Where I Come From — and Why I'm Finally Writing It Down

I've been spending rather a lot of time with dead people lately.



Mostly Jevins'. Or, as I recently discovered, people I thought were Jevins' who, far enough back, apparently called themselves Jebens. What began as a simple attempt to discover where my family came from has taken me through census returns, birth and marriage records, Victorian Wakefield, mineral works, domestic servants, and more men called Frank than any sensible family really needed.

Somewhere along the way it stopped being genealogy. It became a story. And it reminded me why I've been writing one of my own. For the past few months I've been working on a memoir called I Never Meant To Be A Nomad. At first, I thought these were two separate projects—one about my ancestors, the other about my own life. The deeper I dug, the more I realised they're really the same story. One explains where I came from. The other explains how I ended up where I am.

The Jevins Before Me

I was born in Wakefield in 1962, the elder son of Bernard Jevins and Christine Swift. My brother Christopher arrived two years later. My father Bernard was born in 1940, one of three children of Frank and Violet Jevins. My grandfather Frank, born in 1910, started life living around the  Primrose Hill area of Wakefield. Following his story backwards led me to another Frank, born in 1886.

Apparently originality wasn't considered an essential quality when naming sons.

That Frank married Jane "Jennie" Furniss and worked as a labourer connected with the local mineral works. Like countless Yorkshire families, my ancestors were ordinary working people. They didn't leave behind grand houses, portraits or published biographies. What remains of them survives in parish registers, census returns and birth certificates. There's something rather reassuring about that.

They worked hard, raised families and got on with their lives, never imagining that one day a descendant would be sitting in California trying to piece together who they were.

Then the trail took an unexpected turn.

Before Jevins There Was Jebens

My great-grandfather Frank appears to have been the son of Francis Jebens and Frances Anne "Fanny" Walker, who lived around Wakefield and Sandal during the nineteenth century.

Jebens.

Not Jevins.

Between their generation and their children the surname changed. Whether through accents, handwriting, clerical error or simply the slow evolution of language, Jebens became Jevins. Whether we were originally Jebens whose name gradually became Jevins—or Jevins who briefly became Jebens—I may never know.

For now, Francis and Fanny are the earliest ancestors I can confidently place at the head of my direct paternal line.

Their children included Phebe, Ernest, Lily and Frank. Lily worked as a domestic servant. Phebe married at St Helen's Church in Sandal. They're tiny details. But they're the details that transform names into people.

As things currently stand, my direct paternal line looks like this:

Francis Jebens → Frank Jevins → Frank Jevins → Bernard Jevins → Paul Jevins

There may well be more to discover. I hope there is.

Until then, I'd rather leave a question mark in the family tree than fill it with the wrong name.

Somewhere in the Middle

While I was looking backwards, something else became obvious. I wasn't just tracing where I'd come from. I was also looking at who comes after me. I became a father in 1985 when Dominique was born. Jordan followed in 1991 and Megan in 1998. Then came the next generation: Taylor, Koby and Milo. Behind me stand my father, grandfather, great-grandfather and, as far as I can currently trace, Francis and Fanny. Ahead of me stand my children and grandchildren.

Which leaves me somewhere in the middle.

I quite like that.

Family, though, has never been just about surnames. Many people reading this are Jevins' by birth. Others became family through marriage. Some belong to branches that stopped carrying the name generations ago. Others aren't Jevins' at all. You're part of my blended family, lifelong friends, or people whose paths crossed mine and never really went separate ways.

Families don't just grow down a family tree. They grow sideways. A family tree explains how we're related. It doesn't explain who mattered.

I Never Meant To Be A Nomad

That's one of the reasons I decided to write my memoir. Movement has been one of the defining themes of my life. New places. New jobs. New opportunities. Small decisions that quietly changed everything that followed. I certainly didn't grow up in Yorkshire with a master plan that ended in California. Like everyone else, I made good decisions and bad ones. I took opportunities I probably shouldn't have missed—and probably a few I should have. People entered my life, changed its direction and, in many cases, changed me. The memoir isn't an attempt to tidy everything into a neat story. Quite the opposite. It's my attempt to understand the journey honestly. I never meant to become a nomad. I just kept moving.

Why Any of This Matters

Researching my ancestors answered one question while raising another. I know Francis Jebens existed. I know where he lived. I know who he married. I know the names of his children. But I don't know who he was. I don't know what made him laugh. I don't know what worried him, what he hoped for, or whether life turned out anything like he expected. History tells me he lived. It doesn't tell me his story.

One day I'll simply be another name in somebody else's family tree. Perhaps one of my great-grandchildren—or one of theirs—will one day find a record that simply says:

Paul Jevins. Born 1962.

Unlike Francis, though, I hope they'll find something more. I hope they'll know who I loved. The mistakes I made. The opportunities I took. The places I lived. The adventures I enjoyed. And, most importantly, the people who shaped my life. Hopefully they'll even find a few stories worth smiling about.

That's why I wrote I Never Meant To Be A Nomad.

Not just for people called Jevins, but for everyone who became part of my family—by birth, by marriage, by friendship, or simply by sharing the journey. Perhaps that's what a memoir really is.

A message handed from one generation to the next.

This is where I came from.

This is what happened while I was here.

These are the people who mattered.

Beyond Francis Jebens there are still chapters of our family history waiting to be discovered.

Beyond Taylor, Koby and Milo there are chapters that haven't yet been written.

I Never Meant To Be A Nomad is simply the chapter in between.

Mine.

Paul Jevins

August 2026