Genealogy Chat

Richard LOL! All this just goes to show, in my opinion anyway, how 'dodgy' the royal line of succession is, and how much chance, or contemporary events has shaped something we see as set in stone. I meant really, that the illegitimate children of Kings are at least acknowledged (usually) and given high rank, whereas the illegitimate child of a Queen is (usually) smuggled out of the bedchamber in a warming pan! So, when dealing with royal connections (or any other connections for that matter) turn up every stone and check the facts for yourself, from as many sources as you can find. OC

'Yes, his mother was highly-born too. However, as things stood at the time, her illegitimate son should not have been heir to the english throne, and her undoubted royal blood should probably not be in our royal line now - certainly not as mixed with the blood of some lowly archer anyway' I don't personally doubt for a minute Edward IV was indeed illigitimate. Wheareas his brother Clarence, Rutland and Richard, especially were all short men who much resembled their father, Edward was a giant of a man, and totally unlike them in build, looks and charachter. Apparantly he did inded very much resemble the 'French Archer' Blaybourne, who Lady Cicely supposedly took to her bed in her husbands absence. (He wasn't actually French he was English based in France..so not that bad!). Also If you look at his grandson Henry VIII he is a dead ringer as a young man for Edward, also large built and glutunous. They both died morbidly obese from their gross over indulgenge. Both notorious womanisers too! In contrast Edwards legitimate brothers and father Richard Duke of York were polar opposites in their charachter, appetites and general demenour, especially the much derided Gloucester, Richard III. So a rogue gene definitly slipped in there somewhere if you ask me... As to whether an illegitmate son to a king would have been better recieved, the irony of course is Henry VIII was in just that position with his son Henry Fitzroy but parliament was having none of it. Unlike a queen he could not pass of an illegitmate offspring as anything other than that illegitimate! I did read somewhere one of his living descendants today is the singer James Blunt, so perhaps a good thing too!

Richard Sorry sorry sorry! I always get mixed up with Edward Longshanks, and Edward 1V, who was supposedly extremely tall too! Yes, his mother was highly-born too. However, as things stood at the time, her illegitimate son should not have been heir to the english throne, and her undoubted royal blood should probably not be in our royal line now - certainly not as mixed with the blood of some lowly archer anyway. But I have made my point - some academics have serious doubts as to his legitimate status, and the 'proof' of his illegitimacy is out there to be found. I am sure that you will concede that the illegitimate offspring of a royal male are generally speaking well-received, whereas the illegitimate offspring of a royal female are not! OC

'The point I made earlier in this thread about having to check even historical 'facts' is a good one, I think. A lone researcher discovered documents which virtually prove that Edward Longshanks was illegitimate and therefore not the rightful heir to the English throne' Is this correct OC? I was unaware there were any legitimacy issues with Edward Longshanks, so would be interested if that is true. A lone researcher did cast considerable doubt on the legitimacy of Edward IV a couple of years back, and there was even a channel four program which claimed to find Britians supposed 'real monarch' living somewhat modestly in Australia! Though the program was quite right it does cast into doubt the line of succesion since, it did fail to mention Lady Cicely Neville, Edwards mother, had a fairly impressive pedigree herself as a grandaughter of John of Gaunt, and great grandaughter of Edward III. So Bastard or not he was still royally descended, and our queen still therefore very much a descendant of the Conquerer in any case. It's also somewhat ironic so much emphases is put on descent from the conquerer, he himself being the only King in English history who was certainly and provenly illegitimate, a fact openly known at the time.

I would agree that it would be difficult for a relative beginner to recognise whether a Tree is genuine or not.Lets say though that those who have been at this for some time should though.Forgive the pun,but its all relative anyway! Regards William Russell Jones Cefn Mawr Wrexham.

William No, it shouldn't detract from the genuine trees, but the problem as always, is in deciding WHICH are the genuine trees. OC

You are quite correct Margaret,as to the time the Royal Surname was changed.However the fact that someone is obviously;'having a laugh',shoudn't detract from all the legitimate Trees. Regards William Russell Jones Cefn Mawr Wrexham.

