Newsletter
- 25th April 2013
Come
to our 9th Birthday party
Bring
your friends and relatives
Save on
DNA tests ENDS TUESDAY
Tracing
your ancestors through death records
Who
will inherit your online accounts?
Online
archives of the Imperial War Museum
War
memorial to be corrected after nearly a century
Searching
for living relatives
Door to
door challenge: solution
The LostCousins newsletter is
usually published fortnightly. To access the previous newsletter (dated 8 April
2013) click here, for an index to articles
from 2009-10 click here, for
a list of articles from 2011 click here and for a
list of articles from 2012-13 click here.
Whenever possible links are
included to the websites or articles mentioned in the newsletter (they are
highlighted in blue or purple and underlined,
so you can't miss them).For your convenience, when you click on a link a new
browser window or tab will open (so that you don’t lose your place in the
newsletter) - if nothing seems to happen then you need to enable pop-ups in
your browser or change the settings In your security software.
To go to the main LostCousins
website click the logo at the top of this newsletter. If you're not already a
member, do join - it's FREE, and you'll get an email to alert you whenever
there's a new edition of this newsletter available!
Come to our 9th
Birthday party
On 1st May LostCousins will be 9 years
old! It will be 9 years to the day since I stood outside the Royal
Horticultural Halls in Westminster handing out leaflets to people queuing for
the Society of Genealogist's Annual show.
From now until Monday 6th May the
LostCousins site will be COMPLETELY FREE. This means that whether you're a
subscriber or not you'll be able to contact any relatives who are currently
waiting in the New Contacts section
of your My Cousins page PLUS any new
relatives you find between now and 6th May.
To join in the fun simply complete your My Ancestors page by entering as many as
possible of the relatives you can find on the 1881 Census - whether they were
living in England & Wales, Scotland, or Canada. Remember that whilst it's
natural to start by entering your direct ancestors and their households, it's
the members of their extended
families who are most likely to be the link to your 'lost cousins'.
Tip:
if you take the total number of relatives on your family tree and divide by 5
this gives you a quick estimate of how many of them would have been alive in
1881.
Bring your friends and
relatives
It'll be an even better party if
everyone brings their friends and relatives - and there will be loads more
opportunities to find 'lost cousins'. By far the easiest way to invite other
researchers to join is through your My
Referrals page - and you don't even have to provide the email addresses of
your friends and relatives, though if you do I guarantee they won't be misused.
Tip:
when you invite a cousin using your My Referral page you can do them a favour
by indicating the relatives on your My Ancestors page that your cousin shares -
they'll automatically be copied to your cousin's My Ancestors page!
Family Tree DNA,
the testing company chosen by most family historians, is offering heavily
discounted prices - but only until Tuesday 30th April.
For example, a 37-marker Y-DNA test to
trace your direct paternal line costs just $119 - about £80. For comparison,
British-based Oxford Ancestors charge an eye-watering £199 for a 15-marker
test!
Family Tree DNA is the company I've
chosen for my DNA tests, and the one that I've recommended to my own relatives.
It isn't just about price - because they have the largest genealogical DNA
database on the planet you're likely to get more matches.
To remind yourself how DNA tests can
help you with your 'brick walls' see my articles here
and here.
Thank you for the many, many messages of
support I have received since publishing my letter to
the Home Secretary and the rather unhelpful reply from the Communications
Manager at the GRO.
It transpired that the response from the
GRO was even more unhelpful than I realised when I was writing my last
newsletter - an eagle-eyed LostCousins member led me to two online documents,
published just before Christmas, in which the Home Office set out their Digital
Strategy. Surely the GRO must be aware of those documents, and if so why
did they not mention them in the letter (especially since the provision of copy
birth, marriage, and death certificates for family historians is listed in the
documents as one of the most significant services - in terms of volume -
provided by the Home Office)?
Reading those documents it was clear
that whilst the GRO may be happy to remain marooned in the 19th century, the
Home Office intends to get up to date - and fast.
A few quotes will demonstrate the wide
gulf between the GRO and their masters, starting with this one from the Civil
Service Reform Plan:
- Central government where possible must become a
digital organisation. These days the best service organisations deliver
online everything that can be delivered online. This cuts their costs
dramatically and allows access to information and services at times and in
ways convenient to the users rather than the providers.
Note those final words "convenient to the users rather than
the providers" - what a change that would be! The Home Office
documents go on to outline some of the benefits from going digital:
- a better relationship with citizens who can
freely contribute to policy making and influence service-design
- well designed
services that are quicker and more convenient for users - GDS research
shows redesigned services are 18% easier and one third quicker to use than
previous versions
- high quality published information that evolves
in response to citizen feedback
- cost savings
and increased efficiencies generated over time as the shift to digital
channels enables us to scale back face-to-face services, eliminate
paper-based services and reduce the cost of mistakes.
I couldn't have said it better myself.
