Family Historian User Group

Hi,

I have just found out my step fathers parents are not who he said they were on my mother and his Wedding Certificate. His daughter only found this out recently as well, as he had never told anyone that who he passed off as his parents were actually his grandparents. My question is, what is the best way to put this information into FH? I now have a scan of his Canadian Birth Certificate with his proper parents (so job done on that count) but the Wedding Certificate still has different information on it. Is it best to just ignore to Wedding certificate (Parent information) or put a note attached to the wedding stating that the wrong people were on the certificate and who they were.

Don't ignore that information because if you do, sooner or later, someone will come along and say, "Silly fool's missed a whole section off the source!" Worst case scenario, of course, is that someone is you.. (Been there, done that - I've deliberately omitted something and then thought I'd accidentally omitted it!)

So I'd put a note, at the very least, against the wedding event saying who's been put on the certficate but the real truth appears to be that...

Of course, this raises further questions. Was this a one-off recording of his grandparents as his parents? Does this suggest that he was, perhaps, brought up by his GPs? (Plenty of people get to be "granny reared") Or had he had a massive falling out with his his parents just before his wedding? You may never know but you might care to ponder the possibilities - and perhaps you might find it better to add another note against him - perhaps even a note record shared between him, his parents and his grandparents - raising the point that there are unanswered questions of motivation about why the GPs appeared at that point.

Agree - what you put in sources is an accurate record of what the source actually says, and your tree is your current best interpretation of those sources. So record the source fully and accurately, and record the relationship as you now believe it to be, with a note attached to sources that support other interpretations explaining why you believe that to be incorrect.

Adrian

There's a whole can of worms been opened with this information. Second marriages, probable murder and a few other things, but that is for his daughter to deal with at the moment. I do know he came back from Canada with his grandparents when he was very young, so he may have saw them as his parents (much like lots of adopted children do). I don't know at exactly what age he returned, but he may not even have known his parents and he definitely never kept in contact with them.

I had planned to put the information into a note in the marriage event but just thought I would check other peoples views on it. I more wondered the best way to do it. If I used a DEA to add the information, would I put the wrong parents in then put a note in stating they were his grandparents or should I leave them off the information in the DEA and just add a note under this stating the reason for not putting them in?

On a slightly different topic but still fits in with the Subject. What to do about spelling mistakes on certificates, I have just noticed that my wife's fathers middle name is spelt wrong on her birth certificate. Is that just a case of ignore it or put it in as written and put a note in about the spelling mistake. It is only an E instead of an A. I am sure there are many mistakes like this on certificates, I was just wondering the best way to deal with them.

Re the DEA, you'd put them in as 'Name Only' so that they only appeared in the Source from Text (no records created for them, but an accurate record of what the Source said) and add a note (I'd add it to the fact, myself) explaining what you've described here.

Thanks Helen that makes perfect sense. I edited my post have you a view on the other part?

Ditto my last comment - record the source exactly as stated, and the name as what you believe to be the "normal" spelling (or set up an alternative name if the same variant occurs frequently). That is a minor but manageable disadvantage of mechanical tools such as AS or DEAs - you don't always want exactly the same text in the source and the record.

It rather begs the question of "what is the correct name?". IMO, there is no single source that is definitively correct for names. Legally, that may not be strictly correct, but I'm talking about our interpretation of how we record it in our hobby, not creating legal documents.

Mark

The spelling of his middle name (his mothers maiden name) has been the same for the two centuries I have been able to track them back, so I am quite sure the spelling on my wife's birth certificate is wrong. I think the problem was that her mother registered the birth and wasn't quite sure about the spelling of her newish husbands middle name

Text from Source should (IMO) be exactly what is said on the Source , spelling mistakes and all. In the DEA, enter the name as its spelled in the source, and choose the appropriate record. The name on the record won't be changed; and the name in TfS will be a link to that record.

P.S. My DEAs will always prompt before changing the name on an existing record, so that you can bypass the change if you wish -- ditto changing the details on any existing fact.

Thanks for that Helen & Mark

ColeValleyGirl wrote: ↑

12 Feb 2022 09:33

Text from Source should (IMO) be exactly what is said on the Source, spelling mistakes and all. ...

Agreed - but I'd perhaps add in things like "[sic]" to highlight an "error" (whatever that means!) and possibly put the "normal" spelling or any other interpolations into the Text From Source in [square brackets] or <angle brackets> to show that it's an interpolation (choose according to your recognised transcription standards).

But, but, but... I don't use AncestralSources nor DEAs so I can wing it on each occasion as I see fit.

I would tend to put the normal spelling or other interpretations in the Source/Citation Note rather than interspersed in the Text from Source that I feel should be as far as is reasonable a literal transcript.

With FH V7 Rich Text you could add superscript digits in the Text from Source that cross-refer to numbered Notes.

tatewise wrote: ↑

12 Feb 2022 12:52

With FH V7 Rich Text you could add superscript digits in the Text from Source that cross-refer to numbered Notes.

Well there's a sentence I never thought I would read in a genealogy software forum , in other words "what does all of that mean?

I'm not sure which parts you don't understand so I'll try and cover everything.

1. In each Source record and also in each Citation, there is a Text from Source field on the Text from Source tab.
   Also, they each have a Notes field on the Notes tab.
   IMO the Text from Source field should hold a literal source transcript and the Notes field should hold explanatory notes.
2. Click on the [...] button on the right of Text from Source or Notes fields to open the Rich Text editor window.
   That supports word-processor style editing such as bold, italic, colours, lists, tables, etc, etc...
3. I was suggesting that rather than embed explanatory notes in the transcript they should be in the Notes field.
   So the Text from Source transcript needs to identify by cross-reference which text has explanatory notes.
   I thought that superscripts could be used in the same way that Citations are referenced from facts in Reports.
   Unfortunately, superscripts are not supported, but a [[#Note ]] hashtag can be used instead.
4. So in the Text from Source Rich Text editor, put the cursor where an explanatory note applies.
   Click the Add Hashtag > Add #Note option via the penultimate icon in the toolbar.
   Then edit [[#Note ]] to have a number such as [[#Note 1]].
   The double square brackets allow the hashtag to be omitted from Reports if you wish.
5. In the Notes Rich Text editor type Note 1: followed by the explanatory note for the transcript text chosen above.
6. Repeat the last two steps for each section of transcript text that needs an explanatory note.

All that from one line, no wonder I didn't understand it and you managed to put a red herring in there as well.

Not sure I fully understand it all, but that's not a trouble. Thanks Mike