Although I have written about his two marriages before, I have not yet looked for more information about my paternal great grandfather, Otto von Fircks – pictured above. Despite having plenty of genealogical information about him, I have not been able to find out much about him as a person,
As the saying goes, school days are the best days of our lives – or are they? I tend to think the days we spend in school are not memorable for the education we receive, but for the friendships we make and the lack of responsibility we have. It is
I thought this would be a relatively straightforward post when I began to write it. A picture of the Fircks family Coat of Arms, a description, a bit of history and the job is done. But the more I looked into it, the more I felt like Alice in Wonderland,
December 1944 was the last time my father would see his father, and it was also approximately four months before my father would be captured by the Americans. It is difficult to say whether he spent Christmas with his father, his diary notes just mention that from 20 – 26
Once again I find myself spiralling down the rabbit hole of research. This time my curiousity was sparked by a recent conversation about the 1905 revolution in Latvia. I confess I knew almost nothing about it so off I went, two steps down the rabbit hole before plunging head first
The geographical history of Europe often blows my mind. Areas, regions and even entire countries are seemingly juggled between various governments, with borders being drawn and redrawn at will. Both sides of my family have been impacted by the geographical history of the land which is now known as Latvia.