Genealogy Chat

Gemma Have you got the jj family too?

Well all I can say is that my CAPTAIN RUSSELL BEVERLEY must be listed as Hernkfdhklghdlk dklhhikdffhihireirekd jj because I can't find him anywhere

You would think that Parker was a nice simple name, but I have had Packer and Parkes to contend with. My worst nightmare was a marriage it took me two years to find, eventually tracking it down on the 1837 online website, the lady's name was Laxton, but was recorded as Laston- once you know it seems simple, but it kept me guessing for some time!

Just reading a book by someone who has researched her tree and wants to tell us how to do it. She has had no luck, she says, tracing a marriage witness with the unusual name of Elizabeth Jolistone. She gives a photocopy of the marriage cert - well, it looks like Elizabeth Johnstone to me! Whats more worrying, this lady is a transcriber for Freebmd!

My Crawley family were listed as Shawley in the 1881, both next door to each other, the other one was listed as Cranley as the writing would have been the same it beats me why two different interpretations of the same name. My Tucker family in the 1901 were listed as Lucker. Regards Christina

Another one to look out for on Ancestry and 1901: the first name and surname the wrong way round - quite why they thought everyone in a household had the same first name but different surnames, I'm not quite sure! Hannah

Has anyone noticed that on the 1871 Wales very few birthplaces are actually transcribed, there is a comma instead. When I look at the images, the birthplaces seem perfectly legible to me.

My grandfather George transcribed as Gaye in 1901. Mersh transcribed as Mash. I would have expected Marsh but not Mash. Wendy

In the 1891 Ancestry UK census the birthplace county produced as a result of an enquiry comes up as "Norths" instead of "Northamptonshire It took me a hell of a long time to find my paternal great-great-grandfather and his family; because I knew they were born in Northamptonshire I entered it as the birthplace county in the search box and kept getting zero matches. Try searching for Joseph Boulton age 76 !!! There are some 30,001 entries with this error. Ancestry have been informed this very day. Peter. PS, I know the savvy ones would have entered "north*" instead of the full name....that's how I eventually cracked it.

On ancestry 1891 my Poynts family became Loynes although not had anyone from the Moon or Saturn yet!

Personally, I like the Chinese whispers approach. My great, greatfather tells the census enumerator (in Liverpool), he was born in Denbigh (a town in Wales). The enumerator writes it as Denby, and then it is transcribed on the FDS as Derby! Wrong country then! This fooled me for ages. I went searching for him in Derby and couldn't find him so was miles off the scent. Only on reading the 1871 did I realise! JB

I have a comparatively rare name of Horstead. I have seen this transcribed as Horsted, Hosted, Hostead, Kostead, Horsehead!!! and Hersted.

Seeing that you all enjoyed those so much, here's some more - this time from the Ancestry 1901. Our interplanetary visitors appear to have returned to whence they came, but there's still plenty of immigrants from exotic lands! Only got as far as the C's when the boss came in... George Chapman - Guildford, Albania Florence Stachan - Lewisham, Algeria Georgina H Fisher - Queensland, Andorra Martha Whitehouse - Holyhead, Angola Price Fred Blackwood - Antrim, Armenia William Morgan - Edgbaston, Bahamas Walter Belcher - Long Wittenham, Bahrain Rachel V Branden - Bruesels, Belarus Martha Parry - Wrexham, Benin Ernest F Webb - Aston, Bosnia and Herzegovina Harriet O New - Denbigh Llarggnhefal, Botswana Mary Blanderfield - N Yarmouth, Brazil Lucy Jane Neesham - Handsworth; Birmingham, Brunei Darussalam Beatrice Bailey - Ely, Cambodia Emily Morris - Ely, Cameroon Emily Rigby - Ely, Canada Eveline Thomas - Ely, Chile Susan Clarke - Ely, Comoros Frederick Pollard - Cambridge, Czechoslovakia

Well after having a good laugh reading these, - UK always thinks of itself as an island, but now I know that the world resides in Britain LOL LOL LOL - I loved Exeter being in Venezuela!! Seriously I can now see why I am having so much problem locating my Pike's in 1901 they all have unusual first names so it’s going to be trial and error over a long period of time... I also found the family Doe as Dor and with so many bad translations of first names. I know we have to use lateral thinking on the ways names can be transcribed, but some of the posts here are off the planet!!! Good luck everyone....

