Yes, isn't that interesting. I may well be descended from the Stricklands of Sizergh Castle, even if you probably have to go all the way back to Elizabethan times to find a connection to Katherine Parr, the last wife of Henry VIII, or Mary Queen of Scots, but I am not alone in claiming such descendancy. Thousands, nay, perhaps tens or even hundreds of thousands of Americans may have descended from Strickland immigrants to America. Take for example Matthew Strickland, who sailed from Liverpool in 1680 aboard "The Globe" and settled at Isle of Wight in Virginia. Among the distant cousins of the Stricklands in America, found by punching the famous relatives button on Ancestry.com, we find illustrious presidents of the United States such as Jimmy Carter and Lyndon B. Johnson, even First Lady Barbara Bush, all the way down to the famous bank robbers and outlaws Bonnie and Clyde Barrow and Chuck Barrow. If it were not for our Strickland connections we might not be enjoying a connection to all of these varied peoples.
Thus it might also be imagined that the Stricklands left behind in the United Kingdom are also equidistant in kinship thus also affording a variety of entertaining connections even if further removed in terms of geography. One interesting example might be found in Gerald Strickland, the 1st Baron Strickland and 6th Count of Catena. Unlike we Strickland descendants here in the U.S. who have not the slightest interest in Italian politics and did not even know clue that Maltese people don't even speak Italian, their Strickland was born in the city of Valletta, on the island of Malta, to a Maltese mother, Luisa Bonici Mompalao, a niece of the Count of Catena. Strickland is even buried there on Malta, at Mdina. Strickland founded the Anglo-Maltese political party in 1917 (funny thing is my sister used to own a Maltese dog, Tiger), which later evolved into Malta's Constitutional Party. Oddly, Strickland represented Lancaster in the House of Commons in the U.K. (Conservative Party) and also served as Prime Minister of Malta and it seems that the terms were overlapping. Strickland also published newspapers, the Daily Malta Chronicle and the Ix-Xemx
Yes, from 1903-1917 Strickland had previously served as Governor of Tasmania, Western Australia, and New South Wales so he had a lot of experience in government, obviously.
Obviously we have not the slightest thought of competing with or taking over for Gerald in his role in British politics given that the relationships is so far removed from our existence here in the United States as to be unimaginable, not to mention that we have no connection whatever to the island of Malta.
In 1930 things got very dicey for Strickland after the Catholic archbishop published a letter declaring it a mortal sin to vote for the Constitutional Party or to read the newspapers published by Strickland. Finally Malta got a new constitution in 1939.
Mussolini announced Italy's plan to annex Malta, a British colony since the early 1800s, but Strickland died in 1940 so he did not see the outcome of World War II.
And why are you bugging us anyway? Are you not happy and relieved that Italy's fascist government was a colossal failure and by 1943 had already surrendered to Allied Forces? Is independence not good enough for you? Do you really think a Big Brother would not make your lives miserable? Perhaps you really liked being a British colony or perhaps you would prefer be annexed to Italy after all or even to Libya rather than the United
States or the U.K. given the many similarities in culture and politics and language.
That is something that the people of Malta would have to decide for themselves. We can't really tell you what to do. Over here we don't even speak the Maltese language. Gerald is gone. Gerald is dead. You will have to find your own way just like everybody else.
