Genealogy Chat

I think you have a very sensible approach there larzus.

Well said larzus, I totally agree, it is disappointing that nobody has " put me right " and it only goes to show that nobody else is doing any leg work here !! I would love someone to contact me saying Hang on a minute, did you know so and so actually married so and so, I have the certificate to prove it.

I too, have spent hours "walking " up and down roads or even whole villages trying to find someone I am pretty sure should be there, checking out witnesses and in laws, just in case. That was how I found my gt Grandad, boarding with his future wife's brother in law to be.

My Grandfather's tree is fine up to my gt gt grandfather, who although he lived in a small Devonshire town shared a name with four others born in the same year. It wasn't until I bought " his " BC a few years back and his parents names didn't match those on the cert that I realised my error. For some reason he was born about thirty miles away from the family home and curiously, so was his sister, the following year but thirty miles in the opposite direction. He was, however, the only one who ended up living in London.

Thanks to parish records I can take the family back to the 1600s so it is really only his date of birth and maybe the actual place that I would gain from spending any more. On most other trees though he also goes back to the 1600s but with the wrong family from 1840 back because originally I had the wrong parents for him on my tree.

Last week I thought I would have another crack at it and ordered another BC for him. Not a good idea when suffering with a heavy cold, I opened it yesterday full of hope that of the remaining four, this might be THE ONE only to find I had ordered the same one again. Silly old fool, that's now twenty quid wasted !! As well as the "wrong " brother's BC and parents marriage certs I had.

The other one is my gt gt grandmother who I have had some help with on the help boards. Lots of people have her death for 1900, I know this is not correct as I bought that cert, and it is not her but according to almost every tree she died then, shame is I can't find her, she just disappeared in a puff of smoke around 1895. I will find her one day though, I am sure. M ;-)

I don't make my trees public, they are for my own research and storage only. However, if someone appears to have a genuine connection, I will allow them to see the tree. Since I keep them for my own research, I'm sure there are errors there, which I (like others) correct as I go along. I'm still in the process of buying certificates - and yes, have a few that are clearly wrong, and those people get scratched from my tree.

If someone has copied them in the meantime, well, like 'Larzus', I feel that's their own silly fault. It's up to each of us to check everything.

However, I DO add families who have married in. There are several reasons for this - one is to keep track of my family, and to provide information for future generations of THEIR offspring who may want to follow up on their family history, and also, I've found that back in my own family's previous generations, cousins have married cousins and so the 'other' families have turned out to be genuine, blood relatives anyway. I think there was more of that going on in past times than some like to admit.

We each have to research our family histories in our own way.

Having said all that, I don't understand why someone would copy reams of someone else's research wholesale, either. For me, it's no good unless it's accurate, and anyway, where's the fun if you don't do your own research?

Can anyone tell me why, despite being signed in to Genes Reunited, I come up as 'Unknown'?

If you click on ACCOUNT at the top of the page you will have to put your password in again . Then you can give yourself a board name.

At present if anyone clicks on Unknown they can see the name the system knows you by.

AHA! Thanks, KenSE! I see you can also hide living relatives, which is useful. :)

Oh Judy, it's you !!! I wondered who it was , he he. M