Incorrect Trees

I am today finally reading your September 2018 magazine and came across C Glenn’s letter regarding mistakes in other people’s trees.

Over the years I have found a large number of people copying my family tree and then adding wrong details. It has made me so angry at times. In the past I was able to send a notification to these people about their wrong additions to their trees (although I have yet to find any of them altering their tree as I suggested). But, unfortunately, I am not able to do this any more, as I access Ancestry from my local library and that version [Ancestry Library Edition] does not provide an option to contact people.

One person even had her relative’s wedding photo added to my husband’s aunt’s records. When his aunt’s daughter came to do her family research she thought her mother must have had another marriage!

Anyway, it was upsetting me so greatly that I had to give up looking at the family trees. In fact, I gave up my research at the library altogether.

I have spent a small fortune

buying the relevant certificates to prove my ancestors were mine, and yet these people do not seem to know how to find a birth or marriage record. Most do not seem to know where any of the counties of England and Wales are, especially Wales. Are people so ignorant that they do not know how to look at a map? I thought that people were supposed to be so computer savvy these days and know all about looking up information on Google.

When I started researching there was no computer information and only the 1851 census to see, and as for Welsh information there was only a small amount for North Wales – when I wanted South Wales. I had to spend long hours looking at microfiche at the Mormon church and then at births, marriages and deaths on microfiche at the library. I made umpteen pages of lists of people I thought may be mine, and paid for certificates. I have a large bagful which are nothing to do with my trees.

Joan Windust, by email

EDITOR REPLIES: Teaching people how to avoid mistakes in their tree is what we’re all about Joan.