Cousins and Forebears

Last night a first cousin once removed telephoned me at the instigation of one of my first cousins to further my researches into my father's family.  G.C. is only five years older than me although he is a different generation but he doesn't have a computer so telephone and snail-mail are going to be the only way to communicate.  I have only ever met him once many, many years ago but remember it, probably because he was near my own age and that is important to a teenager.  Anyway, he has contacted another of our cousins and obtained her email address for me so that I can clarify her siblings  -  a big gap in my contemporary tree.

I now have the bit firmly between my teeth and have discovered, in the 1851 census, the family of my great great great great grandfather, his wife and his children including my great great great grandmother.  She stayed behind in England after her marriage and followed her husband to South Australia about five years later; in the census she is shown with her married name in her father's house so I know that it is the right family of Smiths (her maiden name).  Yeah!

I have had no luck tracing her husband's family back further than his father; there are too many people in England with the same name and I have no idea where in England they lived.  But more and more information is coming online all the time  -  I didn't think that I would ever be able to find Benjamin Smith in the whole of England and I did.

This research back into the mists of time doesn't affect the two cousins whom I met last week.  Our family trees meet with my great grandmother and I am now researching my great grandfather's forebears but whereas my W. cousins have researched the distaff side no-one seems to have researched the male line and what actually is already in Ancestry.com is wrong and very muddled, so it is worthless to me.  It is worrying that Ancestry.com allows so much mis-information from unchecked sources.  That may be why the erroneous tree is no longer active and I cannot access the owner to correct his/her information.

Today is Opening Day at the RFBYC which I overlook from my apartment and the yachts are gathering.  The weather forecast is for gale-force winds and thunder.  At the moment it is dead calm, hot and humid; it certainly feels ominous.  I have a birds-eye view and will be watching the proceedings with interest.