Topic: Family Tree Searches

[ds2190]

I've put a tree together using www.ancestry.co.uk and some details other family members have done. Managed to go back to the 1500s so far but nothing overly interesting. Is definately worth doing though.

[DJBrenton]

A lot of my family tree was already available on ancestry.co.uk so I've a massive tree going back to 1020. The most depressing part is finding out that two generations lived right behind Goodison early last century. Also finding lots of ancestors who had manor houses and the like which haven't ended up with me. A Large Australian family from 1833 onwards as well.

My grandsons are the 33rd generation in the tree.

[WEST HAM PAUL]

Anybody else do this.

I've done small bits over the years but this year have really got into it & done loads. Using ancestry.com .

Managed to trace in some parts as far back as 1650 but others only as far as 1900. Sometimes one thing can lead to so much other times you can't find nothing.

I've 500 people on the tree there only direct links not including all there children etc.

The hardest parts are Irish family members.

Most of my family come from East London, Essex, Suffolk with a couple branches out to Ireland. Plus one disturbing link when I discovered my Great, Great, Great Grandparents where Geordies ....ouch lol.

Didn't see point in starting new thread Mods.

[Sir Harvest Fields]

Ive been talking to Karl in the pub about this and its fascinating. Im not sure i want to delve into my family etc but some of the things he had found out were mind boggling.

[Manila Vanilla]

You do find some interesting things.
I've got a bit stuck in Ireland now for the same reasons. Following Williams and Jones in Wales isn't that easy either. But I now know:

1. Since 1824 we're all descended from a dalliance between Major George and his chamber maid. He knew how to treat a woman. He left her an annuity "providing she remains unmarried and conducts herself with propriety".

2. There used to be some money in the family until someone became a "four bottle a day man" and lost everything in ten years. Both parents died intestate in their thirties, as well as two children, leaving seven orphans.

2. My great-great grandmother died of cholera in the workhouse on Brownlow Hill. The site is now the Metropolitan Cathedral.

3. It used to be illegal to marry the sister of your deceased wife - but it was OK to do so in Australia.

4. Betting shops were illegal until 1961. At least two of my ancestors were involved in illegal-off course betting.

5. My cousin (who has the same name and who I've now met) is the guy who set up the Oddbins chain of wine shops.

6. This cousin is the family historian and has traced us back to Huguenots who escaped from France in the 1600s.

[John C]

I want to do a bit of research for my old aunty, I've spent a few hours going through google pages so assuming there's nothing already out there where do I start - I've got places of birth, DOB and death etc.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

[KERRYKOP]

All scousers are Irish arent they? The only difference is they gave lamb stew a different name

[flw]

  I have just started again. I have found it to be a very time consuming hobby and very frustrating. Having no family as such and no real information , just snippits.. i seem to come to a dead holt all the time . I wont give up though as i think its an absolutely amazing hobby."Watching Who Do you Think You Are "  makes it all look so simple though dont you think ? although i love the programme. Anyway good luck to all of you in your researches.

[Cato]

I was reading this thread this morning and although one of my cousins has done a brilliant family tree on my maternal side, I know very little beyond my paternal granddad and grandma, both of whom were dead before I was born.
One of the posters from 2005 had suggested putting the full name of who you're searching for into Google, so I tried it with Grandad's name.  BINGO! There's someone who I'm certain is a cousin (Dad's sister's daughter) looking for family members and info. I've emailed her and am awaiting a reply. How good is that!?

[L12]

  I have just started again. I have found it to be a very time consuming hobby and very frustrating. Having no family as such and no real information , just snippits.. i seem to come to a dead holt all the time . I wont give up though as i think its an absolutely amazing hobby."Watching Who Do you Think You Are "  makes it all look so simple though dont you think ? although i love the programme. Anyway good luck to all of you in your researches.

Have you tried freebmd.org?
I have found a few people ,for births use the family name then enter the mother's maiden name, it only gives you the qtr of the birth though.

[Big Red Richie]

I was reading this thread this morning and although one of my cousins has done a brilliant family tree on my maternal side, I know very little beyond my paternal granddad and grandma, both of whom were dead before I was born.
One of the posters from 2005 had suggested putting the full name of who you're searching for into Google, so I tried it with Grandad's name.  BINGO! There's someone who I'm certain is a cousin (Dad's sister's daughter) looking for family members and info. I've emailed her and am awaiting a reply. How good is that!?

The internet never forgets. 

[L12]

I want to do a bit of research for my old aunty, I've spent a few hours going through google pages so assuming there's nothing already out there where do I start - I've got places of birth, DOB and death etc.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

freebmd.org,for births, marriages and deaths,
 You can order census dvds from S&N geneology, but that adds up, also if the index is available pay the extra for it , you will save a lot of time .

