Tracing your ancestors?

Question

Like those shows you see on tv called "who do you think you are" how could i trace my ancestors and see what they did and all that detailed stuff?

Answer 1

well, i was on tv for tracing my ancestors and you just do it with ur mind. I am in a movie about this called Snake Hill, just take up facts and then let yourself find the person.

Answer 2

First of all, don't think that it is as easy as that BBC show makes it out to be. None of those celebrities does any research themselves, it is all done for them. You cannot just magically walk into a record office or library and have all this information presented to you magically on a plate. Genealogy does not work like that. It is a slow painstaking process not entirely dissimiliar to police detective work, and it does not come cheap. Many people have been working on their trees for years, if not decades, and have still not discovered it all. Don't expect to have all your answers presented to you in a day, and certainly don't expect to be able to do it all on the internet without ever leaving the comfort of your chair.

That said, what you can achieve on the internet is growing every day, and if you are lucky enough to find someone else online who is already working on an existing branch of your tree then that improves matters enormously. With that in mind, although it is a website I loath immensely, it is wise to put your existing tree on Genes Reunited, beginning with yourself and working backwards with what you know.

The hardest part is getting back to 1901 and the census. From there, working in the 19th century is comparitively easy. Working backwards from 1837 is slighly more difficult but not impossible.

If you can't get to 1901 at the beginning of your quest, then you need to start looking through the General register Office (GRO) indexes (usually at ancestry.co.uk) and start ordering the birth, marriage and death certificates you need to get back that far. You'll need them at each stage in any case in order to be able to prove your research and make sure you aren't following bogus leads. It can quickly get very expensive.

Many of the detailed records (military service records etc) are kept at the National Archives in Kew, London. If you don't live South of Watford Gap then hiring in a professional to do a search for you can cost anything upwards of £20 an hour. If you live at one end of the country and your ancestors live at the other end of the country, you will again find that the libraries and archives places that hold the stuff you want will demand hourly fees to search through their archives for you. It can all quickly become very expensive.

I have got about 20 different reference books on genealogy. I have taught myself over the course of the last two years. It hasn't come cheap. I still don't have all the answers. A couple of family lines are back to the 1500s, but most peter out sometime in the mid-to-late 1700s, some later than this.

You will also probably find that most of your ancestors are recorded as "Ag. Lab." (Agricultural Labourers) so there won't even be any detailed records beyond all the 'hatch, match and dispatch' stuff. Don't enter into this field lightly. There are lots of good websites out there to aid in your quest, but ultimately it requires both time and money. A lot of people bail out shortly after they begin when they realise exactly what it entails and they lose interest. Once you are in it, you are in it for life. It can be very addictive, but please don't believe everything you see on TV. It is not as easy as that!

Answer 3

you can try in google and see what you find. I have tried trace my ancestors but every site I came across wanted money that I don't have to spend. Type in family ancestors or tree perhaps that will help. Good luck to you

Answer 4

Footwork, phone calls and your own investigatory work is the only real answer I've found, because I know somebody with a very unusual surname that couldn't be missed by a cat in the dark, yet despite spending money on the alleged sites that help you find your background etc, he got no further THAN HIS OWN FATHER - yet a trip to the local town hall took him back three generations and led him to find out far farther back than he had thought possible by pointing him in the right direction. Need I say more!

Answer 5

Start with what you know and work backwards. Assuming you know who your granparents are, you'll need to find their birth certificates. This will tell you the name of their parents. You can search birth indices at Ancestry.co.uk or yourpastonline.com - hopefully you'll know where your grandparents are from, which will help.

Then look for their parents' (your gt grandparents') marriages - that'll give you ages, and from that you should be into the 19th century. From Acnestry.co.uk you'll be able to access census information from 1841 - 1901, as well as be able to find references to their birth certificates.

You can order Birth, Marriage and Death certificates - once you've the appropriate reference numbers - from gro.gov.uk.

More information would be available from Parish registers, usually held at the county/city recoreds office.

Answer 6

Start at your local library. ALot of them have free access to ancestry.com. In this site you can go in and type you ancestry name and start looking at census records.

These records will tell you all about your past ancestors. Where they lived, what they did for work. Children's names.