However it isn't all good news, because the Home Office seem to have swallowed
the GRO's line when it comes to the legislation governing the issue of
certificates:
There
are a range of legislative/practical barriers currently preventing the Home Office
from implementing fully end-to-end digital delivery systems. These include:
- Digital certificates where current legislation
requires orders for civil registration certificates (births, marriages,
deaths) to be provided in paper format. This is a key barrier to
maximising the benefits from digitised records and online access to
records. IPS customer insight reveals that the majority of customers
ordering certificates for family history purposes would prefer to receive
electronic versions.
As another astute LostCousins member
pointed out, the legislation might refer to certified copies, but it certainly doesn't
specify that they must be paper copies - it seems the GRO has never heard of
digital certificates (even though the HM Revenue & Customs has for over a
year required most companies to submit their tax returns in a PDF file with a
digital certificate).
What should we do next? A lot of members
suggested that a petition might be the answer - but given that the Home Office
themselves are already headed down the right route there doesn't seem to be
much point (and previous petitions have struggled to get a meaningful number of
votes, even though one in particular was widely-publicised).
Surely what we really need to do is
ensure is that the needs of family historians are fully taken into account -
not just the need for a faster and cheaper service, but also the need for
better indexing so that we can more easily identify which entries relate to our
ancestors? For example, shouldn't it be possible to search for all the births
where the father's name is John Smith and the mother is Mary Smith formerly
Brown?
The
Civil Registration system was never designed with the interests of family
historians in mind. Did you know that in the 21st century there are as many
copy certificates issued in a SINGLE year as there were in the ENTIRE 19th
century!
Although the
certificate system isn't one of the
three areas prioritised by the Home Office, that's probably a good thing -
because it gives the GRO time to consult with users. There have been consultations in the past, of course
- but in those days the GRO very definitely had the upper hand. Now that the
Home Office has recognised the importance of "citizens who can freely contribute to policy making and influence
service-design" and "well
designed services that are quicker and more convenient for users" I rather think
that the boot is on the other foot!
If the GRO are right in their assertion
that there can be "no digitisation without legislation" then let us
make sure that the legislation - when it comes - strikes an appropriate balance
between the rights of living individuals to privacy and the needs of family
historian like ourselves.
As you probably know, over the past few
months I've been working with a group of volunteers to create an online forum.
In view of the importance of certificates to our research I propose that we
have a dedicated area within the forum where we can discuss the GRO and the
certificate issue.
If you would be interested in taking
part in those discussions please indicate your interest in the forum by
clicking the appropriate box on your My
Details page, ie:
I'm sure that most readers of this
newsletter have used Google Books and
the Internet Archive to search for out of
copyright books related to genealogy, but until Brian wrote to me this month I
hadn't heard of HathiTrust.
HathiTrust is a partnership between
major libraries around the world, and 3 million of the 10 million digitised
volumes are out of copyright. A quick search led me to two of the three volumes
of statistics published after the 1831
Census, and whilst I later discovered they're also on Google Books, the
fact is I'd never found them there. (Volume 1 can be found at the HistPop
site, and invaluable source for census data.)
London Gardens Online has an
enormous amount of information about parks, gardens, churchyards and cemeteries
in the Greater London area - there are over 2500 locations.
Walter Harrison was born in 1921 on a
coal barge on the Grand Union Canal. It was therefore fitting that when he died
this year aged 91, his coffin was carried on a canal barge to his funeral and
then to his final resting place. See this BBC article
for photographs - what a way to go!
Tracing your
ancestors through death records
Celia Heritage, author, lecturer, professional
genealogist - and LostCousins member - will be running a one day course entitled Tracing your ancestors through death records at Canterbury Christ Church
University in Chatham, Kent on Saturday 11th May. As a fellow LostCousins
member you can book a place on the course for just £27 (normal price £37).
You'll find full details here.
If you want to attend the course please email Celia as soon as possible since
at this price the course is likely to sell out quickly (like the half-day
course that Celia is running at the Society of Genealogists this weekend).
Tip:
why not use the £10 you've saved on a copy of Celia's latest book (you'll find
it here)?
I'll be reviewing Celia's book in a future newsletter.
Who will inherit your
online accounts?
Sally wrote to tell me about Google's
plans to make life - or rather death - that little bit easier, by allowing
the holders of Google accounts to decide what should happen to them when
they're no longer around.
It's certainly something that we all
need to think about - let's face it, we're not going
to be around for ever. Mind you, they say the two things that are inevitable in
life are death and taxes, and since Google has managed to avoid paying more
than a token amount of UK Corporation Tax (see this BBC article), it wouldn't
surprise me if they're working on avoiding death as well, particularly since
the wife of one of the Google founders runs a DNA company!
But what I found most interesting about
the announcement is that Google are 8 years behind LostCousins in identifying
the problem - since 2005 it has been possible to enter on your My Details page the email address of the
person you would like to inherit your LostCousins account.
That said, 90%
of the readers of this newsletter haven't
completed that box. Maybe you should?
