When Family Myths and Research Collide

Surprise! Not everything you think you know about your relatives is true

The author’s grandparents and eldest aunt, 1908. Courtesy of author.

This morning I received an email that torpedoed one of my family’s central myths. My father and his siblings always told the rest of us that their grandfather was “the Viceroy of Canton.” Naturally, our extended family took that as gospel — even if we could never identify the…