Starting A Family Tree

By starting with you, your parents and grandparents we can build a one-surname tree, incorporating Birth, Marriage and Death dates. The more family information you can collect either orally or physically (copies of any/all certificates) the better. Oral history can be vital to an insight into our past, if you have elderly relatives, Grandparents, Aunts & Uncles it is advisable that you gather as much from them as is possible. It is best to record them using a video camera for example and make notes along the way. The downside of this is that what is important to you is not to them and they will not think to mention it, there is also the 'closed' relative who feels they cannot 'divulge' family issues. If you have no or very little information on your parents/grandparents and so on it will be a case of using your Birth certificate and Marriage certificate (if applicable) and working backwards.

I will point out that not all records are on line and for various reasons lots of documentation has been lost or destroyed. Census returns were taken from 1801 every ten years, from this period only statistical information was required by the government such as how many male and how many females along with age groups, making these records of little genealogical value. Most of these early returns were unfortunately destroyed, although in some isolated instances they have been preserved.

The census returns for 1841 were the first to be kept and from 1851 contain the most information. The last viewable census is 1901. The 1911 census will not be released until 2011. Many records are closed to the general public for 100 years. The census was taken sometimes against many people’s principles; For example who would be able to find out what from them, be it future generations whilst they were still alive and was it a ruse to make people pay more taxes. The elderly often thought that if they were found not living with true family that they would be sent to the dreaded workhouse!

The census records that we research are 1841, 1851, 1861, 1871, 1881, 1891 and 1901.

Family research can be fraught with many problems and can either be a joy to 'unravel' or a disappointment when those elusive ancestors just cannot be found. Some examples of not finding ancestors are that enumerators' (the people who recorded the census) handwriting was often poor; another was that many householders could neither spell or write and some could not remember where they were born.