Families are like fudge... mostly sweet with a few nuts (Tracing Your Family History - Anthony Adolph)

Member Name: Sarccyslayer

Product:	Tracing Your Family History - Anthony Adolph
Date:	10/06/06 (210 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Lots of information, pointers, hints, tips, guidence

Disadvantages: It is a hardback book

When I decided to start researching my family tree I had no idea of what to do, where to start or how to do it. I have decided to research my family tree mainly because as more and more relatives within the family die, with them goes links to history and further generations of whom I could end up knowing nothing about. I was also interested to learn about both of grandfathers, one of whom I have never met and due to that side of the family being relatively small, those left living can only remember a few details.

If you think researching your family tree is a good idea and it is something you want to look into doing then there are a lot of useful tools, resources and information available to you, mainly because thank to television programmes such as ‘Who do you think you are’ and websites such as ‘Genes Reunited’. However, as advanced as the internet has become over recent years, there is no substitute to the good old fashioned way of learning – books.

The subject matter of Genealogy when typed into Google will bring up 42.6000.000 items and 4.8 million if restricting the research to the UK alone…. As far as book are concerned, again there are a lot to choose from and whilst you can end up spending thousands of pounds on books, there is one particular book which stood out to me when purchasing.

‘Tracing Your Family History” by Anthony Adolph. From his website it states that “is a professional genealogist, broadcaster and writer. As a freelance professional genealogist, he provides a complete range of services from one-off searches to full scale projects to trace family trees in Britain and abroad, and investigates all aspects of surname origins, heraldry, house histories and much more besides.” Through my time on Genes Reunited I know that he often does web chats so that he can offer personal advice to those of us who have hit yet another brick wall with our research and since taking part in one of those web chats, I have been able to research further into history with his help because I would never have known what Manorial records were nor how to use them.

Tracing your family history is the perfect guidebook for someone who is just starting out in genealogy. As I have said before, it isn’t as simple as typing in a name on a search engine to see what you get. For me this book is an invaluable resource guide and has provided me with a lot more information, tips and guidance than anything I have spent my time reading on the internet.

The book is split up into four sections. Part one is titled “Getting Started” and is perhaps the most vital part of the book. It states that tracing your family tree is mainly about seeking records in order to link together relatives and ancestors through information, but before you start searching for real there are a few things you can do before hand. So we are taken through the motions of questioning your own family, especially grandparents and if you’re lucky enough great grandparents because already you will be back to the 1800’s without a lot of effort however, more importantly, anything anyone can tell you must be recorded so you don’t forget it.

From your family members you may also be able to get hold of copied of birth, death and marriage certificates which hold vital clues and information within the family tree line. Another reason that this section is so vital within your research is that there is a chapter about charting conventions and abbreviations which will be vital when it comes to charting and recording the information you have gathered, so my advice would be to pay particular attention to the detail here.

Also throughout and at the end of each section there will be ‘quick reference’ points usually on the left or right hand side of the page to point you to helpful websites, record offices and there could also be mentions of places to search for particular pieces of information.

Section Two is titled “The Main Records” and has eight separate chapters, again another vital source of information and through this section we are taken through what General registration was and when it came into being for Births, Deaths and Marriages (also known as BMD’s), The use of Censuses and what they record and how they can help you in your research, Parish Records, Directories and Almanacs, Manorial Records, Wills and even Gravestones and Memorials. There are useful pointers as to which websites to use and which national records office’s you can visit.

The one thing you can end up relying on heavily during your research are census details and the data they give you and also Parish Records. It is important to know which censuses and Parish Records are available and where you can search them, some of them are free to search, others there is a fee but everything you need to know you can find within this section.

Also within this section Anthony Adolph gives you a brief guide on how to use birth, death and marriage certificates to help use the information and this alone is extremely useful as the information contained within a certificate gives you ancestry lines to further decades.

It is also useful to learn that you can order Birth, Death and Marriage certificates from the General Register Office online, as long as you know the dates, name of the person and whether or not it is a Birth, Death or Marriage Certificate you require then it is yours for the price of £7 and to date I must have 40 or 50 certificates, thankfully not all of them I have purchased, as some members of my family are researching, we take it in turns to purchase and copy certificates. Again, I can reiterate enough how important these certificates are due to the amount of information they contain, all I will say is that you need to be doubly sure that you have the right data for the certificate as you could end up spending a lot of money on the wrong information which could take you in the wrong direction with your family tree.

Section three, the largest section deals with everything you need to know after you have searched through everything mentioned within section two. Things such as Newspapers, Land Records, Slave Ancestry, Maps, Records of Elections, Hospitals and workhouses, Legal Accounts, Immigration and Emigration records right down to religious denominations.

I have used this section to find out where a lot of my ancestors where buried and what the inscription read on their gravestones and also old newspapers from libraries which contain a wealth of information. For example, one of my grandfathers brothers was in the Navy, as was a lot of my family an he never returned home and it wasn’t until I went through old newspapers detailing the dates in which he went missing that I found an extract stating that he had gone overboard and was presumed drowned, by doing this I was able to get a copy of the death certificate to add to my collection and from that I have now managed to trace further members of his in-laws.

Finally section four is ultimately there to help and guide you into finding out what your surname means and where it could have originated from, whether or not your family belongs to a clan or could have descended from Royalty as well as the use of genetics and DNA. Again, Adolph does include a lot of website addresses, useful references centres and references to other books on particular subjects, such as the meaning of surnames and it is through using this book that I have also managed to trace the origin of my father’s surname and my husbands surname, both dating back to when time began and along the way I have found both coats of arms which belong in the family.

At the end of the book there is a reference section detailing the names, address, phone numbers and email and website addresses of every reference point mentioned throughout the book and this is one of the most useful tools you could possibly have to hand when researching.

Since starting my research I have through using this book and emailing the author for hints and tips, been able to research my tree on my mum, dad and husbands sides of the families back to the 1600’s detailing where most of them lived, their occupations, life and death, their families and their family’s families.

There are no end of things you can find out using the internet and research archives and little over 3 months ago I managed to track down the sister of my Nan, neither of whom had ever met each other and it was only because I was looking through my Grandfather’s side of the family that I was able to locate Bridget, whom I am glad to say is still alive and is now in constant contact with my Gran, her sister, and she is now learning a lot about the family she never knew to complete her family tree and within a few months we are all hoping to be able to get together and meet for the first time. I have found cousins I never knew I had and for Bridget she has found a whole family and its history, just through one click of a button and an email through genesreunited.co.uk

So, if you are about to start your family tree or have started your family tree and you are looking for a good reference and resource guide, then I can’t recommend this book enough. Since using it I have been able to progress a lot further than I originally thought possible and that is without using all of the information available to me. This book is of constant use and a lifeline.

** Further Information **
• Hardcover 320 pages
• Publisher: Collins
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0007214839
• Category: Reference , History

Prices of this book vary depending on where you buy it from, it retails at £20 in most high street books shops, but can be found online for as little as £13.

Anthony Adolph can be found at www.anthonyadolph.co.uk

Summary: A definitive guide to traching your roots