against her about this second marriage when it was clear that her family lost out on something. But here's the thing - she did answer my query and provided a tidbit of info that I would not have had otherwise if she held any real resentment and didn't answer.

There's drama in every family - you research enough and you are bound to find something that happened that ticked someone off or where spouses or children were abandoned or something similiar. My grandmother Harriett's family has tons of drama - alcoholism, divorce, children in foster homes, possible adultery - that I've not even begun to uncover; it's just hinted in the wings and I'm still trying to sort it all out.

Am I hesitant about posting about this family? Yes. But I do it anyway because each little tidbit given draws me closer to the truth about what happened, since those past generations wouldn't talk about it. None of this could possibly hurt me now - if ever - and it's something that I'd really like to understand because it affected the way I was brought up.

Don't be hesitant about bringing up something possibly unpleasant. Be cryptic if you have to, or answer a query by private mail. If what happened in the past didn't escalate to Hatfield and McCoy proportions and is not sending shockwaves through your family to this day, you should go for it as long as you are comfortable working with it.