Supposedly I'm related to Lucrezia Borgia (noblewoman who was noted for not being particularly noble, specifically a rather unpleasant habit of poisoning people to further her and her husbands social, financial and political means), the corrupt Borgia Popes, and a Privateer (licensed pirate) crewmember on one of Francis Drakes ships, a Johnathan Skelton or something, who died in a swordfight over a woman.
Also Cornish ancestors who lured ships onto rocks to loot them and some other rather murky stuff that plays out awfully similar to an English version of Delivetance (basically minus banjos and with somehow worse dental hygiene).
Also may have had some rellies in Penzance around the right time period to possibly be related to the famed pirates.
Umm, red hair itself can be universally traced back to Scandinavian people, although mine would have largely come through Ireland/Scotland (I have blood from basically all of the UK/Ireland), on my fathers side anyway (there's ginger on both sides). I use this to legitimise filling out census forms with "norse pagan".
On my mothers side, I'm mainly dutch with a little German somewhere about 5-8 generations ago (though it is directly through the paternal line or w/e). My grandfather, who died of mesothelioma from crawling though asbestos rooves for Australia's telecom company (now Telstra) was a soldier in occupied Holland, and had some hair-raisingly close encounters with german troops (including one instance requiring cross dressing and another luckily having a stamp from the office of a german dignitary for some reason on one of his papers). Basically, the naxi's couldn't kill him, but Telstra did. I am often disappointed I never got to hear these tales told by the man himself, but such is life (and death).
Further back there are fisherman, sea rescue people (more than a few bravery awards there), and maybe a soccer player or two, though generally, most of my dutch rellies, including my grandfather, had quite a knack for it.
There ya go, should be plenty of juicy tidbits for potential identity thieves. Enjoy.
Yeah, my mother has taken great interest in family genealogy of late.