When we sit down to watch ‘Who do you think you are’ on television it is astounding at how far the team of researchers are able to trace the celebrities family tree back. I often sit there and wonder what gems my family would hold if I was able to do that.
With swathes of TV researchers and an endless budget it is made to look so easy whilst they employ various methods of family research.
Luckily with the invention of the internet, methods of family research have become much easier for those of us who do not have access to TV budgets.
The first method of family research is to ask your relatives. It can be amazing how much knowledge is passed on from older generations in the form of stories or snippets of memories. This can be the best way to find out towns where people lived, maiden names of maternal grandparents, and when people died.
Armed with this information, the next family research method would be to consult with Birth, Death and Marriage records. Records of these events started in England and Wales in the mid 1800s so it would be possible to trace back nearly 2 centuries using this method of family research. These are now mostly transcribed for search on the internet, or it could be possible to visit your local registrar who would have access to the local records.
If your family has been in the same parish for many generations, a visit to the local cemetery would be another useful method of family research. This would give exact dates of birth and death and maybe throw up relatives that you didn’t know about.
Once you have used these methods then visiting the census records is another great family research method. Although only done once every 10 years, the census gives all the full names and ages of the people in the household, along with their occupations, therefore giving you more insight than the birth or death certificates could.
There are also military records and emigration records that can be searched via the internet or through archives, which may fill some gaps especially around war time.
Whilst sitting at a computer researching the internet may not be as glamorous as the TV show, it will certainly be just as rewarding.
What Methods Can Be Used To Research Your Family History?
What Does Ancestory Mean?
The Oxford English Dictionary says that ancestry means ‘the relation or condition of ancestors: progenitorship; ancestral lineage or descent, hence, distinguished or ancient descent. Well that clears that up?
Ancestry is the history of a person’s origin, not meaning Granny in Southend, but where the roots of your family came from. This can be closely related to ethnic origin, which is about where your ancient family came from. As an example, many Irish people emigrated to America, so whilst the people born today would be American by birth, their ancestry would have roots in Ireland, making the American Irish.
Relations in the past are known as ancestors, a concept that has become popular in recent years with the popular television show ‘Who do you think you are’ which chooses a famous person and takes them on a journey back through their ancestors to see what stories lie in their past.
There are many websites available to help you research your ancestors www.ancestry.com is one such site. All you need to do is type in some known details and the site will guide you through finding your past relatives.
Your ancestry can be traced back through birth, death and marriage records, Census records and emigration records. However as all records were kept on paper, there will be some difficulty the further back you go.
Ancestry is also important with regards to understanding why we are like we are. An inherited disease will have come from your ancestors, but so will ginger hair or blue eyes.
Ancestry also explains why people in the North of the UK would have looked different, a few generations ago, to what the people in the South did. The North of England was a prime shore line for the Vikings on their voyages across the world, and this would have left a Scandinavian ancestry imprint behind.
With family moving ever further away in the search of better jobs or a better life, maybe that is why the interest in ancestry has become reinvigorated. People are still interested in having a sense of family and a sense of belonging, and by finding out where we came from can help with that need.
Find your family
How do I find my family? – Research of birth and adoption families
Tracing your family lineage uses genealogy which is the study of tracing and collecting relatives names whether deceased or living and establishing the relationships between your relatives
Tracing your family history is an extremely popular hobby. With the use of the internet the resources for researching your family lineage has greatly increased.
Creating your family tree can be very rewarding and sometimes very surprising when you discover you have famous relatives.