Re: New to this - how do I proceed
- From: "Lesley Robertson" <l.a.robertson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 3 Jul 2007 13:19:42 -0700 (PDT)
I am very new to genealogy research and have never posted to a
newsgroup or forum of any kind. Please bear with me while I go
through the learning curve of how this all works, and excuse me if I
break, or don't follow, accepted protocol.
My Mom and Dad had started researching the family several years
before they both died in Dec 2000. They traced one line back to
Scotland. I have found a family tree on Rootsweb.com that
apparently extends that line back to Robert the Bruce of Scotland.
My question is: Can I accept this line, or should I undertake my own
research to develop the documentation that proves this line? If
there are several trees that show the same information, does that
necessarily validate the information?
"PapaEagle" <ehh@xxxxxxx>
There are a lot of lines that claim descent from the Bruce, or
various other assorted royals. While some of them are possibly
true, I'm afraid that there's a lot of wishful thinking in most of
them. The problem is that Scottish records haven't always survived
that well - damp, poor materials, civil and international war, and
neglect don't do a lot for their survival. If you're lucky, you
might find records back to the 1500s, but this is exceptions - for
example, one of my lines is stuck, after 20 years in this game, in
1821!
The problem with several trees showing the same info is that they're
probably all copied from one original one...
Your best bet is to go to the data you're most sure of (presumably
the line your parents found) and work on that, documenting it as you
go. It's much more fun that way, anyway. There's a good pay-per-
use website called Scotlands People where birth, marriage and death
certificates (started in 1855) and Church of Scotland parish records
can be searched.
http://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/
However, before you start, and even before you register, they have a
very good "getting started" section under the [help and other
resources] tag. You can do some preliminary work with the IGI
http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/frameset_search.asp?PAGE=igi/search_IGI.asp&clear_form=true
BUT remember that this is a mix of data extracted from the records
and information supplied by patrons - and it's impossible to tell
which patrons were careful researchers and which were not, so always
check that the data you're looking at was extracted. If you find
useful information, you can then use that to cut the searching you
need to pay for on Scotlands People. There's some other useful sites
listed on my website
http://homepages.ipact.nl/~robertson/
Finally, you could post to soc.genealogy.britain. If you do, ask a
specific question (you wouldn't believe the number of people who
post something really vague such as :I'm looking for the Smith
family", and give whatever info you have about the person you're
asking about, even if it's very rough - even something as rough as
"at the start of the 1800s" is better than no time span at all..
It's much easier to help those who try to help themselves!
Good luck, and welcome to the addiction.
Lesley Robertson
"Lesley Robertson" <l.a.robertson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
.
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