Discussion
I knew nothing of my family history beyond my father. Research is not too difficult if you have a less than common last name and have some idea on home towns.
Be prepared to uncover some horrors on the way if you do some research.
I found ancestors with some certainty back to 1650 and 1550 picking up on other peoples research with one person believing that an ancester came down from what is now Sweden around 900 and settling in France coming to the UK around 1500.
Be prepared to uncover some horrors on the way if you do some research.
I found ancestors with some certainty back to 1650 and 1550 picking up on other peoples research with one person believing that an ancester came down from what is now Sweden around 900 and settling in France coming to the UK around 1500.
My wife has done some family history research and with my male lineage got back to the 1600's. In that time we have been steadily moving North, and in 350 years we seem to have moved 10.8 miles!
On her side she has found the marriage of her great great (great?) grandparents and both had a father of the same name, which I assume is either an extraordinary coincidence or a mistake on the marriage certificate.
On her side she has found the marriage of her great great (great?) grandparents and both had a father of the same name, which I assume is either an extraordinary coincidence or a mistake on the marriage certificate.
anonymous said:
[redacted]
I am not sure why because I have no immediate family but I got myself an a5 notebook and made records and notes, copies of Certificates, photographs and the like, family tree. I think just to have some sort of evidence for the work and research.I think it is next year when the 1921 Census is released.
PH5121 said:
My wife has done some family history research and with my male lineage got back to the 1600's. In that time we have been steadily moving North, and in 350 years we seem to have moved 10.8 miles!
On her side she has found the marriage of her great great (great?) grandparents and both had a father of the same name, which I assume is either an extraordinary coincidence or a mistake on the marriage certificate.
Always be careful with earlier data.On her side she has found the marriage of her great great (great?) grandparents and both had a father of the same name, which I assume is either an extraordinary coincidence or a mistake on the marriage certificate.
Lower levels of literacy and loads of errors even in formal records.
vaud said:
PH5121 said:
My wife has done some family history research and with my male lineage got back to the 1600's. In that time we have been steadily moving North, and in 350 years we seem to have moved 10.8 miles!
On her side she has found the marriage of her great great (great?) grandparents and both had a father of the same name, which I assume is either an extraordinary coincidence or a mistake on the marriage certificate.
Always be careful with earlier data.On her side she has found the marriage of her great great (great?) grandparents and both had a father of the same name, which I assume is either an extraordinary coincidence or a mistake on the marriage certificate.
Lower levels of literacy and loads of errors even in formal records.
And also the classic X instead of a signature on a death certificate.
I've used both Ancestry.co.uk. and Findmypast as you often find information on one but not the other.
Findmypast give full details of everyone in a household in their census search, which is very useful, and they have been awarded the Contract for the 1921 Census which will be published in January 2022.
Findmypast give full details of everyone in a household in their census search, which is very useful, and they have been awarded the Contract for the 1921 Census which will be published in January 2022.
It pays to have a sceptical approach as you go back earlier. I have a brick wall at circa 1750 for one part of the family here in Scotland. I've done a lot of research and pretty much concluded that it will be impossible to go further back. However a number of Ancestry members have built trees on the same line going back to 1100. All wrong and based on a complete lack of geographical understanding, let alone how Scottish clans worked.
Try telling them that though....
Try telling them that though....
I recently did some DNA testing. Very interesting to see a map of your DNA common match segments spread across the world. Found one trace going back to the 1600s in France which suggests they might have been Huguenots which came to the UK.
Found 2nd cousins in Australia and NZ from Norfolk which were new to me. Unfortunately there are relatively few DNA test results from Russia and that direction where I know some relatives went during Stalin's time.
Funniest thing I found was in the 1881 census where some relatives were living in "Mud Hall". Eventually I found a modern reference to the location. It's now a field called "Mud Hole". Great hobby.
Found 2nd cousins in Australia and NZ from Norfolk which were new to me. Unfortunately there are relatively few DNA test results from Russia and that direction where I know some relatives went during Stalin's time.
Funniest thing I found was in the 1881 census where some relatives were living in "Mud Hall". Eventually I found a modern reference to the location. It's now a field called "Mud Hole". Great hobby.
BT Summers said:
This is true, I found a record where the son had a one letter difference in a surname than his father.
And also the classic X instead of a signature on a death certificate.
Also illegitimacy, covert adoption, "special uncles", etcAnd also the classic X instead of a signature on a death certificate.
Family trees are full of secrets and wrong turns, even in recent generations.
Abbott said:
If yo have any family member the are linked to Scottish Clans their records are pretty good and go back a long way
That's a very interesting snippet. Where is this information available please? I've had inordinate trouble tracing family in Scotland pre-1900 - my family's own records just don't show up online anywhere so I've hit a block.CanAm said:
I've used both Ancestry.co.uk. and Findmypast as you often find information on one but not the other.
Findmypast give full details of everyone in a household in their census search, which is very useful, and they have been awarded the Contract for the 1921 Census which will be published in January 2022.
Does that mean Ancestry won't have access to it?Findmypast give full details of everyone in a household in their census search, which is very useful, and they have been awarded the Contract for the 1921 Census which will be published in January 2022.
