Ooo Source-y!

Well this weekend I did my last webchat for the Organising Your Genealogy course (as whittered about in previous posts!).  It has been just three actual lessons but boy has it given me a wake-up call.  Each week has crammed in so much information that my head is still spinning!

 

This week we covered sources.  Both protection/use of original sources such as documents (acid free tissue paper and so on, apparently, are needed) and the correct usage for citations - forms, information to include etc.  It got quite academic in the end.

 

It has made me realise just how carried away I got at the beginning of my family research.  I had always had an interest in my family history and had made a couple of hand drawn family trees when I was a teenager and my grandparents were still alive.

 

However, I started again four ago in earnest.  I was looking for an original christening present for my gorgeous nephew.  So I agreed with my sister-in -law's sister that each side would provide family tree material.  She wisely employed someone to do this for her.  I, in my enthusiasm, decided I could do it myself!  Typical, some might say...

 

The amount of information that was by then available to me was astounding.  I had never really attempted to get any further back than whatever my grandparents and great aunts could actually remember.  In part, I had been put off with my father's Anglo Indian side by the difficulty of getting any data.  I had made a new effort using some of the sources referred to on Alastair McGowan's Who Do You Think You Are? [when he discovered for the first time that he was Anglo Indian.].  However, these yielded little new information.

 

What a revelation to find Families In British India (FIBIS), the British Library India Office records and the National Archives catalogue on line and searchable!  And that was just the free basic stuff for starters.  I remember being up until one o'clock in the morning many times in the weeks before the christening - completely overexcited about following the newly revealed trail that I had begun.  I took out an Ancestry subscription there and then!  Totally carried away. Made no attempt to see which subscription service would best suit me or anything.  (FYI, do check them all out before you choose.  SO much better!)

 

Of course, in the rush to see as much as possible, I ended up with a pile of notes and hurriedly drawn trees.  I did not, unfortunately, write down the sources properly...

 

Having now read The Ten Commandments of Genealogy, as recommended by my tutor for the sources lesson, I can see that I basically broke many rules that first week - because I did not know any better.

 

I did produce a tree of sorts for the christening day.  However, as detailed in my very first post on this blog, my brother and his son are still waiting for me to produce the "final" document.  Hence "how long is a piece of string"...
 

I am sure that there are items on those original scribblings that, for the life of me, I could not find again.  Worrying.  I need to re-trace those steps somehow.

 

So herewith are my own commandments of genealogy - at least for the next few months:-

 

1)  Thou shalt finish the trees that thou has started - at least, pursue no further lines of investigation until...

 

2)  Thou has provided sources for every item on said trees.

 

3)  Thou shalt finish the new filing system and buy a cabinet for it to reside in, rather than leaving piles of folders on the window sill...

 

4)  Thou shalt learn how to use the new Family Tree Maker software to assist in this process.   There is no excuse for scribbled trees all over the place in this day and age.  It is time that thou grasped that nettle!

 

I am actually looking forward to getting more organised.  I highly recommend Pharos courses.  They are reasonably priced and convenient; their materials are excellent.

 

Just be prepared for the real work to start after the course!

The pressure, the pressure of a Name

What's in a name?  My maiden name was just annoying quite frankly.  I got sick of spelling it out to people (as my sister in law now must) and no-one ever seemed to know where it had come from.  It is not, as far as a I know, rude in any other language, infamous for some reason or any such.  It was just highly unusual and therefore caused much annoyance.

However, it has proved to be a genealogist's dream.  At last it is proving its worth.  And yet, it has also shown me just how unreliable some of the family tree sources available to us actually can be, if you take them at face/(ie transcription) value.

Initially, when I began my father's family tree, it was not plain sailing because I had to learn about the India sources.  However, the unusual surname then often worked in my favour.  So much so that I began to wonder if I was over excited, as everyone of that surname on each database seemed eventually to link to my tree!  Was I, in my enthusiasm, making connections that were just not there?

But no, I am  now as certain as I can be that my initial conclusions were right.  The tricky part has been the gaps - or "brickwalls" as they are known to genealogists.  For example, I simply stalled on the question of how my ancestor founded our line in India.  That is to say, I do of course (!) know how the mixed race babies were made!  But how would I ever find out who their mother was?

I had the name of the original Napoleonic era soldier who had gone to India.  His name appeared on a marriage entry for my 3 x great grandfather and I was able to establish that he had been born in Shoreditch in London.  No sign of a mother's name - it was not required on the marriage certificates.  What to do?

To quote Kit de Luca (Pretty Woman sidekick - got to love a Pretty Woman quote), "the pressure, the pressure of a name"....  However, in my case, it was clear that "Cinder-f**king-rella" was not going to work as an answer...

And so I ventured to the British Library for the first time.  Pathetically over excited at the idea of a whole day of research and a hotel night on my own. 

It was amazing.  For the first time, I could actually see the handwritten records of things that I had seen transcribed on websites.  There was so much more that could be gleaned from these records.  For example, until recently, most websites' transcriptions for British India deaths simply gave the dates and name, possibly a spouse name or place of residence but definitely not causes of death.

A big question for the day was Joseph, the original soldier.  To my immense surprise, I could not find the birth of my 3 x great grandfather even though it was one of the few dates of which I was certain.  My desperation at knowing that it would be months before I could return to the Library spurred me on and I began to feverishly look at all entries with similar spellings.  And there he was.  My 3 x great granddad and 3 siblings!  But each of their surnames were spelt differently (hey, I did say that it was a pain of a name!). 

So different that were it not for the regimental detail given in each birth (and sadly death for one child) entry, I would not have made the connections.  So different that unless I had trawled through every web entry for names with the first same few letters, I would not have found them from the comfort of my own home. 

And even better, the name of a mother was given for the eldest sibling.  "Namallah, a native of Madras".  Not Cinderella but for me, a fairytale (after a fashion!) end to my Library day.

I have to go shopping now.....