Looks like the whole of the Royal Family is on GR. (roflmao) They even have Victoria b 1819 as Victoria Windsor. The royal family didnt even change to Windsor until the first world war. What a load of twaddle. One more reason that GR trees are rubbish.

Jessica Sorry, I meant County Records Offices - but that depends where your ancestors were and how important they were at the time. Records could be anywhere. Unfortunately there is no ONE repository for ALL records, although historically important documents are held by the TNA. You just have to follow the trail your ancestors left and see where it takes you. To get a broad idea of which records you could use, look at the TNA website (National Archives). A2A - Access to Archives is also a useful site as it is an INDEX of millions of historical documents and it tells you who holds them and where. If you are descended from an illegitimate royal, then you may have a big problem proving it, although not necessarily, as many Royal illegitimate lines were acknowledged by the King.But if the link is hearsay evidence from some long dead rellie, then it is often a hopeless case - some girl in the 1600s, saying she was taken advantage of by the King isn't necessarily fact! If you are descended from a legitimate line, then all you have to do is PROVE the link, your link, that is, without any question of doubt, and the rest will be easy! OC

I happened to answer someone on this site about two months ago now,who apparently has a Charles,Edward,Anne,Andrew Windsor,born in Buckingham Palace London in their Tree,and as it was put on by someone called Charles;Attaching the reply to the Charles,I said;'Does one know who the Parents of your Charles are?'! Regards William Russell Jones Cefn Mawr Wrexham.

Thanks OC. I think i do have a lot of work ahead of me so it's a good job i enjoy it! When you say the records office do you mean the main one in london? And do they charge you? And things such as wills would these also be kept there? If you have any recommended sites/books please let me know and i would be very grateful. Thanks millions Jess

Jessica Glad to see we havent put you off with our rather negative comments! The classic and accepted method is to start with yourself, and then get every birth marriage and death certificate of your direct line ancestors. If you can flesh these certs out with census entries, Wills etc, then so much the better - every piece of 'evidence' adds weight to your research and helps to confirm it. Once you get back to 1837, then you have to use Parish records, some of which will be online, but ultimately you have to go to the records offices and look at the original parish registers, to prove what you found on line. Pre Parish registers (usually about 1554) you are then in the realms of rarified research, using a wealth (hopefully!) of historical documents, such as manorial records, wills, land transactions, ecclesiastical records and so on. Some of these will be in latin (but not as many as you might think) and all will be in Records Offices or other archival depositories - you have to track them down. And sometimes the records simply run out - there is a black hole in the 1400s, partly because of the result of the Black Death (wiped out at least a tenth of the population, including many landowners, and many records got destroyed in the resulting chaos).You will have to weigh up what you find, because you are very unlikely to find dates of births marriages and death, for instance. The above will take you more than a week or so, lol, and you may very well decide it is not worth the effort. A good question to ask yourself - the tree you have seen, does it quote detailed sources and give extracts from those sources? If it doesnt, then it is rubbish I am afraid, or at least a not proven tree. Happy hunting - sounds like you have a lifetime project ahead of you, lol. OC

Thanks everyone for your replies and there is some great help in there. I have only been doing this for about a year i have have fallen into the trap of using the internet so it is probably likely my infomation is wrong. I think i have made my life a lot more difficult. Some of you mentioned going back through and validating every person. How would i do this? A lot of these ancesters are on my american side so what records can i get hold of? Is it a case of having to make a trip over there and check offices. Also where would i find this info in the uk and is it expensive? Sorry to ask loads of questions but i want to do this properly. Thanks again Jess x

It's true you can't ever be 100% sure of any line you are following. As was said by Janet T the female lines are by far the more reliable if you can trace them. However when we can follow a male line back through parish records, wills and other documents then that is all we can hope for. None of us can be sure that any given father is the actual one even in very recent times! One of my family friends died recently and it has emerged since that he was probably not who he thought he was. It looks very likely that he was unofficially adopted by some family but his actual parentage is a bit of a mystery. Obviously the further back you can get then the more likely you are that some link or other is perhaps not what it seems but if we give up on the male lines because we can never be sure before DNA testing then we might as well give up our family history research. Good hunting Sue

