Snares to Avoid in Family History Research
Author: Nick Thorne
In the past, when I have set forth to find an ancestor or two, I have to admit to being guilty sometimes of narrow thinking. What I mean by that is I have often focused too strongly on what I assume to have been the correct facts about a forbear. For example, perhaps I had known that his or her name had been spelt in a particular fashion, or that they lived in particular town or city. When I have made this error in the past then I have caused myself unnecessary grief and so much wasted time. I think that we family historians may often be searching in the right place, but are simply searching in the wrong way? If we just open up our minds to researching in a smarter fashion, then very often we will find that record of our ancestor that we were looking for.
I urge you to consider how your web-based research could perhaps gain in its quality if you always:
> keep handy a list of the known surname variants for your ancestor's name (e.g. in my own tree there is Thorn, Thorne, Stephens, Stevens and a huge variation in the spelling of Sissill.)
> think about what common first-name nicknames may apply and also any regularly used shortened forms of names. For example Thomas may be written as Thos. Elizabeth as Eliz. or Eliza. and I've seen John written as Jono.
> have written down some of the capital letters that can easily be confused like J and I, for example
> remember that place names can be confused - in my Devon branch there are two Galmptons very near each other and I jumped to the conclusion that my great grandmother came from the one near to where they lived. Wrong!
> keep in mind the typical length of a person's life-span and don't end up pursuing someone with a similar name thinking they are one and the same. Then there are the ranges of dates for ancestor's weddings, deaths and the births or baptisms of their children?
> keep detailed research logs as you work and so avoid repeating searches already done at earlier stages.
> remain conscious that gaps can occur in whatever data sets. If you are searching a particular period and can't find an ancestor and this time frame also matches a known gap in the data, then this will stop you wasting more time than necessary looking.So if you memorize these seven ways for avoiding family-tree research pitfalls, you may be able to miss out on the errors that I made in the past!