Finding Families Connected to Your Tree

Increasingly you'll find that other people have one of your ancestors in their tree - for every wife or husband you add into your tree as you discover a marriage, there's the potential that somebody else is researching their family - and this can be a great way to discover more about your own ancestors.

Each time I add new people into my tree I have a quick look to see if they are on the family tree of other people - and, increasingly, they are!  This is great because that means you've the potential to get more clues as to the lifestyle of your own ancestors.

Coming from a long line of agricultural labourers, with women who didn't really have jobs - they were cleaners, or looking after the home/kids and doing general seasonal farm work, I suddenly hit something new!

In looking at my great-great-great-grandmother's siblings, I discovered Alfred Finedon Stokes.  He languished on the tree, untouched, for over a year, until the day I stared at the tree and thought "who today?" and thought I'd have a quick look at the line of siblings.  I discovered that Alfred had children - and they'd married and had children - and there they were .... people doing something different.  Alfred's daughter Eliza Jane Stokes married Mr Charles Thomas Haley Waite.

By this time I was at the stage where people were born in ~1900 and I seem to have tapped into a theatrical connection, actors, actresses and musical hall entertainers.  The person I'd discovered was Ruby Waite, who married a Mr Walter Snelson.  But, Ruby's brother seemed to also be in the entertainment game.  And, the bonus find - somebody else had compiled a page of information about one of their ancestors, with a great publicity photo - and in the photo was Ruby Snelson (nee Waite) aged about 15!

For now they're just sitting on the tree as I need to take time out to investigate that family further, to see who was involved and what they did.  They appear to have become acquainted with the Snelson family, who organised stage entertainments and stage shows, including Shakespeare plays.  As this is a new industry to me that's now on the back burner!  Without spotting the connection, Ruby Waite would've simply sat on the tree as born, married, had children, died.  These discoveries were made possible not with Censuses and Parish Records, but by searching old newspapers online, which I do through Findmypast - that's why I prefer Findmypast to Ancestry, as I find the old newspapers more informative once I've got names on the tree.

Some families have great photo sets, my family haven't fared so well, so I've a shortage of photos of my own.  There's not even a wedding photo for my own parents!  Or my grandparents!  Almost nothing.  On one side I have just two family wedding photos from 1955 containing my grandmother and my great-grandmother - and then she's tiny and sideways on.  On the other side I've a photo of my granny aged about 20 and then aged about 70! The photos I've found of my ancestors' siblings through the efforts and websites of other people has been very exciting!

The Internet is a wonderful place for doing research online and easily tapping into all the further information you need - plus there's the chance you'll have some unexpected photos that drop into your lap!