General Chat

Hi Patricia, I must tell you of my experience. When I first started, I put out a request regarding one of my ancestors, and a very helpful and well-meaning person kindly replied. This person gave me loads of information, even going back to 1500's - and I was so chuffed, I really was. To be fair, this person did say to verify the info she'd given me, so I started to do just that - and found that she'd inadvertently given me info on a completely different person, which meant of course that the rest of the info was useless. As I say, this person was well-meaning, and she did stress that the info had to be verified via certificates. I wonder if the person you mention has verified their info? If they have, I'm jealous!! :-)

Hi Pat Don’t get despondent there’s no timescale of when to complete your family history – it can be a lifetime of enjoyable work. Some people are luckier than others in finding their rellies whilst others keep hitting brick wall after brick wall. Some people are lucky to have a mountain of information whilst some have very little to go on. I have been looking for my grandmother on my father’s side on and off for 20+ years and she just does not want to be found, and it was her that started me off on this genealogy millarky!! I will find her one day – Do you hear that Eunice Annie!!!! lol I have recently started researching properly again after about a 12 months gap and I must admit that the thrill of anticipation of who or what I might or might not find is still there. Lol Good Luck Jxx

I get excited when I find proof back to the 18th century!!! I have been researching 30 years, the last five more seriously. I just wish just one of my families had stayed in the same county let alone the same village or town. All mine seem to have had itchy feet. Ann Glos

Thanks everyone I do feel so much better now. I am pleased for all of you (but jealous) who have generations living in the same village I think mine must have been nomads. I never expected them to move around so much in those days. You have certainly helped me as I felt like giving up. Off now to help number one son set up a web site (forum) for family and friends. Pat

Hi Pat, I never bother looking at the success board but reading this thread I got curious, so went to look. I appologise if I am wrong but I would take some of the claims with a pinch of salt. One says she joined on friday & by saturday had hundreds of relatives she didn't know she had. There is no way she could have verifyed that by today. I only looked at page one but have you noticed how many trying to finds there are on there. Vivienne

I cant believe that,,,,what proof has she got from 1048 or whenever it was? Wishfull thinking on her part i think..

I'm the same Pat, have to prove my finds first before moving on. Twice now I've gotten to a point to find that the records were kept in local churches and both times the original church burned, just after my ancester would have been recorded. One was in Ireland and the other In Southern Ontario. Trying to figure out where to go from there.

Hi Pat Hey dont worry about it, genealogy is all about luck as much as anything else! Like others, one line of my family stayed within the same 20 square miles for several hundred years. They were considerate enough to be a bunch of rogues and therefore were well documented by various history societies before I even started genealogy! So with them I was (almost instantly!) back to 1600's. On the other hand, my great grandmother has proved so blinkin' elusive that's its taken me a year of research just to find her maiden name!! But I wouldnt hold out much hope of getting back to 1000AD ..... and to be honest I doubt that many people can, unless they have a proven link to Royalty! Bev x

Managed on one line to get back to c1620 no bother as they had all lived in the same small place for about 200 yrs now my Mum's side can,t get passed her father, mind you thats Irish records, but still live hope Norah

I have been researching for over 20 years. You cannot prove a tree in just a few weeks. My main line goes back to a document dated 1187 and comes forward beautifully, over 800 documents available for this family. One small snag is,despite all this WONDERFUL and detailed info, I cannot actually place my 2 x GGF anywhere on it, well, not without pushing hard to fit! I could of course, just place him where I THINK and impress the hell out of everybody, but it wouldn't actually be proven, would it. However, from my Gt Grandmother backwards, I have sailed back effortlessly to 1539 and am awaiting a Will, to get back even further.I have now six main lines in this one small village - they were all farmers and made Wills and married each other! I have not even attempted to trace my mother's family - she was born in Scotland and both her parents were orphans - I cannot even confirm her mother's maiden name. Olde Crone