General Chat

Good point PP,

I also use the "Phonetic search surnames" I when i cannot find someone that i no should be their

Roy

Thanks PigletsPal.

The trouble is that many people assume that search engines on Genealogy sites work like google. which attempts to find anything which vaguely resembles any of the criteria you specify.

They dont.!

With minor exceptions, they will only return a result when ALL the criteria you enter is matched in full, which is why less is often better.

Always use wildcards where you can. I spent years looking fro someone called Norah, only to learn she was actually called Nora. Nora* would have found her straight away.

Lil*y gets you Lily, Lilly. Liley, Lilley, Bag*t get Baggott, Bagot, Baggot, Bagott, . Bet*ridge Betridge, Bettridge, Beteridge, Betteridge, and so on and so forth

Free BMD has a bulilt in wilcard for christian names, but not surnames, in that it effectively adds an * to anything you type in, so typing Lil is in effect Lil* which get Lily, Lilly, Lilian, Lillian etc.

Family Search also uses a type of soundex search, unless you specify otherwise which can be a mixed blessing.

I know what you mean about Lilly etc Mr IGP, I eventually found a birth for one of mine, and her actual name tuned out to be Lilla. :-D

I had similar problems with other Lilly`s in my tree as well, they seemed to be spelt differently in every census... :-S

Thanks all. I have seen the box for "phonetic" search, but haven't used it so far. In my head, all my ancestors spelt their name correctly on censuses and such, but then I have to remember that they weren't necessarily filling in the form themselves. I have only got back to the 1800's on my tree, and imagine that, when I am looking for earlier records, the phonetic search will come in very handy.