Genealogy Chat

Kate. I am not being negative just factual. My birthplace,Kippax for example is only about one of eleven in West Yorkshire with 'complete' parish records. For many periods in many parishes the records just do not exist. You only have to look on the IGI to see how many guesses there are!! Bob

Well a friend of mine used to say, ''It's a lucky man who TRULY knows who his father is'' So all of us have to take things with a degree of licence when doing family history. After all, if my dad isn't my dad I have hundreds and hundreds of the wrong people on my tree!!! lol MMM

Robert I agree that a certain amount of luck is involved in finding what you call 'specialised' stuff. However, the National Archives list literally MILLIONS of documents. So does A2A.Some of them are trivial in the extreme (a receipted bill from Jones the Coalmerchant etc) And there are probably millions more documents as yet unlisted...... My very distant ancestors were important Landowners. Their doings are well-documented and I have to accept those documents as fact, otherwise there is little point in doing this at all. Are you suggesting that when I find Fred Bloggs, baptised 1 Jan 1709, father Arthur Bloggs, wheelwright of this Parish, I should discount this evidence because it MIGHT be wrong? Or someone MIGHT have told lies? Even if they did tell lies, the further back you go, the less it matters in a way, because you are diluting the importance of that particular ancestor in your tree anyway - your 10 x GGF is not as important genetically, as your GF. I seem to be making a case for inaccuracy! I'm not though, I am merely saying that it IS possible to get an accurate tree, certainly back to the 1550s, and if you are lucky, before that. I feel you are rather a defeatist! Happy hunting Olde Crone

I feel Robert is being too negative unless he is answering a more specific question than the original one. I am confident about the lines I have managed to trace back as far as the 17th century because I have a birthplace from censuses and then traced back through parish registers. If you can't trust the parish registers there is no point starting on this hobby, surely? Also, don't forget about wills. You can download pre-1858 wills from the National Archives Documents Online, and they can be very very useful indeed. Kate.

Robyne The truth is they don't. All censuses,civil registrations and parish records/bishops transcripts are incomplete or with errors. Other more specialist sources only apply if you are lucky. Add to this all the mistrancriptions, lies and name changes and it's a rare 'honest' tree that will have all it's branches unbroken. Too many people invent answers when they can find none. Stick to what you can reasonably establish and ignore those who claim to go back to Doomsday. Other than Royalty and suchlike this is not possible for most. Bob

I must admit that recently I have discovered www.familysearch.org and have traced back some lines to the 17th century when I thought I was going to be stuck for ever. These transcripts are also useful because they sometimes cross link deaths with marriages. Of course the information is limited in its scope but provides useful clues in terms of dates, parents names and so on.

My rellies came from Lancashire and Cheshire, mainly, and I live in Cornwall. I rely heavily on my local LDS, ordering the relevant Parish Records from them. But my best source of information by far, is A2A, on which I have found over 700 documents concerning my family, back to 1179! Particularly helpful are Tenancy Agreements, as I have many confusing families, all with the same Christian names, and finding, say, James Holden baptised son of James Holden isnt much use to me when I have fifteen possibilities! But the Tenancy agreements etc, usually name Grandfather, Father and Son, so I can at least sort out SOME of them, by location if nothing else. And the Bastardy Orders, Removal Orders and Settlement Orders have also come in very useful, too! Good hunting. Olde Crone

One of the very best things that happened for several of my lines was that I made a contact with other related people who were researching and put our heads and resources together, without them I would never have achieved what I have so far. Helen

Visiting the local records office and looking at church records is ideal, we were able to get back to 1530 by tracing the births marriages and deaths back to then, very satisfying and fasinating. So try and make the effort, Durham records is at county hall durham and they do have distant search facility. Helen

Don't tell him you will be there all day lol MMM

How do i go about finding my LRO? Im in a fairly big town so it would be a problem to go, just finding the time but im sure i could persuade my hubby to look after the children for an hour or so!!

Hi Robyn I go to my local Records Office at least once a month and when I do, I ask if anyone wants lookups doing. This way when I need lookups doing in Cumberland or Durham I don't feel so guilty when I ask on this site. Take care

Robyne! You're not the only one!! I too have rellies in both Newcastle and Durham and am now exiled down south. It is frustrating not being able to just go along and have a look isn't it. I know the church I was christened in (my dad's cousin still attends). I would dearly love to be able to go and see for myself where both my ggrandparents are buried in the churchyard. I fully intend to do so, but something always gets in the way. I am making no plans at the moment, they always seem to come to nothing. I have found some of the sites like 1837 etc invaluable, but as I said in my earlier thread, cash for certs. is the thing holding me back now! Cheers Jak

When you are trying to find rellies in USA it`s even harder especially if you want a marrigar cert and don`t know bride`s maiden name ! Rosalyn

I think this is where i am going to lose out. The majority of my relatives come from either Newcastle or Yorkshire and i am in the south of England, so there is no way for me to be able to get there!! what a pallava!

and sometimes we have gone a long way back, but it has taken a very l-o-n-g time! (years and years!) MMM

Hi Robyne, This is where visits to the relevant record offices come in. We search through the parish registers and of course the 1851 and 41 census. The parish registers are invaluable. Also at most records offices there are card indexes showing wills, hearth tax and so much more. Not always lucky to find anything on your own rellies but always worth a go. Pauline

I think it's something to do with the kind of relatives you have. I have Scottish rellies and so therefore because of the way their BMD's were recorded it makes it so much easier. I too am back to the 1700's but ONLY with my Scottish rellies. I need the cash to be able to send for more certs. I think this is where the trouble lies, everything you want to do costs money!! Cheers Jak

Robyne, You just take one step after another. When you have got back to mid 1837 you have to go to the Parish Registers. This is where most people can score. But only if your ancestors more or less stayed put. It is possible to trace a family in a Parish right back to about 1500 if the records are still in existence. It also helps if you find someone else who is researching the same family.

I am now currently stuck on all my tree lines, once i get past the 1861 census (and even before that in some cases!!) How do you all manage to get so far back and even into the 1700's??