Genealogy Chat

by doing a one name study?

No!

Maybe a one name study is the wrong title.

However, someone once told me (a long time ago now) that people sometimes look at the people with the same surname that they are researching in a particular area and then work downwards rather than upwards. Sometimes you can make the connection that way.

I can see it might be interesting, but only once you have researched your own line, and if you have an unusual name - I have Legges from Clungunford for example! So chances are they are all related somehow.
But it's not really something I would try for tracing my own ancestry.
Jan

I've never attempted it although I did guess the father once before I found out through other methods - mind you he was the only one with that surname in the village :-)

I think the man who suggested it was saying that it was an option when you hit the brick wall as a possible option, however, most of my brick walls tend to be in big cities or where they went off to sea!

Yes - I used the G.O.O.N. site (Guild of One Name Studies) and found a man looking into a not too common surname in my family.

Thanks to his research I am now in contact with 2 first cousins I never knew about!
Mother and her brother were estranged many years ago and no-one knew he had married and had 2 children. Sadly by the time I found them both my mum and her brother had died.

But it can work. Probably more successful with the more unusual names, rather than like mine of Simpson or the dreaded Smith and Jones!

:-D

I have done something similar when I was researching my ancestry.

I did my research using Family Search and paying close attention to the Traditional Scottish Naming Patterns.

For Example: a firstborn son is named for his paternal grandfather.

If the grandfather had 5 sons, then it's more than probable that there are 5 grandsons, all with the same name.
Confusion arises trying to sort out which cousin married which wife, but I finally sorted everyone out.
I have seen many trees where a marriage is found but, the husband has been connected to the wrong set of parents.
....Usually his father's brother or cousin!

Yes I've also used the Guild of One Name Studies and found lots of info on one of mine but probably because the surname was unusual, the surname 'Hidden'.

Rather than a specific 'one name study' I am trying 'family reconstruction' as an aid to research.

I am trying to track down where my 4xGGrandfather came from. Starting from where I know he was when he married I am searching outwards from that village gathering instances of the surname in any type of record hoping that one day something will click! Luckily the surname is not especially common, I don't think I would attempt it if it was.

I have set myself a target of 20 miles radius but as that is into 3 counties it is a long slow process and I dip in and out of researching it.........And, of course, there is no guarantee that he wasn't born at the other end of the Country :-|

I have used the Goons for this surname and the lady was really helpful but had no more information than I have. Maybe one day I will be able to give something back to her :-)

Chris

I have done something like Chris has done and collected a particular surname in an area and then with parish records, Wills and certificates etc. have made sense of the information and sorted out families with some success.
I still have 2 distinct lines in a small West Sussex town, which as yet I have been unable to link. They both tended to use the same limited Christian names for their children, but I live in hope that one day I may find a link.

It is always worth checking to see if there is a registered one-name-study of a surname of interest.
My friend used to be the registered researcher of one on G.O.O.N.S and still has a keen interest.
She has literally thousands of certificates and parish records, which she is always willing to share with interested family and descendants.

Gwyn

I was delighted when I found that my maiden name was on GOONS .................

I thought it would help prove that my research was correct



............................ until I discovered that my father had disappeared, and my brother (10 years older than me) was "married" to my mother and shown as my father


The study owner had a name that was familiar to me as one of 5 cousins.

I tried to contact him, but he would never respond ...... even though one of the requirements of being in GOONS is that the study owner will repsond "within reasonable time" to any and all queries.


I tried for over 2 years ................ then contacted the Registrar of the site, who also tried to get a response.

In the end, the cousin removed the study rather than correspond with me.



I DID discover the problem .............................. my brother had worked on the family history with one cousin back in the 1970s/80s, and I had letters to prove this.

Unknown to me ...................... the ONS cousin had stolen his brother's research and passed it off as his own :-)



However ............................... as their father and I were the same generation, his incorrect information re my family made me wary of all work that had not been done by the brother!



So ............. I'm using my own research to prove how much of that work was correct!




The major, major problem as far as I am concerned is that the ONS cousin had arranged a conference of people with the name some time in the early 2000s, and had produced a CD of his work ......................................... which, of course, has my brother as my father.

I contacted GOONS re two names several years ago. One didn't bother to reply and I later saw his name had been removed, the other did reply after several months but the information he eventually supplied turned out to be rubbish. Since then I haven't bothered again.

That said, I now do a number of mini one-name studies myself. These tend to concentrate on a specific geographical area and can prove quite fascinating. It is surprising how many cross connections between the various local families there actually are once you start digging around.

Some of my earlier efforts have even been sent back to me by people claiming to have done research either by themselves friend or family, complete with errors I have long since identified and corrected. This sort of thing used to annoy me but now I fine it quite amusing.