ElectricSoup said:
Abbott said:
If yo have any family member the are linked to Scottish Clans their records are pretty good and go back a long way
That's a very interesting snippet. Where is this information available please? I've had inordinate trouble tracing family in Scotland pre-1900 - my family's own records just don't show up online anywhere so I've hit a block.https://www.clanmacfarlanegenealogy.info/genealogy...
GloverMart said:
So, now we have an end to the story (and this has reappeared in my "My Stuff" this evening), may as well update the thread.
Armed with a birth certificate with my brother's birth name on, I ended up meeting with an adoption charity in their local office in Bristol. Lovely case worker, explained all the ins and outs of the procedure and so I handed over my £130 to them to begin the search for him. Didn't hear back for a while so ended up chasing them a few months later; out of the blue, a letter arrived saying they were going into administration in three days time!!
Bit of a shocker and despaired a little before, a few months further on, my case worker emailed me out of the blue saying she had been taken on by a new agency & although she had no responsibilty to do so, she'd like to take my case on which was brilliant. Warned me that at some point, I'd have to pay a searcher to look for him once it had been established there was no block on his file.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I paid £200 to the searcher and off we went again. My case worker contracted COVID in March and didn't work for three months. She got back in touch last July to say she was just waiting to get a certificate back and that she would write when she received it.
I got her letter about a fortnight later. The certificate she was waiting for was my brother's death certificate. The previous two years of searching and digging had been to no avail as my brother died six months before I started looking for him; he had COPD and cancer and passed aged 52, the same age I am now.
The case worker then wrote to my brother's adoptive Dad to see if he would be happy for me to contact him to ask questions. Turns out he was delighted to and since then, we have spoken on the phone and exchanged Christmas cards. Once COVID is more under control, we will meet up and say hello. He actually adopted three children when he was younger, one of them lives about five miles from me now. No relation at all of course, but would be nice to find out more about him.
So a bittersweet ending really. My case worker is still struggling with long COVID and has now given up work completely. I owe her a lot & one day, hopefully we can meet up again.
Sad that you weren't able to make the link early enough to meet but I hope you will be able to get a good feel for your brother's character from his adopted father. Good luckyArmed with a birth certificate with my brother's birth name on, I ended up meeting with an adoption charity in their local office in Bristol. Lovely case worker, explained all the ins and outs of the procedure and so I handed over my £130 to them to begin the search for him. Didn't hear back for a while so ended up chasing them a few months later; out of the blue, a letter arrived saying they were going into administration in three days time!!
Bit of a shocker and despaired a little before, a few months further on, my case worker emailed me out of the blue saying she had been taken on by a new agency & although she had no responsibilty to do so, she'd like to take my case on which was brilliant. Warned me that at some point, I'd have to pay a searcher to look for him once it had been established there was no block on his file.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I paid £200 to the searcher and off we went again. My case worker contracted COVID in March and didn't work for three months. She got back in touch last July to say she was just waiting to get a certificate back and that she would write when she received it.
I got her letter about a fortnight later. The certificate she was waiting for was my brother's death certificate. The previous two years of searching and digging had been to no avail as my brother died six months before I started looking for him; he had COPD and cancer and passed aged 52, the same age I am now.
The case worker then wrote to my brother's adoptive Dad to see if he would be happy for me to contact him to ask questions. Turns out he was delighted to and since then, we have spoken on the phone and exchanged Christmas cards. Once COVID is more under control, we will meet up and say hello. He actually adopted three children when he was younger, one of them lives about five miles from me now. No relation at all of course, but would be nice to find out more about him.
So a bittersweet ending really. My case worker is still struggling with long COVID and has now given up work completely. I owe her a lot & one day, hopefully we can meet up again.
BT Summers said:
And also the classic X instead of a signature on a death certificate.
To be fair, it's incredibly hard to write a full signature once you're dead.My father-in-law never knew his father, only has a photo and a few details; managed to find a whole family tree of hundreds of people going back to great grandparents, photos of 2nd cousins and a genuine 1st cousin who is still alive and probably met his father. Waiting on a death certificate and military records from WW2 but I have a feeling it's going to reveal something that's maybe not as pleasant, will see.
I recently got a DNA link to south west France from 1664! I guess some early relatives were Huguenots. I love this hobby.
Also trawling the various websites I find that the earliest photo that I could find of the family from my oldest cousin in NYC and which I annotated with the names in bright colours and my original research has been copied right across the internet in various family trees without a single attribution. Which is a bit of a pity
Also trawling the various websites I find that the earliest photo that I could find of the family from my oldest cousin in NYC and which I annotated with the names in bright colours and my original research has been copied right across the internet in various family trees without a single attribution. Which is a bit of a pity
ScotHill said:
BT Summers said:
And also the classic X instead of a signature on a death certificate.
To be fair, it's incredibly hard to write a full signature once you're dead.My father-in-law never knew his father, only has a photo and a few details; managed to find a whole family tree of hundreds of people going back to great grandparents, photos of 2nd cousins and a genuine 1st cousin who is still alive and probably met his father. Waiting on a death certificate and military records from WW2 but I have a feeling it's going to reveal something that's maybe not as pleasant, will see.[/quote)
Silly. Of course the X on the signature line was for the next of kin or person reporting the death.
The implication of the X in terms of not being able being to write your own name is not easy for a Cambridge graduate for just three generations along.
Gassing Station | The Lounge | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff