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Series 21: 3. Melanie Chisholm

Melanie Chisholm found fame as Sporty Spice in the world-famous girl band The Spice Girls. Today, she’s an award-winning solo artist and believes that her success is partly owing to her drive and resilience. Melanie would love to find out if she shares this with her ancestors.\n\nBoth sides of Melanie’s family come from Liverpool, and so this is where she begins her journey. Armed with a photograph of her great-grandmother Mary Bilsborough, she heads to the port city to see what she can find. In Liverpool, Melanie discovers that her great-grandmother Mary was quite a character. She was married twice and had several illegitimate children with Melanie’s great-grandfather, while her first husband was still alive. Mary is also listed on the 1939 Register as a moneylender. Melanie wonders how her great-grandmother could lend money when the family were not well off.\n\nAt Liverpool Central Library, Melanie meets local historian Pat Ayers, who explains that it was not unusual for working class women to become moneylenders. They would use any spare cash to lend as the returns from charging interest were lucrative, but you had to be tough and savvy to do it. In 1927, a bill was passed, which meant moneylenders had to be licensed. In order to carry on legally, Mary Bilsborough would have had to defend her character in court.\n\nMelanie looks through the register of moneylenders to see if her great-grandmother managed to get a licence. She’s relieved when she finds Mary’s name on the list, and also discovers from her probate that Mary was very successful, leaving the equivalent of around £46,000 in today’s money on her death.\n\nMelanie is keen to explore a family rumour about an Irish connection. The 1911 Census reveals that Mary’s father was called Patrick Flaherty. Could this be where the Irish connection starts? Melanie meets up with genealogist Rachel Rick to see if she can push the line back to Ireland. Rachel explains that Melanie’s great-great-grandfather Patrick Flaherty was actually born in Liverpool, but his father, another Patrick, was born in Ireland and came from Croom in County Limerick. This is where Melanie heads to next.\n\nMelanie wants to know what made her family leave rural Croom in Ireland for Liverpool. She discovers that her third great-grandparents were tenant farmers, and that they started to have children in 1846. This wasn’t a good time to be bringing up a family in rural Ireland. In 1845, the potato crops were devastated by blight, a fungal disease, and what’s known as the Great Famine began.\n\nThe famine had an enormous impact on Irish history, including Melanie’s family. As crops failed and poverty led to extreme hardship and starvation in rural Ireland, Melanie’s family, like many others, sought work in the cities. They moved from rural Croom to Limerick city, and from there to Liverpool. Melanie reflects on how strong and resilient her ancestors had been, surviving such hardships and finding a way to endure and prosper in a new city.\n\nMelanie now turns her attention to her maternal side. Having discovered how her dad’s family ended up in Liverpool, she now wants to find out how far back her roots in the city go on her mum’s side. Genealogist Rachel King shows her a family tree that traces back generation after generation to Liverpool, but then reveals that her fourth great-grandfather Thomas Keef actually came from Devon. Records dating back to 1828 reveal that Thomas was an orphan by the age of eight and grew up in a workhouse. Although his prospects seemed bleak, Melanie discovers in the 1851 Census that he was married with three children and worked as a baker. Seven years later, an advert in the Western Daily Press shows he changed profession and worked as a manager in an insurance company in Bristol.\n\nMelanie picks up the trail in Bristol, where she meets insurance historian James Kneal. James tells Melanie that her fourth great-grandfather had worked his way up to become manager in what was then a booming industry. But Melanie is shocked to discover that in 1860, Thomas was in court, charged with embezzlement. Newspaper articles reveal the twists and turns of the court case and that finally, three years later, Thomas was cleared, although he lost his job. The articles also reveal that Thomas had a new position – in Liverpool.\n\nMelanie ends her journey where she started, in Liverpool. Thomas Keef may have moved cities, possibly to escape the stigma of the court case, but once again he was making headlines. However, this time as a campaigner to improve working men’s lives and rights.\n\nAs Melanie reflects on the journey she’s taken, she feels proudly Liverpudlian, and sees the city as a place that gave both sides of her family a chance to start again and reinvent themselves. She’s also discovered a long line of determined, hardworking and ambitious people who stood up for themselves and what they believed in. She hopes that she has a little bit of that in her, too.

Source: BBC 1