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1. Use the local Archive Office
2. Tracing emigrants
3. Tracing missing persons
4. Types of genealogical information
5. Place names
6. Occupations
7. Family name
8. Given names
9. Dates

 

Use the local Archive Office

Local Archive Offices have a wealth of information. They may have census records, newspaper articles, land records, etc.

Do not rely just on online sources
For the foreseeable future, it is likely that much of the information you will need will be found only in books, or on paper (or vellum), microfilm or microfiche in various libraries, record offices and archives - both national and local. Do not expect to be able to restrict your research just to data that is available to you here in GENUKI or elsewhere online.

Just as now, many years after the introduction of microfilm and microfiche, you will find many of the records you might want to use can only be seen in the archive which holds the originals, so only a very small proportion of what has been microfilmed has in turn yet been made available online.

However the online sources are growing all the time. Recent major online developments include the LDS's FamilySearch website (includes the IGI and LDS library catalogue), Scots Origins (1855-1898 Scottish civil registration indexes, 1891 Scottish census index, and pre-1855 Church of Scotland baptism/marriage index), and FreeBMD (computerising English and Welsh civil registration indexes). However, among the best of the online "resources" are the people out there, who you can contact via newsgroups, mailing lists, etc. Through them you can tap a vast amount of information that you might not be aware of, that is not systematically indexed or filed anywhere, or that is at too great a distance to access directly. This server will, we hope, provide you with effective means of tracking down these sources, both human and documentary.

 

Tracing emigrants

When trying to trace the origins of someone who emigrated from the British Isles, you should try to use all the information sources that are available in the country to which they went, in order to try to locate just where in the British Isles your emigrant hailed from. There are very few passenger lists listing such emigrants dating from before the early 19th century - arrival in the foreign country is more likely to have been recorded than departure from here.

 

Tracing missing persons

Be aware that many professional genealogists and a good number of amature family historians have ethical issues with tracking down living persons and may have even taken a pledge not to do so. They consider such efforts an invasion of privacy. And in some places, such searching is an act in violation of legal statute.

Types of genealogical information

The classes of information that genealogists seek include: place names, occupations, family names, first names, and dates. Genealogists need to understand such items in their historical context in order to properly evaluate genealogical sources.

 

Place names

While the place names of an ancestor’s residence or location of their life events are certainly core element of a genealogist's quest, they can often be confusing. Place names may be subject to variant spellings by partially literate scribes. Additionally, locations may have the same or substantially similar names. For example, the name Brocton for villages occurs six times in the border area between the English counties and Staffordshire. Shifts in political borders must also be understood. For instance, county borders in C17th-C19th England were frequently modified, with outlying and detached areas being reassigned to other counties. Old records may contain references to Middle Age villages that have ceased to exist because of disease or famine.

Many sources provide locations for our ancestor’s life events and place of residency; these include vital records (civil registration), censuses, and tax assessments. Oral tradition is also an important source, although it must be used with caution. When no source information is available for a birth, death or marriage location, circumstantial evidence may provide a probable answer based on the place of residence of the individual or the individual’s family at the time of the event.

Maps and gazetteers are important sources for understanding the places where our ancestors were born, lived, married, and died. They show us the relationship of the area to neighboring communities and may help us understand migration patterns.

 

Occupations

Occupational information may be important to understand an ancestor’s life. Two people with the same name may be distinguished by their occupation. Also, a person’s occupation may have been related to his or her social status, political interest, and migration pattern. Since skilled trades are often passed from father to son, occupation may be indirect evidence of a family relationship.

It is important to remember that occupations sometimes changed or may be easily misunderstood. Workmen no longer fit for their primary trade often take less prestigious jobs later in life. Many unskilled ancestors had a variety of jobs depending on the season and local trade requirements. The perplexing description "ironer of rabbit burrows" may turn out to describe an ironer (profession) in the Bristol district named Rabbit Burrows. Several trades have regionally preferred terms. For example, “shoemaker” and “cordwainer” have the same meaning. Finally, many apparently obscure jobs are part of a larger trade community, such as watchmaking, framework knitting or gunmaking.

Occupational data may be reported in occupational licenses, tax assessments, membership records of professional organizations, trade directories, census returns, and vital records (civil registration). Occupational dictionaries are available to explain many obscure and archaic trades.

Family name

Family names are simultaneously one of the most important pieces of genealogical information, and a source of significant confusion for researchers.

In most cultures, the name of a person references the family to which he or she belongs. This is called the family name, or surname. It is often also called the last name because, for most speakers of English, the family name comes after the given name (or names). However, this is not the case in other cultures, e.g., Chinese family names precede the given name.

Patronymics are names which allow identification of an individual based on the father's name, e.g., Marga Olafsdottir or Olaf Thorsson. Many cultures used patronymics before surnames were adopted or came into use. The Dutch in New York, for example, used the patronymic system of names until 1687 when the advent of English rule mandated surname usage. In Iceland, patronymics are used by majority of the population. Surnames made their way into the language in the 19th and 20th century, but are not widely used. In order to protect the patronymics system, it is forbidden by law to introduce a new surname to the language.

As with place names, surname and personal name data may be subject to variant spellings. Older records may include greater variation in spelling than modern records. Phonetic spelling may be the only link between two variantly spelled names; e.g., "Quilter" and "Kieltagh". Records may also include completely different variants of names, such as Mort for MORDECAI.

The transmission of names across generations, marriages and other relationships, and immigrations also causes significant inaccuracy in genealogical data. For instance, children may sometimes take or be given step-parent, foster parent, or adoptive parent names. Women in many cultures have routinely used their spouse's surnames. When a woman remarried, she may have changed her name and the names of her children; only her name; or changed no names. Her birth ("maiden") name may be reflected in her children's middle names; her own middle name; or dropped entirely.

