The Nosey Genealogist

I was talking to someone recently who asked me to show them how to use Ancestry.co.uk to find their ancestors.

Now, like many people who have done a bit of family history research, I take it for granted that others can find their way around that site and with a few clicks start building their own family tree. It was only when my friend started asking me for a written list of what pages to go to and which things to click on that I realised that, to some, it doesn’t seem that easy.

I decided to use a really useful piece of software that I have on my PC called Camtasia and record the exact pages and the clicks on them that I would make if I was starting out in populating my family tree. My friend now had a short video to watch rather than the written list of pages they had expected. I know it is so much easier to ’show’ than to ‘tell’ and so I got to thinking that if I burned my video onto CDs then maybe others might like to get their hands on them.

I have teamed up with The Printed Word Bookshop www.JerseyBookshop.co.uk to sell this first disc for £12.50 plus postage. If you want a copy just go here:

http://www.jerseybookshop.co.uk/promotions.htm

I have written to The Generations Network who own Ancestry and they have given me permission to use their website in the demonstration so I am ready to go.

When you get hold of a copy and watch the screencast you will see me trace my grandfather in the 1901 census, find his birth in the BMD indexes on Ancestry and more. I may make more of these help videos, so watch out for more information in the future.

I knew that some of my family were from Dartmouth in Devon and when I set out on this search into my ancestors I did a Google search for one of them called Captain Henry Thorne. I was over the moon to find a picture of the captain at the wheel of the Railway Steamer Dolphin. I think the page has been taken down now but at the time it made me do a second search for a family History Society in Dartmouth.

Once I made contact, I then planned a visit and was rewarded by being introduced to cousins descended from the eldest son of my great-great grandfather!

From this I realised that it is well worth trying to contact FHS in the area that your ancestors lived in.

I’m a bit nosey really, that’s what this boils down to. I am fascinated by who my ancestors were and what they got up to so I decided to start researching my family tree several years back now. I had very little to go on especially when I asked my dad if he could remember his grandfather’s name. He thought for a second or two and told me: “We called him grandpa” !

I’ve subsequently found out how to use Ancestry.co.uk and  have become really quite proficient in finding my way round it. I used the full set of UK census back to 1841 and the Birth Marriages and Deaths until I had got myself back 5 generations of Thornes and discovered on the way that we adopted the extra ‘E’ on our surname in-between the 1871 and 1881 census when my great-great grandfather came back to Dartmouth from working in the naval dockyards of Portsmouth. He returned with a wife and I wonder if it was her influence that the extra letter was attached?

When I started on my paternal grandmother’s line I found myself in Plymouth and some problems with misspelling in transcriptions. One of my ancestors seemed to be called Rover! He turned out to be a Robert, I am pleased to say. This branch of my tree impressed me in that they all seemed to be grafters, working their way up from being mostly small businesspeople to one or two of them living on their own means.

When I turned to my mother’s line I was in for quite a surprise…I shall post about them later.

As I tell people about this journey I am always a little surprised at just how much people are interested in Family History, but often tell me that they find they don’t have the time or the knowledge to do the research. I don’t think it is too difficult for the majority and I wonder if I should put down some simple pointers for people to follow.

Now that’s a thought!