General Chat

I sometimes follow up relatives of people who married into my family, purely through trying to track some of them down on census records. For instance, my 3xgreat grandma Ada had a sister Alice Amy who married Henry Owen, mariner of Liverpool.

Just for my records, I like to identify where people are on the census, even before they were married (ie. this Henry didn't marry Alice until 1891 but he was in his twenties) and I managed to establish who the parents of Henry were, that his mother possibly died in childbirth, his father died and that the surviving children were sent to live with the father's married sister. It's not directly relevant at all to the line I'm tracing but - if someone is down on the census as nephew or niece of the householder, I like to try to work out what the connection is.

Suppose that is the lottery of searching - what might be someone else's crucial link that they're trying to prove or disprove might to someone else just be great-aunt Ellen's husband.

I only research them if they are interesting too! Sometimes it makes a change - especially if I can't find who I'm looking for on my line. At least it's progress of sorts.

Jill

Hi Mark,

I don't usually look at them, but I DO look at the aunts and uncles thru the censuses, sometimes you find other links/info that way. Sometimes I do get sidetracked if someone has an interesting name or occupation or something just captures my imagination.

I only put my direct lines on Genes, so I don't tend to get contacted by such distant connections. I figure that if someone is actually related to me then they'll have my direct ancestor in their tree, so will still be able to find me.

so, after all that I agree that it's personal choice :-) and probably not one you'd make unless you have tons of time

Maz. XX

Hi Everyone.

Is it me or does anyone else find it a waste of time researching the ancestors of a distant uncle/aunt via marriage.
I have 1 guy who married my great great aunty and i had a contact ask me who his siblings were, I told this contact as politely as i could that because he is married to my gg aunty that i was only interested in his descendants and not his ancestors.

Some contacts find it odd that i have a relative of there's but not there ancestors in which i can't help them with there ancestors.

My question is is it a waste of time and resources to research ancestors of relatives by marriage or is it a personal choice?

regards

Mark