Uncovering The Truth-Hero or Bastard?


 The idea of time travel has fascinated me since I was a kid.   I remember, sitting in the middle of our hay field, willing myself back in time. Chances are I had just finished watching an episode of Bewitched-if Samantha could  do it, why couldn't I?

Beginning our genealogical journey, is, in reality, taking a step back in time.We hope to discover,  ancestors worthy of ballads as those written for Heroes and Heroines of old.  Are we for certain the events to their claim of fame will actual place them as heroes, or will those events prove to expose them as a bastard more than the hero?

What attracted me to Outlander, the Starz Original Series, was the aspect of time travel. As our story begins, we meet  Frank and Claire, a lovely British couple, on vacation in the Scottish Highlands, shortly after the end of WWII.


Frank, a fellow genealogist, is researching his ancestor, Black Jack Randall, the famous English soldier who fought at the Battle of Culloden, the final conflict for the Jacobite Rising of 1745.

Clair, through the magic found only in the Highlands, is transported back in time, shortly before the battle.  Now we meet the famous,  Black Jack Randall, possessing a striking resemblance to her beloved Frank. In no time at all we discover Black Jack is anything but the hero of legend and lore.  Instead, we find him to be a sick, twisted, cruel bastard.

When he surely deserved to die by the hand of a certain Scottish Highlander, Claire, finds herself having to spare Black Jack's life. Due to the "facts" written in the family Bible, Claire realizes to take Black Jack's life before he marries, Mary Hawkins could affect Frank's existence 200 years in the future. As the story continues, we discover, a twist in the family history, changing everything as it was known.

 View your heroes and heroines with an objective eye. Remove yourself from contemporary morals, and ethics. Put yourself in their place. What would you have done, if faced with the same circumstances?

Could it be possible we have stories in our family history needing closer scrutiny?

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