How You can Help Yourself to Taste Success!

[Red Dragon]

Hi Everyone!

Here's a weekly update on how well people have been doing over at LostCousins.

• 33 new members joined the LostCousins site
• 2,306 new entries have been added and
• 374 relatives have been matched.

All numbers up on last week. New members and relatives matched are above average again this week. The ratio for this week was 6.2, on average every 6th person added produced a match.


Good Luck Everyone!

Here's a graph showing the activity over at the Lost Cousins site.

 

[Red Dragon]

Hi Everyone!

Can I start with an apology? Unfortunately my hard disk crashed and I lost everything. Thankfully, the file with the LC data has been recovered, so I am able to start publishing data again.
What I've had to do is to average out the data for the last 6 weeks, so it looks pretty static.

Also, sadly, a couple of members have closed their accounts. This has had an affect on new entries and relatives matched, but next week we should be back to normal!

Numbers will look odd but here's an update from the last figures I published.

• 603 new members joined the LostCousins site
• 12,913 new entries have been added and
• -302 relatives have been matched.

Even though the closure of the accounts has had an effect, there has been a big increase in new members and new entries is also very high. Both well above their average.


Good Luck Everyone!

Here's a graph showing the activity over at the Lost Cousins site.

 

[Gillian]

My condolences, Red Dragon. What luck that at least you got your LD data back. Your misfortune gives me a good opportunity to thank you for all your work on LC's and our behalf.

 

[chrissy1]

I am still sorting through all my 2nd, 3rd and 4th cousins who are related via females who have married and therefore have less recognisable surnames, with a view to adding more when I can find a spare moment.......but holidays and grandchild minding have intervened of late. I have also been waylaid by the new GRO index, finding or confirming missing children who died pre 1911. Next job is searching for those elusive pre 1866 deaths which now have ages attached. If this index had appeared some years ago it would have saved me a lot of money purchasing unnecessary certificates. However, keep up the good work, Red Dragon, as it does inspire me to make more effort, even though I have a large number of entries already.

 

[Bryman]

Peter mentioned in his latenov16news that, "If you have British or mostly British ancestry then a simple calculation shows that over 200 fellow LostCousins members are your 6th cousins (or closer). You might think a 6th cousin sounds distant but, . . .". They are exactly the other members that are researching similar lines to yourself.

WHERE ARE MY 200 RELATIVES? Please hurry up and identify yourselves. I have cast enough (I think) hooks over the side to find a fair proportion but it sounds as if most of you are not even in the water! Maybe I am preaching to the converted here but perhaps even some of our forum members don't realise just how far they can cast into the surrounding mist.

I am sure that I read a post recently (but can't remember where) in which someone stated that they entered blood relatives at LC but not those related by marriage, due to 'lack of interest'. That is a pity. That person and others like them may be missing a trick or two. I used to think that way but then found that some 'by marriage' families linked up with blood relatives that I had not been researching. That led to dozens of changes to the contents of My Ancestors page, updating records to indicate that they were really blood relatives after all. As a result, I was matched with a 7th cousin who has since been most helpful in adding extra individuals to both of our trees.

I don't wish to make any criticism of how any member does their research but my experience suggests that it is worthwhile entering ALL identified relatives at LC that appear in any 1841/1881/1911 census. Having done the hard work finding them, why not give others a chance to match with them? Currently, I have more records of people related 'by marriage' than I do that are 'blood relatives'. However, the same surnames keep reappearing in marriages at many of the 'isolated' villages where my ancestors came from and I suspect that the same is probably true for several other members.

 

[PhilGee]

Bryman: So far I am restricting myself to blood relatives based on "Direct Ancestors and descendants thereof", plus the spouse and just one generation below a female blood relative (nominally a "name change" generation). Why? because I'm well behind in documenting these - including LC entries Like you, I'm wondering where my 200 relatives are - I have three identified "cousins", all by marriage and two through the same person, but no blood relatives.

Must get back to documenting 1841/1881/1911 census data so that FTA can give me the list of people I need to add!

Phil

 

[chrissy1]

6th cousins are great, as long as they are concentrating on the same blood lines as me and not ones randomly related via the marriage of an ancestor's sibling or distant cousin.