 For parish records, for say the Liverpool area lancashire parish register society sell cds, but they are missing some records.

Archive CD Books sell directory cd's,the gore's 1911 & kellys 1881 I have found useful if you know the ancestors occupation or address

 William Brown Library have records on microfiche,on a first come first served basis.
It's all time consuming stuff, but well worth it in the long run.

9 pounds 25 for BMD records from GRO is much cheaper than what sites like ancestry charge.

If you are prepared to wait a while I find the liverpool city council records better quality for about the same price, that is if the ancestor event happened in Liverpool.

[meff]

I want to do a bit of research for my old aunty, I've spent a few hours going through google pages so assuming there's nothing already out there where do I start - I've got places of birth, DOB and death etc.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

First and foremost you'll need some kind of access to the British Isles Vital Records Index (BIVRI) which will provide you with the information required to order birth, marriage and death certificates from the GRO or local records office. The LDS church distribute transcripts of this via CD or their familysearch.org website which is free to access but the only authoritative sources of these records are the GRO indicies themselves for which you'll require paid access to a site like Findmypast, Ancestry or the Genealogist.. either that or sit in front of a microfiche reader at the local records office.

You can access earlier vital records indicies for free at freebmd.org which covers from the beginning of civil registration: 1837-1915. Anything before this period you will need to start looking at parish registers which is where things can start to become tricky particularly if you have non-conformist roots where you'll most likely struggle once you get back to the mid-late C18th.

Meaningful census records for the British Isles begin in 1841 and the latest census with open access is the 1911. You will require paid access to a subscription site once again in order to view all of these although the 1881 is free to access via the LDS familysearch site. The problem with the census records and many others is that the information may have been transcribed several times from the point where the enumerator transcribes the census returns to the data entry clerks who transcribe the searchable indicies you use to find the records. Our ancestors were often economical with the truth so information such as age, family relationship and occupation can be called into question. Always expect the unexpected when you are searching for census records and in some cases expect to find nothing until you start thinking outside the box.

The 14 day free trial on Ancestry is a decent starting point particularly if you are primarily doing Liverpool as they have transcribed the marriages and banns for a fair proportion of the city but not St Mary's Walton iirc, baptisms and burials which are a bit sketchy (although they do have Ford and Yew Tree if you are looking for RC burials).

hth

[Big Red Richie]

I want to do a bit of research for my old aunty, I've spent a few hours going through google pages so assuming there's nothing already out there where do I start - I've got places of birth, DOB and death etc.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

Electoral registers, census, church records (start by parish/ date - which were later folded into diocese) marriage certificates, birth and death certificates.

You might find this useful.

http://family-tree.co.uk/getting-started/

[shanklylass]

I'm really struggling to find anything out about my Irish ancestors too. The earliest record I have of them is being in Scotland in 1847, and from later census know that they were from Ireland, but I'm really struggling from thereon in without knowing which part of Ireland they were from.

[L12]

I'm really struggling to find anything out about my Irish ancestors too. The earliest record I have of them is being in Scotland in 1847, and from later census know that they were from Ireland, but I'm really struggling from thereon in without knowing which part of Ireland they were from.

Sadly a number of Irish immigrants had good reason for their backgrounds to be kept secret.
Unless your ancestors had an unusual name, you might never know, if only we had quizzed our grandparents.
A couple of suggestions, try looking for records of siblings aunts & uncles etc.
If you can access Griffiths Valuation 1848-1864, it has names of taxpayers, it will be hit and miss though as it only gives the head of household's name.

[shanklylass]

Cheers for that - I'll give it a try.

I did find out I have a half brother living in Liverpool which was unexpected 

[meff]

If you are lucky then your Irish ancestors may have recorded their township on the census returns which is one of the key fragments of information you'll require to pin down the parish registers you need to search for lines. Male ancestors may have been in the army or militia either before or after moving to England so WO96/97 records and E.504 Militia attestation forms can lead you back to birth parish/township particularly when used in conjunction with known information from English/Welsh/Scots census records.

When looking for RC records in Ireland these can be quite sketchy for C19th and non-existend for C18th but don't assume that records don't exists as many Catholics were married in the C of I and it was also common, particularly in the North, for families to baptise their children in both the local RC and C of I churches.

[John C]

Thanks for the replies everyone, I'll have a look n detail when I can. Cheers.

[WOOLTONIAN]

Finished mine as far back as possible last year.
Oldest Ancester Georgius de Brodricke born 1026

There is a record of Breton 'King Brodrick' circa 500ad but finding links between 500-1026 is impossible.
An early Breton poem (c. 500 A.D.) vividly depicts a horse race where the victor won the hand of Princess Alienor, daughter of King Brodrick.

