Really proud of myself for a novice [Archive] - Genealogists' Forum

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Anglosaxon

10-09-12, 05:09

Got my dad's family tree back to 1660 using ancestry and found a whole new family who have embraced me its great.

Now for the fun part, how do I start finding out more about these people ? :D

do you use a site on ancestry it just gives me hints etc.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

Carrianne

Merry

10-09-12, 06:00

You are very lucky - I've been researching my tree for several decades, but don't have anyone born that early and only two tiny twigs with any entry that says 16-something!

When you say:

and found a whole new family who have embraced me its great.

...do you mean some of the research you have is what has been done by someone else? Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but you should check out anything you are given by a third party to confirm it is correct. Also make sure any information you have gleaned from the GRO is backed up by certificates and any information taken from transcribed sources is checked out for accuracy (you don't want to spend a lot of time and money investigating the wrong people!).

As you have got this far so quickly you may not have had time to take in what you already have, so it might be worth concentrating on one or two families and see what out can find about them. It's difficult to say what else you may find without knowing where they lived or what sort of lives they followed. Perhaps you could learn more about the history of the towns and vilages they lived in, or exactly what their work might have been like?

kiterunner

10-09-12, 08:13

If you give us an example of someone you want to find out more about - and how your tree goes back to them - we might be able to give some suggestions.

JBee

10-09-12, 10:35

Yes I agree you can't take everything you find on ancestry trees as gospel. I've just got a marriage certificate for 1903 which makes about 6 trees on ancestry wrong and they've gone back a lot further following the wrong lines.

I also previously went wrong with the same family and only when I got my grandfather's wedding certificate did I find his father was Francis and not Patrick. I too had got certificates (but hadn't started early enough) and gone to record offices to check parish records. Thankfully I seem to have got them all right at the minute (unless someone tells me different).

However I shouldn't have assumed and got the certificate early on and checked every stage - it cost me a lot of time and money - I've kept the research just in case I find a connection but so far I haven't.

Margaret in Burton

10-09-12, 10:50

Merry

10-09-12, 11:34

Don't imagine we are saying you must have some incorrect information, Carrianne, just that you should be wary, that all.

In my tree the lines I have got a long way back on are mainly those where I have had to research just about everyone living in a group of villages to work out who is who (and which took me months/years!), mainly because parish records that far back have so little information - baptisms without mother's recorded, marriages without condition or witnesses recorded, burials without ages and in some cases without forenames recorded and no way to know if someone was born where they died or miles away. Of course, there may be many other ways you can get information to back up what you have found, but these tend to vary a lot depending on which part of the country you are studying and whether you can go to an archive office in person, or not.

I would suggest the easiest part of your tree to study in detail is the Victorian era and the end of the 18thC because there is so much information available online. Have you got access to any online newspaper sites for the UK or looked at the many available databases on sites such as Ancestry to see if anything obscure pops up? You could try searching their card catalogue to see if anything looks interesting.

As KiteRunner suggested, you might like to give some details here of people you hope to discover more about and we'll see if we can help.

Anglosaxon

11-09-12, 01:55

Hi,
Thank you it is very overwhelming, for me I wanted to make sure have a purchased birth certificates and confirmed on the census. So really double checking.

I have found out my great grandad of the granny I never really knew as my dad was fostered, left my great granny moved to hull and had a lot more children. My great grandad in question is correct as I have his birth certificate so know its him. I alos have found a decendent of my great great aunt living in Utah California its so great.

As for my question, so if I want to know more about George what he did for a living where he worked, etc apart from the census what else can I see that he did ? I have asked the new family who have given me a photo of him.

Thanks x

Merry

11-09-12, 06:14

As for my question, so if I want to know more about George what he did for a living where he worked, etc apart from the census what else can I see that he did ?

Your making us work hard, as we can't answer the question witout knowing when he lived and where! lol I've gone back and tried to work out who George is.....am I right in thiking he's George John Staines who married Betsy Fisher who married in 1924?

I think you have George's birth (1906) and marriage (1924) certs and a cert for the birth of his daughter in West Ham (or somewhere around there, I've forgotten - Romford?). Is he the one who died in Beverley district in 1979? Have you got that certificate too?

Have you found any birth records for the children in Hull (to place him with an address)? (don't name them here, please)

Do you know if George was divorced and did he marry the other woman? Do you know when she died? (Wondering if they wrote wills?)

Have you tried the phone directories on Ancestry?

Before you can do much more you need a time line with as many places as possible so you know where he was. Certificates for his children may tie down his occupation at different times. Can the family who gave you the photo help at all?

I'm not saying any more now in case I've got the wrong person, but you get the gist....electoral rolls could help too. It's worth searching for addresses on Google maps/street view as I'm sure many of the houses he lived in willl still be standing!

garstonite

11-09-12, 09:19

Merry - remember 4 years ago ...I had my Oakes tree for 5 years ( started 9 years ago ) and for 5 years I had the WRONG ggg grandfather /ggg grandmother - because of someone elses tree - false info ....I remember Merry and OC pointing out the error( one of them spotted the error , can`t remember which one , but between them they corrected me )
...so I learnt an invaluable lesson that day ...I never trust anyone elses tree now...if I can`t see a written transcription - I leave a question mark next to the ancestor with the words " in obeyance "
once bitten - twice shy
allan

Anglosaxon

11-09-12, 09:59

merry not trying to be a nusiance yes thats george and yes I have all his certificates and yes he did die in Hull and I do have all his family who are giving me info too. Ancestry is just so confusing :)

kiterunner

11-09-12, 10:06

So you have all George's certificates - what occupations does he have on them?

Merry

11-09-12, 10:09

yes he did die in Hull

But his death reg is Beverley District? Hull has it's own district. That's why I asked you if the Beverley one was him. The districts are next to each other though.

I don't see a likely second marriage for him.

Anglosaxon

12-09-12, 09:46

No he never married and was a scaffolder.

JBee

12-09-12, 10:41

Anglo you said you've got all his certificates - have you got the all the certificates leading up to him?

Reason I'm saying that is that people have found surprises even on their own birth certificates or parent's certificates. I made the mistake of assuming I knew up to grandparents but was wrong and didn't find out until I'd spent a lot of time and money on wrong people.

Anglosaxon

12-09-12, 21:28

Yes I have I have his parents names on his birth certificate and will now order their wedding certificate.

Merry

13-09-12, 05:58

I think Juie meant all the certificates between you and him!

Following on from earlier posts on this thread, it's sentences like these.....

Got my dad's family tree back to 1660

I have I have his parents names on his birth certificate and will now order their wedding certificate.

that will make people on here feel nervous!!! As I guess the marriage certificate you mention for your 2xg-grandparents is from about 1900ish, that's over 200 years of information presumably unproven. You are doing the right thing though, concentrating only on the people you have actually proven, before moving backwards.

I'd be interested to know what George John Staines mother's maiden name turned out to be, a I remember I spent a lot of time looking at this!