Having already entered all my direct ancestors and their descendants, spouses and siblings on LC from the 1841, 1881 and 1911 censuses, Irish 1911 and US 1880 and 1940, I am about to embark on adding all my remaining 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th cousins (plus cousins removed) who are not already listed and with a view to possibly looking at autosomnal DNA in the future, I have also investigated both male and female blood lines down to the present generation where possible.

A few months ago relationships such as 'husband of grand aunt of wife of third cousin twice removed' etc etc appeared on my tree, but on revisiting these entries today, I note that they have been altered to read to 'no direct relationship found' and it is these entries which I shall not be entering for the time being, as I can add no further information about the families, other than the fact the surname also occurs in my tree. (Unfortunately I don't know how to keep such branches separate from my main ancestral tree, so they are all mixed in together).

To include them on LC really is an impossibility at present, as I need to prioritise and get the more direct cousins listed first. Like Bryman, I have investigated numerous apparently non-related lines with a familiar surname, especially in rural areas where intermarriage seemed frequent and often struck gold, but when ancestors were extremely mobile, like many of my mariners and 'nomadic' lines, I have found this blanket approach doesn't help much unless the surname is extremely rare.

With unusual surnames like HORTOP and MINTOFT , I have investigated almost every occurrence (though not an official one name study), since the surnames were restricted almost exclusively to one county prior to 1900 and therefore likely to be related, so I might be inclined to list some apparently unrelated people on LC in the hope that I get a bite, but it would be counterproductive to do that for every surname in my tree.

All my early research - the first 15 -20 years or so - was carried out at local record offices where I painstakingly recorded every instance of a surname in which I was interested, covering all parishes within a wide radius of my ancestors' origins from about 1750 to 1880, so I would feel confident answering queries on these lines as I have primary data.

To date, I have located 11 cousins on LC, half of which are through marriage........ How about anyone else?

 

[peter]

6th cousins are great, as long as they are concentrating on the same blood lines as me and not ones randomly related via the marriage of an ancestor's sibling or distant cousin.

Cousins are people who share your ancestors - if they're only related by marriage then they're not cousins. The figure I quoted in the newsletter was for cousins, and excluded other types of match.

The chances that a cousin will be focusing on exactly the same line as you at a given time is small, because we all have so many lines to research.

Having already entered all my direct ancestors and their descendants, spouses and siblings on LC from the 1841, 1881 and 1911 censuses, Irish 1911 and US 1880 and 1940, I am about to embark on adding all my remaining 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th cousins

If everyone entered their 2nd and 3rd cousins (however times removed) from the 1881 Census then it would be possible to make matches with 6th cousins - you don't necessarily need to go any further. Indeed, I think you'll find it impractical to enter all your 4th and 5th cousins from 1881 because there will be so many of them.

 

[chrissy1]

I will see how far I get, Peter......and how much spare time I have. Then I might try the autosomal DNA route. Which firm do you recommend?

 

[peter]

I will see how far I get, Peter......and how much spare time I have. Then I might try the autosomal DNA route. Which firm do you recommend?

There's no simple answer - I generally buy the cheapest test, which for those of us in the UK is Family Tree DNA.

But it all depends what you're hoping to discover, how many tests you're going to be buying for cousins, and how much time you have to spend analysing the results. Ancestry DNA keep it simple, as is their way, but don't give you as many tools or as much information about your matches. On the other hand they have a much bigger database (although 90% plus seem to be in the US).

Note that the Ancestry sale ends today (Monday).

 

[chrissy1]

Well Peter, all my ancestors are English and my cousins are overwhelmingly English too. I am all for saving money, but don't really understand much about Autosomnal DNA and I wonder if I would manage to see any matches at all without provision of a very explicit set of instructions! I have plenty of time, but I am not sure about the ability to detect matches from complicated data, as I find it difficult enough to interpret results from Y chromosome tests in any useful terms (ie how close the matches are and what they tell me about the likelihood of relationships in say the past 6-8 generations, which is what our HORTOP group have been aiming to prove).

I don't really know what I am hoping to discover, though it would be good to break down my paternal 'GANE' brick wall ca 1800-20 as they were a seafaring family and difficult to trace........and records seem to stop in Harwich ca 1820, an area with virtually no IGI or other coverage. If I could establish viable DNA links with any of the possible ancestors I have identified, it would be a major breakthrough, though I fear this is a bit ambitious!