Ancestry doesn't appear merely to mistranscribe, it alters. All those people born in Preben, rather than Prussia. A man born in Bath, Somersetshire appears to be born somewhere in Europe, beginning with S with about thirty letters. (I'm commiting the ultimate sin here: I don't subscribe to Ancestry, so am quoting from memory!) Brenda

If you want a good laugh and have an Ancestry subscription, try searching for people born in obscure countries and it throws up some wonderful stuff! I'm sure that when they did the data entry, the transcribers must have had a pick-list of present-day countries to chose from - many of these countries didn't even exist under their current names in 1891! Sometimes, the error is (sort-of) understandable - e.g. Laos for Lancs, but some of them beggar belief - I'm sure that sometimes, they just picked a country at random! Here's a list of a few that I found in a few minutes of searching. All are birthplaces from the Ancestry 1891 census index: Stevens, Jane A - Newport, Iraq Boston, William - Bethnal Green, Iran Bridgman, Thomas - Notting Hill, Jordan Bickford, Rosana Mary - Adelarde, S. austria Gundla, Carl - Vienna, Australia Wentworth, Charles - Southwark, Bolivia Coakley, Alice - Whitechapel, Peru Townsend, Charles - Cheltenham, Ghana Shipley, William John - Stamford, Latvia Bellis, Mary - Ashby de la Zouch, Lesotho Scott, Edgeworth L - Bayswater, Antarctica Dunford, Harriet - Norwich, Nepal Charles, Mary Geraldine - Ilfracombe, Gabon Bennett, W - Lambeth, Finland Adams, George - Daventry, Norway Caught, Emily B - New malden, Mongolia Newling, Amy T - East Peckham, Chad Charle, Frederick - Armagh, Thailand Coakley, Henry E - Liverpool, Laos Randall, Alice - Devizes, Monaco Attfield, Caroline - Marylebone, Sudan Hart, K - Bermondsey, Indonesia Maayer, Julia - Lucerm, Swaziland Booker, Elizabeth - Salford, Qatar Wheatley, Charles - Edgware, Burundi Chandler, Edith - Crewe, Chile Bartlett, Grace E - West Ham, Greenland Heaslet, Alice E - Hayling, Iceland Rogers, Thomas - Colchester, Ecuador Ferson, Joseph - Enfield, Moldava Frise, Frank - Fairford, Korea, Republic of Bray, William - Isle of guernsey, San Marino Cousins, Gertrude - Wandsworth hlyham union, Federated States of Micronesia Baker, George - Exeter, Venezuela Magnusson, Sigrid E - Reykjavik, Ireland Butterly, Rose - Dublin, Iceland But my favourites are these extraterrestrials: Jackson, George - Clitheroe, Moon Codrington, Violet F - East indies, Saturn

I was looking for TAINTON Someone on here found them transcribed as SAINTON and I found them on another census transcribed as TAINTER. The second one I can see from the image why the error was made, but it looks obvious to me on the first one that it is a T and not an S, but that could be because I know what the name should be. Maybe no so easy for a foreigner to distinguish. Also BANGS transcribed as BANGO, this one found again by someone on here. What would be do without the sharp eyes of our friends at GC

Nudge

Like Glynis, I have a 'T' mistranscribed as 'S', in the 1881 census - TULL became SULL. My KEY family have been transcribed as KEYS and KEAY (and probably, KAY). Other than those, I think I have got off lightly so far! Helen

It has to be said that having a rare name to research does make it much easier to trace EXCEPT that being a rare name, it is not easily recognised by the transcribers! My name FRASI hides away, particularly in the census and the LDS site under many guises! the F can also be a T; the A can also be an O or a U; the I frequently becomes an E or a T! I have found many 'lost' relatives by searching FRAST; FRASE; FROSE; FROSI;TRASE; TRASI; TRAST. I've found my grandfather hiding behind the name of Henry Alfred Gardalder Truse!! It should have been Henry Alfred Garibaldi Frasi!!