Barking up a wrong tree

When researching on ancestry.co.uk I was pleased to see a tip appear of someone also researching my Aunt Winifred. I clicked on the link and found their tree on public view. The researcher had married my aunt off to the wrong person so, as the start of the tree wasn’t right, all of the research the person had done was wrong.

I contacted the researcher through Ancestry explaining that unfortunately they had researched the wrong Winifred and who my aunt had actually married and when, so that they could double check. I suggested that they send off for the marriage certificate of their male relation to get the name of his wife and her father’s name, so enabling them to find the right family. The person replied saying they would check with their relation who had met Winifred. To this day the researcher still has my family on their incorrect family tree on public view. We can all make mistakes in early-years research when records are scarce and difficult to read, but in more recent times after 1837 it is easy to get your facts straight through sending for certificates, so saving yourself time and making sure you’re on the right track.

I contacted Ancestry to see if there was a policy of getting people to remove information that wasn’t correct, but there isn’t, which seems odd as these are tips that are meant to help other researchers.

I find it very annoying and dare I say upsetting to see my beloved aunt married off to the wrong person. As a very forceful lady and matriarch of the family she would be turning in her grave. It’s a bit like identity theft. Have any of your readers had a similar experience? How did they handle it? Editor replies: This is a common problem. How do other readers feel about errors on related family trees?