Genealogy Chat

hi im trying to decide which source of info to lean towards? I have found info today on my gg grandfather, both from the census's on ancestry and birth/christening records on family search (latter day saints) The census's give his year of birth as 1844, but lds says 1841. then i found christening records on family search, which has 3 george palings christened in the area he was born, 1 in 1837 and 1 in 1840 - they have the same parents - as each other not as my ggf. would parents name 2 sons the same name, especially born so close together? im wondering if that could be two entries for the same person with confused dates? the other george was christened in 1844, which was the year the ancestry census says he was born. so i am confused as to which might be the right one. any advice appreciated

The parents would often use a name again especially if the first child died in infancy as many did. See if you can find any corresponding death of the earlier child. KIM

You cannot rely on the info in the IGI at all. Use it as a guide and look at parish registers. You can usually order these (as microfilms) at your local LDS centre.

Julie, Most likely is first suggestion, i have lots of children with the same names and it is normally always as first same named child died in infancy especially if same named parents, i had an instance where didn't have parents names for one child so assumed from dates and locations was brother but have since found out was a cousin so always bear these facts in mind! zoë

You can't rely on census ages either. Many of these people had no formal schooling. In fact there's hardly anything on censuses that you can RELY on except perhaps occupation. Names, birth year and place of birth can all vary from census to census. Fun innit?

I have a family with three Marys - only the third survived! Sue