Genealogy Chat

But you can only correct names, not birthplaces etc. V annoying as if you pick any page from the index there are bound to be at least 3 errors which anyone with a basic knowledge of geography can see. In fact only yesterday I found that I had a relative born Cambridge in Surrey. The actual entry just says Cambridge. If I'd been searching by county I wouldn't have found it. nell

Caroline....on the first page where you see all of the info about the person that you were searching for and the list of other family members at the bottom, if you look at the top right of the page there is a link that says something like 'Correct or amend name details', you can make any changes that you know are wrong there. Christina....it is a William Honeybourne that I am looking for born c1804, his birthplace is given as Wayworth (presume Weymouth?) Dorset, Hertfordshire and the United States, depending on which census you look at. The correction was made by MBenedict61 if I remember correctly.

Who, Sue? My lot are all from Kent and I have done many corrections on Ancestry. Christina

Does this mean then when you find something that you KNOW is wrong on the census you can ask for it to be put right? Sorry I don't really know too much about it....it is just I have found several errors that took me ages to find the right record and if I thought I could save some other poor soul some hours I would be happy to do so!

I thought I'd read that on here before Pippa, but I couldn't for the life of me see how to do it. I suppose it could well have been someone who just saw that the name couldn't possibly have been right. We all live in hopes though that someone just might have another step for us that can be proved and set us on our way again. Until then, I'll search every now and again......just in case.

On ancestry they have a new service where you can contact people that have been searching the same records as you.

Have to agree with Christine. I put corrections on Ancestry that are not the family that I am researching but ones that I have found while searching for GR members. Maureen

It may not be someone with a connection to your family. When I'm searching for my own stuff, or on behalf of someone else, I often see names which appear to be wrong. When I do, I look at the image, and (if I can work out an improvement) I post a correction. It doesn't mean the family has anything to do with me, just that I reckon I can save someone else a headache if I get silly errors put right. For instance, I saw ''Jelina Bennett'' today. I can't even recall which census it was, but I had a look, and it was obviously Selina, so I put in a correction report. Christine

I know, you're right, but this guy has caused me so many problems and the thought that someone may have the answers is really galling. Sorry to hear about your problems, that must be even more frustrating. I'll try to be patient (but I'm not good at that). Sue

But Sue, there may be hundreds of people searching for the same names as you - who haven't needed or bothered to make corrections. You just didn't know about them. Frustrating, but that's life! After all I know that the answers to lots of my family mysteries are in the certs somewhere, if I had the time and patience to go though the indexes. What is more frustrating is when you know that the records you need have been destroyed :-(((

Just having yet another look for an ancestor that I am stuck on whose name has now been corrected in Ancestry. I had seen the mistake but at the time didn't know how to get it corrected. Whoever posted the correction (in June 06) must surely be looking at the same family but there's no way to contact them.......Grrrrrrrrr