Saturday 1 September 2012

The lost siblings.

I went right back to the beginning this morning and started checking what information I had on the people I started researching in 2007. I had hoped that the gaps in my evidence wouldn't be so large, however this is one wish that hasn't come true. I've already given myself a headache trying to trace where I got birth dates and places from.

 I am currently looking at my Grandad's father and his brothers and sisters, the Edge family. I haven't really looked at the later generations of this tree for some years now, and my fears of my novice approach have been realised. I have a year of birth for all of the siblings, and yet no birth record to say where I found the information. Now I know I wouldn't have plucked dates out of thin air, and my back tracking suggests that I have used other members family trees for the information that I have. I'm not suggesting that they have made up the years but it seems that there is no evidence on their trees either. I've become a bit of a stickler for evidence to back up the information that I have found and consequently, if I cannot prove something, it doesn't go on the tree. It doesn't seem that I thought that way 5 years ago though. I'll forgive myself for now though as I was new ancestry and naive to my future -self's little precise (correct!) habits.

After finding baptism records for 5 out of the 9 siblings, the three eldest and 2 youngest, I have come to a slight puzzle. The last three baptisms were all carried out on the same day; 12th November 1911. However according to my information, John Austin Edge was the 3rd child, Leonard James Edge the 8th and Laurie Belle Edge the 9th. Why then was the 3rd, 8th and 9th baptised on the same day? Why was there no mention of 4, 5, 6 and 7? I am going to need to find them on the the 1911 census and see which children there are. Number 5 and 7 are both named Joan, which leads me to believe that perhaps the first Joan died. Number 6 is a boy named Leslie after whom my grandad was named, so he must have existed. Number 4 is a girl named Sissy, whom my grandad remembers. Was she an actually auntie though? Or somebody related through marriage and that the children called auntie? Only census hunting will tell.

3 comments:

  1. Be encouraged on your census hunting! Everyone has to start somewhere, and documentation for those dates (or corrected versions) will materialize eventually.

    I just found your blog courtesy GeneaBloggers. Best wishes on your research and blogging journey!

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  2. Welcome Amy! I think in the beginning of my genealogical research I wasn't as obsessive with back up information as I am now ... so I understand your predicament. In time it will all come together. I look forward to following your journey. :)

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  3. I still find things when I go back to my older notes where citations are missing... very frustrating but we live and learn. :-)
    Regards,
    Theresa (Tangled Trees)

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