looking to trace my familys history?

Question

to trace history of my family

Answer 1

I tried that, using one of the best known sites for which I had to pay, and I got all the way back as far as my paternal grandfather, and never even managed to get that far on the maternal side, so beware before you pay up! You might be far better off trying local church and council records and even visiting the places where you know some of the family came from.

Answer 2

I have been tracing my family history for over twenty years.So you will have a long job ahead of you. There are so many search engines on the web to help you find things out. I personally have found Genes Re-united a very good source, Curious Fox is another. 1901 census and all the other Census, on Find my past is another one. All genealogy sites with tell you to start with your nearest and dearest and glean as much information from them as possible. It can be very expensive if you let it be. But most people will help out where they can .I have met some very nice people in my travels and found out some fascinating things.I hope you enjoy it as much as I have .I have 1092 in my tree now. From small beginnings and all that.If there is any way I can help I will.

Answer 3

And what about biological siblings (from one or both same bio parents)? How come they can't be part of the picture. It is certainly more accurate that the adoptive family's information. No, it isn't fair but my experience with it with our eldest when he had to do it was they just don't consider it. It's not excluded on purpose...it's ignorance. He filled in the info as per our family but I put a note in there that this was not the biological lineage. Truth is, HE wanted it to be our family on the project so I tried to balance that at the time. I don't want to undermine his definition of mom and dad etc... We speak about his first family regularly and whenever that becomes a highlight, we go with it. Like when he tells people he has three moms and three dads. Bio, foster, adoptive. It was his project. We did it his way, again, with the caveat to the teacher.

Answer 4

Your question is a little vague. If you're asking where to begin such a search, My recommendation is to start with your living relatives, and work your way back from there. Go to the county courthouse and have someone pull archived records of births, deaths, marriage and divorce certificates and decrees. Check with the vairous local libraries, a good librarian will be more than a littel eager to help on such a quest.

Answer 5

I am assuming your family is in the U.S. If it isn't then disregard my answer.

First, ancestry.com does have a 14 day free trial-BUT you must cancel before the end of 14 days or they will charge your credit card. Also, don't be suprised if they ask you to put your cancellation in writing and fax it to them. I have had friends tell me that they had to do it this way to cancel.

Here is a list of some of the free ones.

www.rootsweb.com -This is a good one that is free. It is run by Ancestry.com but shouldn't be confused with Ancestry.com- the pay site.

www.cyndislist.com

www.familysearch.org website for the Church of the Later Day Saints.

www.genforum.com This is a site that is full of individual message boards. You can search and post by last name, state, country, or county. This is a great one. Simply post your question on the respective board, and when people answer you will get a notification on your E-mail. I have had a LOT of success on GenForum.

I must say, however, that a good genealogy query, doesn't just say. " I need information on John Smith" Try to provide as many dates, places, and details as possible. One little thing can make the difference as to the answer you get.

a good query has

1) the persons name
2) all of the biographical information you know to date and
3) asks a specific question

The reason it is so specific is because people won't waste your time and theirs telling you what you already know. Also, by providing ALL of your known information (for example, the childrens names) it gives people alternate people to research to help arrive at your answer.

http://www.usgenweb.org/ -When you get to the main page, you can get to the state and individual locality pages by clicking on the appropriate links. Keep in mind that some towns are going to have more information than some smaller obscure towns. It all depends on what kinds of volunteers contribute information to their sites. Genealogy is very much a hobby that depends on people.

Check your LOCAL LIBRARY. Many libraries have subscriptions to Ancestry.com or hertiage quest that you can Access from home with your library card number. Heritage Quest is geared mostly toward the US records.

www.interment.net or www.findagrave.com These are cemetery sites that have grown by leaps and bounds.

http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-b...

This is the link to the Social Security Death index. This is a very helpful resource to finding death dates of people who died in recent years (since about the 60's)

If your family immigrated to the US in the last 100-125 years you can try
www.ellisisland.org
This one is cool because you can actually have a look at the ships manifests!!

Good luck in your search. It is a satisfying and rewarding hobby with lots of twist and turns. Remember, you are not going to just find your entire genealogy in one search. It is an ongoing puzzle. I tell people, if you can find one thing every time you are searching, you are doing GREAT. If you find any more than that at any given time you are LUCKY!! Blessings.

Answer 6

Are you in UK?

If so start by getting as much info from your family as possible. You then need to work back using the GRO indexes of Births Deaths and Marriages in London. Other useful sources in your local library or Family History Society are Parish Record indexes and the IGI which indexes numerous different sources and is produced by the Mormon Church (who are big in family history).

Answer 7

I had quite a bit of success with familysearch.org, a site funded by the Mormon church, but available to all.

One difficulty is that most sites will not include information on living people. My grandmother took care of the three recent generations, and beyond that familysearch contained a treasure trove of detailed information, birth/death/marriage dates, and quick links to brothers/sisters/parents, as well as an easy-to understand family-tree layout that helped me go back farther than the Revolutionary War.

Good luck!

Answer 8

For anyone who is wanting census information, I am a member of ancestory.com and do not mind doing free look ups if you want to contact me.

Answer 9

it does take time and alot of effort but worth it in end! There are a couple of websites avaliable to guide you.

Answer 10

www.genesreunited.com thats the best one and its free i found out quite alot on that site..