Genealogy Chat

Has anyone else ever had gut feelings about Ancestors even although all available records suggest otherwise?
I have spend years looking for my Irish family. Getting there was a real challenge.
Deaths, second marriages, second families and even adoption hampered my research

My gg grandmother was born circa 1839 and died in 1867.
Her husband remarried and moved to Scotland but the children from his 1st marriage were left behind.
Family legend says the children were left with their Maternal grandfather.

A daughter remained in Ireland whilst as adults, two sons eventually came to Scotland
I was on a mission to locate and identify the Grandfather
From addresses, occupations ect, I pinpointed a potential candidate,, but unfortunately a marriage and his susequent death info suggested otherwise.

Although evidently older than his wife, he married in 1876 stating he was a bachelor, previously unmarried.
He died 8yrs later, and the age provided at time of death was far too young to be the correct man. I even wondered if he was an uncle of the children rather than their grandfather.

This man's own children from the 1876 marriage were almost 40yrs younger than my deceased gg grandmother.... yet I still had that "gut feeling" about him.

A few days ago, I was directed to Proni where there was an image of his 1884 will
.
Well Well Well!
My ggg grandfather is finally found!
He was certainly married before, and was definitely much older than his DC suggested.
Married only 8yrs as a bachelor,yet he names 2 married daughters as beneficiaries?
Best of all, he named his married grand daughter and her husband as beneficiaries!
This grand daughter was definitely the sister of my g grandfather.
I already had her marriage info, as she was the only sibling to remain in Ireland.

Advice to others
Trust in your gut instincts.

Unfortunately I have a gut instinct that the early part of my paternal tree is wrong. My cousin started off the research about twelve years ago and did a great job. He corrected some mistakes and the tree he created goes back to about 1650.

My problem is that there is one marriage where I cannot confirm the wifes birth or death. I am also uneasy about the husband, William as there a loads of Williams around in the area.

The existing tree takes our family inland as weavers whereas family tradition says we were coastal people. There are many coastal families with the correct name and may be related but at the moment I have those sub-trees in my files.

Verily it doeth my head in! :-S

I agree with you Malcolm.
My gut has told me on many occasions that something was not quite right, even although info is found and transferred on loads of other sites/trees.
I trust my feelings and either omit it altogether, or find the truth for myself.

My ggg grandfather is probably one of only a few isolated incidences where I was absolutely certain that I was on the correct path, even when I was in possession of 2 pieces of data that suggested otherwise.

I often have that gut feeling ...........


......... I've even had it when working on here on someone else's family


Just "that" feeling that we are following or have found the missing person ................. or that we are not following the correct person.


I call it "getting my head into and around the family"

.. or that the family story the poster has isn't right.

There's one that both Sylvia and I were working on this past week where I suspect one of the parents wasn't who the poster thought.

I have a gut feeling that my maternal grandfather has changed his name. this is a complex matter and has travelled a bit and changed his name more than once.HHmm.
josie

It is surprising how often Gut Feelings are proved to be correct.
I could detail about a half dozen cases on my tree where the formation of a Theory and testing same has in the end checked out, albeit in some cases it has taken several years of painstaking research to prove - mainly from Wills and Newspaper articles.
.
Jeremy

thats right jeremy, i have waited several years to sort this, just waiting now to check old newspaers, as this one is a couple of changed names
josie