I know that there there is/are a number of Hoyte Tree/Trees going back to the fourteen hundreds emanating from America that is mainly fiction! Whoever has cobbled it/them together has certainly not done any parish register research, but mainly online 'goo' that has been found and cobbled together and tried to make fit. Part of the tree are my own ancestors which I have researched, and the American version is way off beam. How the family gets from Somerset to the USA and then Northants is not at all clearly shown, never mind researched. This tree is certainly not Victorian Research, but internet 'research' rubbish within the last 10 years and I think that many modern day so called family historians are fuelling the internet rubbish a lot faster than used to be done without the internet!! Janet

Being a pedant, unless your research is purely on the female line you cannot be sure. (and even then there may be the odd daughter who passes a child off as her mothers)

That's sad OC. How frustrating! I think there must be a lot of very suspect trees out there on the Internet though. It's a pity some Victorian genealogists were content to fill in gaps with fiction. There are a number of modern ones grasping at straws. Fortunately a lot of modern day genealogists (professional and hobby family historians) are doing their best to sort out puzzles to the best of their abilities. In my own case I found there's a bit of a puzzle a long way back on my tree which confused me for some time. I discovered two different versions in trees on the Internet. I spent weeks writing e-mails and letters to owners of these trees, universities, online forums and even Dover Museum and Dover Castle. Eventually I think I worked out a timeline and genealogy which makes sense based on the best evidence available. I then tried telling various people with the same early ancestry and quite a lot of them weren't bothered one way or the other! I suppose some think that sorting out the correct line from about 900 years ago doesn't make a lot of difference but it irritated me that some versions that must be wrong were being passed on. Best wishes Sue

Susan I can get the Holdens back to 1179, because by sheer luck all the Manorial documents have survived, apart from about 50 years worth in the 1400s. Even that gap can be (rather shakily) bridged by a fortuitous Will, which names Grandfather, father and son. My Great Grandfather, along with many other Victorians, paid to have a family tree drawn up. This goes back seamlessly to William the Conqueror, and the Holdens are descended from a MONK (pmsl) called Haldane, who came over with Willy. Except - I cannot find any documents, let alone proof, to fill in that 120 year gap! It seems far more likely, that the Holdens were already a well-established land owning family long before Willy landed, according to place names I have seen on a map from around 850 (I think). But I have seen this Fantasy Tree regurgitated by a so-called professional researcher, and all my attempts to point out the errors and inconsistencies in the said tree fall on the deaf ears of those who have latched onto it. OC

LOL That could mess up a lot of people's descent from early royalty OC! Fortunately King John had a lot of children by numerous women and most of those with proven medieval links can get back to him several different ways. Then there are people out there (with I reckon rather too much time on their hands!) who seem to compete against each other to find how many different routes they can find back to William the Conqueror from various given notable personages. When done by some of the professionals those can be useful lines to explore. Best wishes Sue

That is a very interesting site, Susan, thankyou for that. Yes, I can accept that many Amercans CAN isolate their English ancestors, simply because of the 'signpost' that immigration provides - as he says on his Site, English people cannot do this in the same way because there has never really been any mass immigration INTO Britain, which has been documented in the same way (although there are exceptions of course). I do still think though, that it is generally as difficult for Americans to prove their ascent from royalty, as it would be for me. They are not party to any more historical information than we are, once you get back into British records, and there is that huge hole in the 1400s to contend with, unless you are extremely lucky. The point I made earlier in this thread about having to check even historical 'facts' is a good one, I think. A lone researcher discovered documents which virtually prove that Edward Longshanks was illegitimate and therefore not the rightful heir to the English throne. It would appear that no other researcher in the last 800 years had bothered to do the sums and work out that his royal 'father' had been absent overseas in battle for 13 months, and no-one had thought to look for his baptismal record either. His baptismal record records no father and there is no mention of him being of royal blood - an absolutely unheard of thing in any royal family. Of course, if you can hook into a more recent royal than Henry11, it could be a lot easier to prove. OC