Genealogy Chat

You would think that having an unusual name it would help with the searching! Well it does ........ sometimes; and sometimes it goes horribly wrong! My grandfather's name was Henry Alfred Garibaldi Frasi. I eventually found him transcribed as "Henry Alfred Gardaldi Truse"! The surname Frasi is also regularly mistranscribed as Frase; Frast; Trast; and Frosi.

Maggie thats tooooo good!!!! Duncan

I just found a possible relation instead of birth in Folkestone they have put Tollietone?! Bet it smelt there. KIM

Enumerators bad handwriting leads to loss of HEIR!

Last night I found my gr grandparents on 1901 census, when I first started looking we were not able to search via address, which I am fortunate to know. Found them via the address, and the y inthe surname was transcribed as u, I could see why it was transcribed as u, if you didn't happen to know, the same could happen to any other letter like g. Val

took me months to find my g grandfather, Edward Chapman on the 1851, he was down as Edward Chepaca!! ah happy searching Eileen

I've just found my great-g-g grandmother who was born in Jersey, Gorey on 1901 census, born in Surrey,England on the 1881 website- could send you completely up the wrong branch couldn't it. Kim

On the 1881 census, Louis was transcribed as Lus, Agnes as Avril, and her sister Madeline as Mabobolin. Their surname was Baggott, but it's amazing how many permetations of that name there are!

The 1881 census on LDS is pretty awful, I've got rellies on there described as husband aged 78, wife aged 65 and daughter aged 4. And I've lost count of the number of pages where the county of Essex has been transcribed as Sussex. Oh, and on 1901 Annie down as Amie, that's a good one to watch out for as it would be an easy mistake to make in transcribing.

Hi After reading all your comments I must add mine. I recently sent for a part of the 1861 census to transcribe. Some parts are legible, however some enumerators have written right on the line and in small writing. After hours of zooming in and zooming out to try and transcribe correctly it can still be a matter of hit & miss. There are blotches all over some of the pages. As for the ages, on the census sheets I am doing, they have scored two lines through the ages, this makes it extremely difficult to read and in some cases you just have to give up and put ?. Therefore I suggest you try all possibilities when looking and if you know you've found an error please contact the relevant site.

I found one rellie down as a daughter, 31, scholar. I looked at the actual image and it is difficult to know whether it says 31 or 11, but surely a little thought the transcriber would realise that 11 was more likely? Speaking of Ls and Ss, I would also suggest trying 'T' as well. My (Ma)Tilda was written down as Lilda.

On the 1901 , mys siter was looking for one of her hubbies relies and did find him ,,but his occupation was given as peeping tom,!! When she looked at the original it learly says ,'fisherman' I think that those who transcribed the 1901 had a little fun ..

My GAU family has been in as Gall, Gaw, Gan, San, Gore, Gay and Meriwether (erm?). What's more amazing is that May Pearce (how can you go wrong with that?) turned up as Mary Pease. Ah well, just wait till they try to find me in 200 years time (I've changed my name 3 times!) happy christmas one and all A

couldn't find my INGRAMS in 1901 anywhere. Then one day in the libary was looking at the fiche for 1901(only street indexed!!) was looking for another part of the family and thought i'd see if they were in the same road as they were in 1891 and lo and behold are my Ingrams. Very Clearly Ingrams as well. When I got home I searched again usiong just christian names and found them Under Lugram!!! And thats modern transcribing for you!!! Shelli

on the 1891 census image on ansestry . com my great grandads name clearly says Caudwell, his name but they have it indexed as Candwell, i thing they need there glasses looking at, took me ages to find him due to this error on there part.

If you are looking for a name or district in 1901 census that begins with L, try looking under S, we found a Lea transcribed as Sea. Val

Thanx to Ann.y for finding my Strouvelles,they have been recorded as Strowelle,Stronvelle and Stromwelle, and no doubt more permutations yet becuase I'm still looking for some. I think it is all part of a plot to confuse us!!! mind you can't say my writing would be brilliant if you had to do that all day! BYE & MERRRY XMAS. Got to do ironing today otherwise have tosleep in the basket. KIM

I had a similar problem on the 1901 census. I found an Eleanor, son, nursery hand - which should have read Ebenezer, son, nursery hand. I suppose the "son" was taken as a mistake and the "nursery hand" thought of as a childminder instead of a gardener. I did report the error and it was acknowledged, so hopefully corrected. There must be so many mistakes because of difficulty in understanding old writing, and some of the earlier censuses were written in pencil and practically erased. I did read somewhere that the women enumerators wrote more clearly than the men (no offence meant)!! Kathy

Thanks to a scrawly handwritten Census I have lost a few hairs due to pulling them out! Whilst trying to find one of my Rels on the 91 Census (Ggd) everything was coming up Negative I also asked Claire Taylor for help (thanks Claire) with the same result. I did eventually find him (How?) I changed a letter in his surname and Presto! got him. On looking at the Census (I was looking for the Surname Baxby) it does actually say Baxby but whoever read it read the Handwriting as BARBY and that is why he wasn't showing up. Anybody else who has got to a similar halt try a bit of lateral thinking!! Happy Christmas everyone (it is now i've found my Ggd!) Duncan