I have noted you saying that it is worthwhile for genealogists to test, so thought I might treat myself for Christmas. As for cousins, I come from a very small present day family and nobody will be testing apart from me. My parents are both dead, I have a sister and no brothers, (but doubt much would be gained from my sister testing?). I only have one first cousin (on my mother's side) and he won't test and there is nobody alive from my father's side that I am aware of. My father was an only child, his paternal cousins died in the Empress of Ireland disaster in 1913 without issue and his maternal cousins and their offspring are all dead as far as I am aware.....and nobody apart from myself is interested in family history. However, my mother's only male cousin (now deceased) tested about 10 years ago and proved a close match to his 3rd cousin with whom we were in contact.

 

[peter]

I might treat myself for Christmas

Let's hope there's another special offer then!

 

[chrissy1]

So poss Family Tree DNA is best for me, given the above details???? This is the one that the HORTOP group use, so I know there SHOULD be some matches on there.......and I will hopefully get info regarding any offers via our coordinator. I am in no rush. My Christmas presents don't need to arrive before Christmas!

 

[chrissy1]

Probably not the right place to ask, but does anyone know how to contact 'DNA Heritage - Europe'? I know mother's cousin tested with them in 2006 and I have the log in details, but the instructions simply state that all information can be found on ORACLE, but I have no idea how to access that. I am not even sure if the firm still exists. Does anyone know if it was taken over, and if so by whom? (Poss Family tree DNA???) The Churchill surname group coordinator also seems to have disappeared from the radar.

Any help gratefully accepted.

 

[Red Dragon]

Hi Everyone!

Thank you all for your kind words. Greatly appreciated.

Here's a weekly update on how well people have been doing over at LostCousins.

• 68 new members joined the LostCousins site
• 3,327 new entries have been added and
• 151 relatives have been matched.

All numbers up on last week! The numbers are still sorting themselves out but all moving in the right direction. Since Oct 7th, we've had 704 new members join, that's very impressive Peter, well done.
I'm going to re-install FTAnalyzer today and see how many new people I can load.

Good Luck Everyone!

Here's a graph showing the activity over at the Lost Cousins site.

 

[Red Dragon]

Hi Everyone!

Here's a weekly update on how well people have been doing over at LostCousins.

• 44 new members joined the LostCousins site
• 2,850 new entries have been added and
• 171 relatives have been matched.

A nice set of numbers and we seem to have stabilised. This week my Match Potential went up. Did everyone else's?

Good Luck Everyone!

Here's a graph showing the activity over at the Lost Cousins site.

 

[chrissy1]

That is the problem with referrals - most of my e-mail contact addresses are out of date and sites like Ancestry encourage people to communicate via their site..... We don't do face to face e-mail as much. I had many more contacts when I corresponded via snail mail, but sadly the e-mail addresses I had are now out of date. Even more recent contacts have changed their e-mail addresses. However, I think 2 of my referrals took up the offer.

I have a Facebook account, but have never used it for anything apart from family/friends' communications.....nothing related to family history has ever reached me, but this is the way to reach younger people.

However, Red Dragon's earlier post inspired me to get Family Tree Analyzer up and running. I think I already had about 900 names entered on LC, but decided to incorporate work on tracing missing deceased children's names using the new GRO index with adding names of more distant cousins alive in 1911 to LC. Peter tells me I have added over 400 names this week (possibly nearer 700 now) and I am only about half way through the 1911 list thrown up by FTA.......... 1881 and 1841 will have to wait until after Christmas! FTA is definitely the easy way forward to ensure you work methodically through your cousins.

 

[peter]

Remember that you don't need somebody's email address to use the My Referrals page - if you don't provide an email address you'll be provided with some text that you can copy into a message (or print out and hand to someone when you see them over Christmas).

And you don't need to own a computer to be a LostCousins member - there are some who rely on the computer at their local library.

 

[Tim]

I have added over 400 names this week (possibly nearer 700 now)

I hope you are creating the custom Lost Cousin Fact in your FHS (Family History Software) so that next time you use FTA it only shows you the ones still to add?

 

[chrissy1]

I hope you are creating the custom Lost Cousin Fact in your FHS (Family History Software) so that next time you use FTA it only shows you the ones still to add?

Indeed I am! I followed the excellent idiot's guide to setting up the LC fact on FTM (thank you to whoever wrote that, it really is idiot proof!) and hopefully it will then indicate any outstanding entries. Still working my way through the 1911 list at present and don't dare alter anything until I have finished......but fingers crossed it should work.