Official records do not capture many kinds of surname changes. For example, fostering, common-law marriage, love affairs, changes in career or location may all result in name changes which are not reflected as such in official records.

Difficulties can also arise when researching family lines with common surnames such as "Smith", or surnames common to a particular geographic area. Many times, an amateur researcher will assume that a person is a direct ancestor based solely on the given/surnames, only to later find out that this person is not related or is a more distant relative.

Surname data may be found in trade directories, census returns, birth, death & marriage records.

Given names

Genealogical data regarding given names (first names) is subject to many of the same problems as family names and place names.

Additionally, nicknames for personal names are very common — Beth, Lizzie or Betty is common for Elizabeth, which can be confused with Eliza. Patty has been used as a diminutive form for Martha. Also, Amy used for Alice, and Nancy/Ann, and Polly used for a number of feminine names including Mary Ann and Elizabeth. Peggy is often used as a nickname for Margaret. While the feminine names are the most confusing, masculine names can also interchange: Jack, John & Jonathan, Joseph & Josiah, Edward & Edwin, etc.

Middle names provide additional information. Middle names may be inherited, or follow naming customs. Middle names may sometimes be treated as part of the family name. For instance, in some Latin cultures, both the mother's family name and the father's family name are used by the children. Official records may record full names in a variety of ways: First, Middle, Last; Last, Middle, First; Last, First Middle; Last, First, M.

Historically, naming conventions existed in some places, where the name given to one's children was sometimes dictated by a particular formula. It is important to recognize, however, that naming conventions were not used in all families and did not always follow the same formula. They are just a pattern of naming that was common in a particular area during a particular time.

An example is Scotland and Ireland, where:

1st son - named after paternal grandfather
2nd son - named after maternal grandfather
3rd son - named after father
4th son - named after father's oldest brother
1st daughter - named after maternal grandmother
2nd daughter - named after paternal grandmother
3rd daughter - named after mother
4th daughter - named after mother's oldest sister

Another example is Saxony in Germany, where siblings were all given the same first name, often of a favourite saint or local nobility, but different second names and known by their second names.

If a child died, generally the next child of the same gender that was born was given the same name. Quite often, a list of a particular couple's children will show one or two names repeated, sometimes 3 or 4 times. Although this can be confusing, it can also assist a researcher in discovering the date of death for the previous siblings of the same name.

Personal names go through periods of popularity, so it is not uncommon to find many similarly-named people in a generation, and even similarly-named families; e.g., "William and Mary and their children David, Mary, and John".

Many names may be identified strongly with a particular gender; e.g., William for boys, and Mary for girls. Other names may be ambiguous, e.g., Lee, or have only slightly variant spellings based on gender, e.g., Frances (usually female) and Francis (usually male).

Dates

It is wise to exercise extreme caution and skepticism with information about dates. Dates are more difficult to recall years after an event, and are more easily mistranscribed than other types of genealogical data. Therefore, one should evaluate whether the date was recorded at the time of the event or at a later date. Dates of birth in vital records or civil registrations and in church records at baptism are generally accurate because they were usually recorded near the time of the event. Family Bibles are often a reliable source for dates, but can be written from memory long after the event. When the same ink and handwriting is used for all entries, the dates were probably written at the same time and therefore will be less reliable since the earlier dates, at least, were probably recorded well after the event. The publication date of the Bible also provides a clue about when the dates were recorded since they could not have been recorded at any earlier date.

People sometimes reduce their age on marriage, and perhaps those under "full age" may increase their age in order to marry or to join the armed forces. Census returns are notoriously unreliable for ages or for assuming an approximate death date. The 1841 census in the UK is rounded down to the next lower multiple of five years. Also, caution should be used when estimating a date for a husband's death based on his absence from the census. A woman at home while her husband is away could be identified as head of household or assumed to be a widow.

Baptismal dates are often used to approximate birth dates; however, some families wait 3-5 years before baptizing children, and adult baptisms are not unknown. In addition, both birth and marriage dates may have been adjusted to cover for pre-wedding pregnancies. It is very common for the first child to be born before or within a few months of a marriage and sometimes baptized in the mother's name, later adopting the father's name after the parents' marriage. The father's name can be used even if no marriage has occurred.

Calendar changes must also be considered. In 1752 the date of the new year was changed in England and the American Colonies. Before 1752 the new year started on the 25 March, but in 1752 this was changed to the 1 January. This was part of the transition to the Gregorian calendar from the Julian calendar. Many other European countries had already made the change, and by 1751 there was an 11 day discrepancy between the date in England and the date in other European countries. The date continued to be recorded as usual in 1752 until 2 September 1752, the following day became 14 September 1752. Dates that were recorded in the older system can be shown by "double dating". For example; Original date: 24th of March 1750; Modern date: 24 March 1751; Double dating: 24 March 1750/51.

For events occurring before 1752 in countries where the Julian calendar was still in use, it is best to use double dating whenever the exact year can be ascertained. When transcribing an original record where the exact year is evident but not expressed, the double date can be written as, for example, "24 March 1750[/51]".

One should also be aware that, in those places using the old Julian calendar, the numbering of months also varied. The "1st month" of the year was considered March, the second April, the third May, and so on. Those 24 days in March which fell before the beginning of the year were generally regarded as being part of the first month.

NOTE The foregoing may be true for British genealogical records but does in no way apply to records in other countries. A notable exception is the Nordic countries, especially Sweden, which have very detailed and mostly accurate records in the form of church records from the 18th century onwards.

But there, as in any historical research, a critical review of all information and an assessment of the reliability of each source is required.