Genealogy Chat

One of my relatives married a woman who had been married before. I don't want to include details of her first marriage on my tree. Do I enter her under her maiden name or surname at time of marridage or both? How do I do it?
(I use Legacy as well as GR.)

I don't use either of these trees, so hopefully someone better than me will advise. If you don't include the first marriage, then anyone looking at your tree will assume your woman is not theirs if they already know the first marriage. If you use her her surname at the time of marriage then how are you going to explain her parents having a different surname - there people who DON'T know about the first marriage will think they have the wrong person.

You might have a good reason for not including the first marriage, so I must respect that, but if you don't you are restricting the chances of making contact with others with the same family.

If she had children from the first marriage, are you going to exclude them too?

So then it might depend on whether or not you are bothered about making contact with people who know that she was married twice. If not, give her surname on marriage, as that will enable people to trace from there on and forwards. But if you want to go backwards with her family, you will have to give her birth surname.

The recognised way is to always enter women with her maiden name, and show each of the marriages, if more than one. However, you do just what you feel comfortable with.

I would just say, however, only post details on a website that you are happy for others to see, otherwise leave them off altogether.