Inspired by this thread I have begun doing some genealogy research. I have in my possession a hard copy of a chronology of my father’s mother’s family. The earliest entries date back to the 1300s in Germany.
I got a trial copy of a couple of genealogy software packages and was searching about for any information available on line. Around 2 AM today, I finally found a “pedigree” of my grandmother, which goes back 13 generations! I know it’s her, because the spouse matches, and the dates are right, and the locations are right. WhooHoo!
I imported the data into my Legacy software, and I created a chart that shows all those generations from my infant great great niece (my sister’s great grandchild) back to someone born in 1435!!! Now I can take the hardcopy family history and add in other known facts (occupations, etc.) to the data. I am so excited. I also plan to go visit my aunt – my father’s sister – and get more info about people from the last 3 generations who are not on the chart. She is the only one I know who would have a lot of this information.
Not to rain on your parade, but does the pedigree actually list an sources, such as family Bibles, wills, census records, etc? If not, it may all be made up. I’ve seen several imaginary genealogies for my family tree, and some of my relatives are so attached to these fake ancestors that they refuse to accept the actual documentation for their real ancestors.
You’re lucky. My great-grandfather apparently had a fight with his father and changed his surname when he left Finland, so we can’t go back any further than that.
Yeah, what she said. There is stuff in World Connect which, if correct, traces my roots back to numerous noblemen in the 1100’s. But I don’t believe the connections - it only takes one wrong one to blow the whole thing.
Hopefully you’re NOT having your parade rained upon because the treasure trove you unearthed includes sources. And by all means do NOT believe everything contributed by the LDS church on their websites… they’ve sent me down any number of false paths.
And a quick [hijack] to shout out to my Australian brethren: Why did you folks burn all of your census information? :dubious: [/hijack]
I should have mentioned that I also have a gazillion-page family history document, citing numerous sources such as wills, birth, death and marriage records as well as deeds. There is even a family crest.
I had been planning to enter all the data manually, when I found the already-existing data that is set up for import into the genealogy software. I am going to look to see whether there is additional information in the form of notes that I can supplement.
I corresponded this afternoon with the person who is the provider of the on-line data, and she made reference to this very document.
Umm, crests were usually granted to specific people, not families. And just because a coat of arms was born by someone with your surname doesn’t automatically mean that crest has any relation to your family. Those internet sites that purport to sell you a copy of “your family crest” usually just make one up, or paste whatever surname onto a coat of arms. For anything and everything to do with heraldry, check out Heraldica.
Okay, I guess I still didn’t make it clear. The material I’m working from is not just from the internet. I’m cross-referencing between the internet information anbd a large document (over 300 pages) that has been in the family since the early 20th century. The first family chronicle was constructed in 1909 and 1910, based on archives, membership and other church records in several German and Bavarian cities.
One quote from this document, with specific family names omitted:
“In Volume 11, page 84 of Siebmacher’s Book of Coats of Arms by vol Helfner, it states: 'An extinct nobility in Bavaria, <family name>, a Weissenburg family, is still in existence today, but is no longer part of the aristocracy.”
The document goes on to state that as early as 1303, Berthod von <family name> “hung his seal on a deed of foundation and in the year 1326 Conrad de <family name> placed his on a purchase deed.” The source cited is the Royal Wurttemberg State Archive, Stuttgart.
The sources are not some internet site that is trying to sell me something.
That is very cool MLS. Several members of my family (ranging from my imediate family to a second cousin removed once or twice) have been trying to put together a geneology of my family, but the farthest back that have gotten is the 1700’s (as in 170X, not 17XX). Although there are some… unsubstantiated(sp?) sources that hint back to a noble and/or royal ancestors in the 1590’s.
I’ve actually been adding information a good deal of the day. I’ve gotten up to 1685.
One of the striking things in old family history like this is that people seem to have either no children, or about a dozen. My ancestors seem to have gone at it like rabbits – new baby almost every year in some cases. The other thing is how few of those babies survived to adulthood. I’m looking at an ancestor now who had two wives (one at a time, of course). The first died after giving birth to six children, five being stillborn and one died in infancy. The second wife went on to have NINE more, only two of whom seem to have lived long enough to have children of their own.
My Great-X grandfather (who I got my last name from) and grandmother arrived at the First Colony at Jamestown shortly after 1610. I was lucky enough to have an much older cousin who spent most of her life doing geneology on that branch of the family. When I became interested in my family history, she sent me a family tree personalized for me and my brothers. All of her stuff cross-checks perfectly with most of the reputable stuff on the internet. I was able to go back one more generation to England about 1580 but the trail is lost after that. My family name has a huge and very active geneological society that even recruits people like me for paternal DNA matching to prove you are related to the first colonists. Maby people have tried and failed to go back more generations but it just isn’t there.
Different countries have different rules regarding the inheritance of coats of arms. See Heraldica for more detailed info. I get woobly about this stuff because I research medieval genealogy (not personal genealogy, except my own) and you have no idea how many fake “nieces of William the Conqueror”, Cherokee princesses, and eloped duke’s daughters I’ve seen crop up. People love a romantic story, or one that exalts their origins, and other people are only too willing to sell it to you.
Congratulations, ya bastid. It’s seldom that a genealogist is able to come across a bonafide pedigree already researched by someone else. I found a few, and they were invaluable, but much of the work has been pure elbow grease.
Yes, a lot of the hard work has already been done and I am fortunate that it has. It would take a while to develop the knack of genealogical reseach, and I was not planning to travel to Germany to pore through old records!
The person who has some of this on-line is interested in my sharing the information I have from the second half of the 20th century, which is what I plan to try to put together before the people who know the details are unable to provide them.
I’ve gotten to a part of the hardcopy document I have where the compiler is telling actual stories about the people, which is fascinating. For example, some of the men were in WWI – on the German side. There are actual excerpts from real correspondence. Most of the sentiment seems to be along the lines of “How tragic that Johann died and left his wife and 4 children penniless, but at least he’s with God now,” rather than brave sacrifices for the fatherland or whatever, which is of course what you’d expect from a human point of view. There seems so far to be very little political material in any of the accounts. I don’t know if the compiler of the material purposely left out anything of that sort, or if it was not there to begin with.
I was able to find a letter written by my great grandfather after his capture in the Civil War (prisoners were typically released upon their promise not to rejoin the battle for a specified length of time). In it (after an amusing account of his capture by someone he knew before the war), he gleefully relates how he is living with a family in Ohio, feasting on fruit and meat and visiting with all the young women in town. Nothing at all about slavery, the war or politics.