Genealogy Chat

Although I have been tracing family tree for years using all available websites and visits to local Records Office to look at parish records (and census before they became on-line), one piece of advice if you can take advantage of it, is to look at Wills/Aministrations. This has helped me enormously in solving puzzles about relationships which had me at a standstill. I can only give the website for Hampshire, which is: http://www.hants.gov.uk/record-office/catalog/index.html From there go to the search page, enter name required in the 'Any Text' field and the word 'will' in the 'Title' field (OR 'administration' OR 'inventory'). I have actually just entered the name and district and come up with wealth of info. Lots on being called before the parish officers, Poor Relief, etc, etc. If anyone else has a similar website for their county perhaps they could share this info. Regards to all. Wendy

For those of you who keep saying you have proof, you have NO proof unless DNA tests have been done LOL! Just cos Granny put that her husband was Dad's father doesn't PROVE it. It only proves that that was what she told the registrar. Her and the milkman might have known different!!!

nudge

JOIN GENES REUNITED! I have been a member for two days and I can't believe how much I have learnt already. The answers to this question alone have given me so many tips. Also I have had responses to my own queries. In this modern world where so many people seem concerned only with themselves it is heartwarming to find how helpful people on this site are to perfect strangers. Keep up the good work!

Ive just thought of this tip unless anyone has actually done it, when the next census forms come round take a copy of what you`ve written down so the future generations havent got to wait 100 yrs to get the info, eventually if its kept going the family should have all the census records.

I thought of writing everything in a book for my future great grandchildren, ive bought a hard back book to write everything in as soon as i can find all the scraps of paper in my folder that relate to my family tree i started counting how many people i have in my tree that are related i lost count at 73

Best advice is from a televison series ( House) 'Everyone lies '

Tip given many years ago by my then local registrar - if you want several marriage certificates and you have a reasonable idea of the parish(es), go to the record office and use the duplicate registers. Yes there may be travelling expenses, but think how many marriages you can look up in a day, and how many 'incidentals' you can pick up on the way. (This probably works best for small towns and villages) My maximum haul in one day was 23! Jay

nudge for Emma

One bit of advice I read somewhere is when you visit a cemetary looking for gravestones take a bottle of water with you. If you pour the water on a hard to read stone it's amazing what a difference it makes and it will become easier to read. It really works Linda

I don't think I've been given any special tips myself. One I have worked out for myself is ... If your elderly relative is not interested in talking about their parents/grandparents etc, try asking what they did in the summer holidays as a child. Amazing what will come out then - For instance, who they stayed with (often relatives), who they went with, why they went there (often a family connection or working holiday) or, indeed, why they did not go on holiday (eg parents could not take time off from trade)

I have recently come to the conclusion that all notes should be made in a hard backed book, less chance of them being 'cleared away' Suex

Whether you make notes on scraps of paper or in books, whatever, always make a note of where you found/or came by the information as its so easy to forget. I've cursed often when finding something interesting to be followed up only I'd not noted the source so wasn't able to go back and check it out.

nothing to do geneology, but i was always told - NEVER EAT YELLOW SNOW!! lol Claire

Assumptions: in science an 'assumption' is a generally accepted but unverifiable 'fact'. Many scientific laws (these are the ones unbreakable even by Captain Kirk) are built on assumptions and almost all theories. The sort of assumptions that lead to chaos in ordinary life could probably be described as 'factoids', i.e. they look like they should be true, they might even feel like they're true, but they ain't - unless of course by some twist of serendipity they are true. I have a gut -feeling that's about right!. lol julian

Angela I did exactly the same!!! Full of high hopes for myself, I got an A5 looseleaf file with different coloured A5 paper and a big pile of file dividers. It worked for the first week ....... lol!!! One year on, you should see the state of it now .......!!! Page after page of unreadable scribble and crammed with bits of paper that I haven't got round to writing up yet! More advice - always write neatly and accept that if you're not organised by nature, delving into genealogy will do nothing to make you organised!

I have bought myself an indexed hard-backed book so that when I have a little scrap of paper with a bit of info on it that might come in useful at some time, I can write it in the book under the correct surname then throw the bit of paper away. Hopefully I can then refer back to it later when I get stuck. Don't know if it will work yet as I have only just started doing it!!!

I was at the point of giving up on my quest to find out what happened to my Gt Grandparents who disappeared after my Grandad was born - then I found this thread by chance! 'Never give up' seems to be the advice..... I was obviously meant to read this! THANKS!!

Best tip I ever had was when my uncle came home after the war with his kitbag full of cigs, I was only 10 and I helped myself to a packet of 10 woodbines and off I went to my friends for smoke in the shed in his garden. 2 cigs later we were both very sick and I was taken home by my friends dad. Stinking of smoke, my uncle gave me a tip 'DONT SMOKE, ITS BAD FOR YOUR HEALTH' I never smoked again, and spent the rest of my youth chasing the girls in the area. NOW THERE MUST BE A GOOD TIP THERE? ted.

Never ever assume anything ................ so, so true! This is a piece of advice that I have ignored (more than once, cos I'm not very good at taking good advice!) and yes, even my most 'obvious' assumptions have been wrong, almost every time!!! I still do it though, I just can't help myself, lol!! Bev x