General Chat

Thank you everyone for your comments and some very valid points. Yes I can see that belonging to gentry or Royalty would take you back a lot further than the average family. However I will have you know that I come from very good stock as I have found one of my ancestors was a rag and bone dealer now you can't get better than that LOL.. In the meantime I will keep plodding on using my zimmer frame of course. Pat

David - Yes, you are right when you say about them living in a small village.....my one branch is back to 1640 purely by luck as they lived in the small village of Cumnor and didn't move....the records in the church safe was like a gold mine when I visited and the lovely Vicars' wife opened it up for me!!! You do need some easier branches to make up for those ellusive ones!!!!!

I expect that there would come a time where you have to take a good guess if nothing at all is available, and just see what else adds up....then make your decision... Until then I really love to get all the information that I can as I think that it makes it so much more interesting to see the certs and censuses etc....I like to get as much info to get a better picture of the peeps.

A lot of people seem to think that if someone has got back 100s of years they have done it in a hurry and it isn't a thoroughly researched tree. But if you connect to landed gentry or above it's actually quite easy because the genealogies are already in existence - the chap on Success said he had a royal connection so it's quite likely his tree is completely valid. I've got a few lines that I can trace back to the early 1600s - mostly because I've spent hours at the records office going through parish records, burial indexes, wills, county marriages indexes and so on. If a family was in a small area with a not so common surname and a variation of christian names it can be fairly straightforward. Having said that on some lines I'm stuck in the 1850s-1880s where I have unregistered births and no marriages:))

Hi I think there are many different types of geneologists. Some do it properly to the end getting all certs & proving everything as they go along. The other extreme is someone who guesses as they go along & build their tree on probability. The majority of us are somewhere in between! On the success board Clive/Tracey does say he has royal connection so if that fact is proved most of the royal family trees go back centuries anyway so it wouldn't be too difficult to get back that far. Enjoy finding your history that suits you best. Penny

Exactly the same thought crossed through my mind earlier actually when reading a thread..... I am at the stage of having to get the church records to go anywhere anymore and that is much harder from Australia.... Should have done more before emigrating but not to worry, can't be helped now hey!

I know it's selfish but thank God I'm not the only one. Pat

Hello, I am like you.....been doing family history (off and on) for about 10 years and no where near that......unless I have proof it doesn't mean anything to me..... I just want to be sure that the person I find IS my ancestor.....much harder I know and far more time consuming but at least I know what I have is right. Sal x

I'm stuck at c1780 for over a year cant find the b***** anywhere paid for FHS searches even they cant find him

I have just seen a post on the success board by someone who has been researching for about 12 months. She has traced her family back to 1048. So why am I still stuck in quite a few cases in the early 1800's is this because I am useless or just totally incompetent. I could move on if I just picked a name at random but until I can PROVE that a reletive belongs to me I just have to keep my brick walls. Have you all moved on a few centuries also and if you have HOW DID YOU DO IT PLEASE. Pat