For all those struggling with Irish Ancestors the best free site I've found is

http://www.rootsireland.ie/

Good Hunting

[rob1966]

Started doing this back in 03-04 (lots of help from my ex GF's Mum due to where she worked). Managed to go back to 1830 and got stuck there as the family moved to Liverpool from Belfast, looks like two brothers, Henry and William, moved over together. Our surname is actually English though and is a derivative of Knight and has its roots in Derbyshire/York. Tried the rootsireland website but nothing coming up.

The family led by Henry started off living in Moorfields then moved out to Green Street, then out to Walton. Williams lot went to Southport then moved to Moss Side in Manc. The Liverpool males were all initially butchers, then Marine Fireman was the next main occupation.

At some point I'll try to look into this again, was fascinating finding out the history and seeing how firstnames were repeated down the years,

[Cato]

When you go digging, the detail you can find is astonishing. Like I said before, my cousin researched our family tree on the maternal side.
We all knew Grandad lost an arm and a leg in France in WW1. We knew through the ones who were born early enough to know him before he died, that he'd been holding a horse for an officer, when a copy of "Tit Bits" (a weekly mag that lasted until the 80s, and no, nothing to do with glamour models!) fluttered past and he leaned down to pick it up. As he did, a shell came over and blew the horse and everyone on their feet, away.
Now, with copies of his Army medical papers, we found that he lay in the mud, presumed dead for THREE DAYS, in freezing conditions, (while the battle carried on) before being picked up for burial, but a slight movement was noticed. His papers describe a bayonet wound to his neck too. We don't know if a mate or a German tried to finish him off out of mercy.
The cold is what must have saved him from bleeding to death. He was a very brave man. This was 1916 and my mum and her twin were born in 1919, so he was back to full function! There were eight other kids to support and another one after my mum, making eleven in all, so he worked selling papers etc in a kiosk opposite the Adelphi hotel. I've got a picture of that. What a man.
As an aside, he lost his mum as a little boy and his dad remarried, but he didn't like the step-mum, so he stowed away on a ship going from Liverpool to Rio de Janero. He got discovered and when they docked, got sent back to Liverpool. Amazing to think if he'd got away with it I wouldn't be here!

[sms1986]

I've been doing my family history for about a decade now and I used to have a tree with over 30,000 people in it, although that was because I used to put in anyone who had a connection to someone in the tree, so people who were something like the husband of the sister of my 20th cousin eight times removed were included. I currently have one of about 1200.

Irish ancestry is indeed very hard to find if they left Ireland before the 1860s or so and you have little idea of where in Ireland they came from. On my dad's side, he only has a couple of Irish branches - Murrays from Meath, and Connollys who settled in Salford. Apart from that, I can't trace them past the generation that came to England. One of my maternal great great grandmothers was a Callaghan who was either born in Dublin or in Dover, her father being an Irish soldier who may have been stationed there. My maternal grandfather's name is McKenna, and they lived in Toxteth for a while before moving to Leyland, although his dad was born out of wedlock and never knew his own dad, so the name came from the maternal side. My earliest known McKenna ancestor was a horse groom (his son was a basket maker, very unique jobs in my family), and he married a Gilligan, also from Ireland. I also have a maternal ancestor called Scowcroft who was born in Ireland. As it is a rare Lancashire surname, I believe he was the son of an English man and an Irish or Scottish woman, although it may just be that the Scowcrofts lived in Ireland for a few generations.

Most of the rest of my ancestry is from Lancashire (and Merseyside and Greater Manchester), Cumbria, Suffolk, Gloucestershire, Hertfordshire and North Yorkshire.

[J-Mc-]

Always wanted to start one due to my dad saying we've got a relatively big family, the McGraths are closely related to the Hungies and the Ftzgibbons which were apparently two very well known families during the 70s, 80s and somewhat 90s (all this according to my dad and my uncles anyway.)

Always wanted to know the history of the family and exactly how well known we used to be.

Dad's got a book about the Krays aswell which mentions my grandad, says that he was the one person the Krays never dared cross so they barely (if ever) tried to enter Liverpool. Would love to know the complete history but haven't got time (or money) to even stat!

[Roady]

Always wanted to start one due to my dad saying we've got a relatively big family, the McGraths are closely related to the Hungies and the Ftzgibbons which were apparently two very well known families during the 70s, 80s and somewhat 90s (all this according to my dad and my uncles anyway.)

Always wanted to know the history of the family and exactly how well known we used to be.

