Hearing a Family story started me off!

It was about 1974 when my father first told me what he knew about the story of our family. He said that they came from Jamaica where he had been born. I was already very interested in history and this story really fired me up to find out more. An Aunt gave me a folder of letters written about 1903 they were from my grandfather in Jamaica to his brother in England and talked of attempting to claim a piece of land the family had owned and about staying with an old aunt who had the family story told to her when she was about 15yrs old shortly before her father died. At that time the aunt was in her eighties so there was some doubt about its accuracy! Amongst other things she said that the family had owned a plantation, probably coffee, and lost it in a game of cards! She also said that we were connected to the Clarke/Woodchurch family whose origins were in Kent at the time of the Norman Conquest. Forty plus years later I have been able to prove that part of her story was true and that the connection to the Clarke/Woodchurch family is also probably true although I have yet to find the actual connection.
Recently testing both my Y-DNA and the asDNA has added to the story’s fascination and has turned up two second cousins that I never knew existed. One day I hope that with the help of DNA we will be able to tie up the loose ends and make a connection.