I was fortunate to get this info on line thru my local library website

It's really alot of fun.

Answer 7

These questions come up every day.

Where can I find my family tree for free?
Does anyone know the {Surname} family?
What are good sites for ancestors / genealogy?

They are all about tracing your family tree on the Internet. The fourth time I typed in my favorite beginner's links I realized I should save them in a text file and paste them in. This is long and general. Because it is general, not all the links will apply to every question or questioner.

These may help get you started. They are large and free. Many of them, however, have subtle ads for Ancestry.com in them - ads that ask for a name, then offer a trial subscription. Watch out for those advertisements.

http://www.cyndislist.com/
(240,000+ links, all cross-indexed. If you want Welsh or Pennsylvania Dutch or Oregon or any other region, ethnic group or surname, chances are she has links for it.)
http://www.familysearch.com
(Mormon's mega-site. Click on "Search")
http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi
(460,000,000+ entries, of varying quality)
http://www.ancestry.com/learn/facts/default.aspx?ln=
Surname meanings and origins
http://www.tedpack.org/begingen.html
My own site: "How to Begin"

United States only:
http://www.usgenweb.net/
(Subdivided into state sites, which all have county sites.)
(The Canadians have Canadian Gen Web, by province)
http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/ssdi.cgi
(Social Security Death index - click on "Advanced" You may find your grandparents.)
http://find.person.superpages.com/
(US Phone book, for looking up distant cousins)


United Kingdom Only:
http://www.genuki.org.uk/
(Biggest site for United Kingdom & Ireland)
http://www.freebmd.org.uk/
(Free Birth, Marriage & Death Records)

(If you posted your question in Genealogy, ignore this paragraph. If you posted it in the "Family" category, read on.)
Tracing your family tree is called genealogy. YA has a category for genealogy,
Home > Arts & Humanities > Genealogy
There are hundreds of more links in the resolved answers there.


Notes:

You usually have to do some research. Sometimes you get lucky. Don't give up if your Great grandfather with your surname isn't there. Try all eight great-grandparents.

You won't find living people on any of the sites except the phone book one. You won't find many people born after 1920 on any of the sites except the SSDI one. Genealogists hide the birth dates, birth places and other facts of living people to protect their privacy. You will have to find your grandparents' or great grandparents' birth dates and maiden names somewhere besides the Internet.

The free sites are supported by advertising, just like TV. You can't watch the Super Bowl without seeing a beer commercial, and you can't surf for dead relatives without seeing an Ancestry advertisement. Many people complain about advertisements. Please don't. They bring you the "free" sites. There's no such thing as a free lunch.

If you get serious you'll need a genealogy program. They are to family research what "Word" is to writing a novel. I like Roots Magic. Family Tree Maker is the market leader. Both cost around $29. The Mormons will let you download PAF for free. It is clunky, but it is free. You can sometimes find old versions of FTM or Family Origins (FO is the predecessor of RM) in bargin bins at CostCo.

This is a general hint. Even though you go in through YA Canada, YA Australia, YA UK or YA USA, all of the questions go into one big "pot" and get read by everyone in the world who speaks English. Most of the people here are in the UK and USA, but you sometimes get questions and answers from people who worry about kangaroos eating their roses.

So - put a nation, or, better yet, a nation and a state / province in all of your questions. It will help people help you.

Answer 8

first place to start is by talking to ALL your living relatives. Find out if there are any people they know who are distant relatives to those members of your family who have passed away. (I talked to a family friend only to find out she was actually my grandfather's 2nd cousin, and I didn't know this, she told me information I couldn't find online or by talking to my immediate family members). Use tape recorders to get silly stories and any ofther information you think will help you.
visit websites like:
www.familysearch.org
www.rootsweb.com
www.genealogy.com
www.ancestory.com
always get full name/date of birth/place of birth/date of death/place of death as alot of names were very common back in those days and having as much information as you can get will help when visiting those sites.
once you get some information, find a website or program (I use genopro) and start putting the information you have gathered on something besides paper.
You can also go to www.houseofnames.com and enter your last name to see if it is in their database.

good luck

Answer 9

you collect info from libraries, websites, churches, city/town/district councils and first-hand accounts of all sorts you can find

Answer 10

genes reunited.com