Dad's got a book about the Krays aswell which mentions my grandad, says that he was the one person the Krays never dared cross so they barely (if ever) tried to enter Liverpool. Would love to know the complete history but haven't got time (or money) to even stat!

Thatd be some read! I heard there was talk about the Krays coming up to Liverpool and basically they got told to do one.They never returned .not sure how true it is.Do you mean the Ungis? mad bunch they were.You should well look into that family tree mate would be well interesting

[J-Mc-]

Thatd be some read! I heard there was talk about the Krays coming up to Liverpool and basically they got told to do one.They never returned .not sure how true it is.Do you mean the Ungis? mad bunch they were.You should well look into that family tree mate would be well interesting

Aye that's the one, never really delved into it (so much so I couldn't even spell it! )

Ungis, FitzGibbons and now the McGraths, really want to get started on it mate but as I said, haven't got the time or the money haha!

[Cato]

Thatd be some read! I heard there was talk about the Krays coming up to Liverpool and basically they got told to do one.They never returned .not sure how true it is.Do you mean the Ungis? mad bunch they were.You should well look into that family tree mate would be well interesting

That's right. I was a Macmillan nurse before I retired and had to visit the wife of the feller that ran the Krays out of Liverpool!
I was aware of this before the visit and was slightly worried, but they were both OK, nice in fact 

[meff]

There is a distant link to the Ungis in my family tree on my nan's side going some way back. The name came to Liverpool via a Filipino sailor: Gualberto/Gualberti Ungi in the 1880s. When I looked at this a few years ago could't find any record of a marriage to the woman who was supposed to be his wife but there were so many variations of the surname I didn't bother putting any further effort into searching the bmd indicies.

[John C]

Some fascinating tales everyone, great stuff.

When you were a kid history & stuff like this was a boring distraction from football & life, now its really interesting.

[CHOPPER]

Some fascinating tales everyone, great stuff.

When you were a kid history & stuff like this was a boring distraction from football & life, now its really interesting.

John, that's now my new greatest ever answer back. You sound like you were in the unit at school



Anyway, wouldn't you be in the John Cedar, family tree? (Shoot me for my shitness there)

[John C]

Pm'd you Lord Chopper.

[bonzer red]

I'm really struggling to find anything out about my Irish ancestors too. The earliest record I have of them is being in Scotland in 1847, and from later census know that they were from Ireland, but I'm really struggling from thereon in without knowing which part of Ireland they were from.

Ireland is quite hard to find ancestors as well because the records were burnt, if you could find where they from you could check the local parish records, some of which appear on line, i have links on my other computer back in ireland, but i'll see if i can find them, would be really useful for anyone who needs to find info

[Tsar Kastik]

I've just about given up on the Irish side (me Ma's).  Apart from the shortage of records, the names often got changed to an anglicised version, or, the enumerator guessed the spelling; illiteracy was a problem, especially among women (my great grandmother could only make her 'mark' on her marriage cert in 1899).

Don't go expecting exact spellings, I've lost count of the cockups I've seen. (Ancestry are possibly the worst, although FreeBMD have also slipped since I stopped doing stuff for them ha!). Phonetic searches are sometimes the best way to go, especially with an 'oddish' name. 

If you join Lancashire libraries (can be done online) you can access all kinds of old newspapers from all areas of the country. Loads of fun,really.

Also worth considering, if you are interested in a specific area, is Googling to see if that area has an OPC. I've had stuff from these online parish clerks that I simply would not have got from any other source

[John C]

freebmd.org,for births, marriages and deaths,
 

I want to thank L12 for providing me with more than a head-start with this, in about 3 weeks I've gone back to 1784 and found my grt, grt, grt, grt grandparents.

I wouldn't have got there so fast if it hadn't been for L12.

Its been really interesting, particularly to find my gt, gt, gt gp's on some ones else's family tree ridiculously far-removed.

[Bunter]

Would have liked to trace my family back but having a common surname I think the search would prove futile and too difficult to research.

[L12]

Glad to have helped, even in such a small way.

[kesey]

If anyone knows a way of succeeding in Ireland please let me know.

A French friend of mine surprised me in France recently. Out of the blue she said shall I do your family tree , quite naturally I said yes. Fuck me . Within a couple of hours she had traced back to Ireland and even find out their trades , who lived in ther houses what they left in their wills.

I will email her for you to see if she can send me the link.

[kesey]

I knew I had Irish blood in me . My four family names are Dixon , Keen , Murray and Hoare but to actually see it traced back is an amazing feeling. I think she got back as far as Great , great , great grandparents.

[kesey]

E Mail sent.

[kesey]

This is the site my friend used in France with me . For some reason it's saying it can only be used in a library.

http://www.ancestrylibrary.com/security/anclibautherror.aspx?message=login