Online archives of the
Imperial War Museum
The Imperial War Museum has over 33,000
audio recordings related to combat since 1914, almost half of them related to
the First World War - for example, I stumbled across this recording of
old soldiers talking about life in the trenches, and these reminiscences
of a nurse who worked with Edith
Cavell, who was shot by a German firing squad in 1915 after helping scores
of soldiers to escape from occupied Belgium.
But that's not all - there are thousands
of images, such as these World War 2 identity
cards and the World War 1 army manuals
that belonged to Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII). There are
wartime posters, photographs of escape equipment used by prisoners of war -
it's an Aladdin's Cave.
There are currently 28 podcasts at the First World War Centenary site that is run by
the Imperial War Museum, and the same podcasts are available free from iTunes.
War memorial to be
corrected after nearly a century
Private George Samuel died fighting for
his country in 1916, but when his name was added to the war memorial in Shepreth, Cambridgeshire his surname was recorded as
'Samuels'. But 97 years after he fell in combat his great-niece has finally
managed to persuade the local council to correct the error (see this BBC News article
for more details).
I've written many times about the big
savings that can be made by switching your Ancestry subscription to a different
site, but I get so many emails asking for more details that I'm going to run
over them once more.
Here are the facts: Ancestry offers a Worldwide subscription through all of its sites, but the
cost varies enormously from one site to another - this partly reflects changes
in exchange rates since the prices were fixed, but some of the differences are
too large to be explained entirely by currency movements.
Even if you don't need a Worldwide subscription you might still be able to save money
by switching. You might even be able to get a better (or more appropriate)
subscription and save money.
Which Ancestry site is the cheapest?
There's a hint in the title of this article! All of the sites
that charge in dollars - whether US, Canadian, or Australian - are considerably
more expensive than the UK site. Look how little you would pay at
Ancestry.co.uk!
Note: the published price of a Worldwide subscription on Ancestry's UK website is £155.40,
but that includes UK taxes. So long as you live outside the European Union
you'll pay £135.13, as shown in the screenshot above - the actual price will,
of course, be displayed before you complete your purchase.
At today's exchange rate that price
equates to $201 (Australian), $207 (US), or $212 (Canadian), which is a substantial
saving compared to the price you'd pay for exactly the same subscription
(though with a slightly different name) at Ancestry.com.au, Ancestry.com, or
Ancestry.ca! And although it says 'Initial Annual Membership Fee' it isn't a
special offer price - renewals are charged at the same rate.
There are four simple steps to take:
(1) Cancel your existing subscription - do it now, even if
it isn't due to expire for some time (you'll still get the time you've paid
for). That way there's no risk that you might forget to cancel nearer the time.
In most cases you'll be able to cancel your subscription online, simply by
going to My Account.
(2) Wait until your existing
subscription has expired - otherwise you won't be able to switch sites. Then
when you're ready to take out a new subscription* click here
to go to Ancestry.co.uk (note: if you use that link LostCousins may receive some
commission - if you don't we won't).
(3) Don't re-register. Simply log-in
using your existing user name and password - that way you won't lose anything
(and you can even continue using the same site to access Ancestry's records if
you prefer).
* when my
subscription runs out I can often manage for a week or two without renewing, so
that's a way to save even more!
You can still save money if you don't
currently have a Worldwide subscription - for example,
the cost of a UK Heritage Plus subscription at Ancestry.com.au is $215.40 which
is more than you'd pay for a Worldwide subscription at Ancestry.co.uk!
Tip:
if you want to share this tip with friends or relatives please send them a link
to this newsletter - that way you'll be supporting LostCousins and its members.
Searching for
living relatives
I've had quite a number of emails from
members who have been unable to find the 'Living Relatives' search at
findmypast.co.uk
This link
will take you to the right part of the website - this link
will take direct to the Search page.
Tip:
if you click a findmypast link in my newsletter and you end up on their home
page rather than the page you expected - it's not my fault, it's a 'feature' of
the findmypast site. Simply click the link a second time, and then you will
get to your intended destination.
Door to door challenge:
solution
This was a fascinating puzzle because
there were only two possible answers, and everyone who entered was absolutely
convinced that whichever answer they had chosen was the right one.
Here's the puzzle again, in case you
missed it:
Imagine
that you're a contestant on a TV game show and have to pick one of three doors,
in the knowledge that only one of them conceals a prize. When you've made your
selection the host (who knows where the prize is hidden) opens one of the other
two doors to show that there's nothing behind it - and then gives you the
option of staying with your original choice, or switching to the remaining
closed door.
What
should you do, and why?
I should perhaps have stressed that this
is a regular occurrence on the show - the host always makes the same offer
whether or not you have chosen correctly, and he always opens a door that has
nothing behind it.
Solution
You should switch doors - this doubles
your chances of winning! But why?
Let's suppose that you were allowed to
choose 2 doors instead of 1 - then you'd clearly have 2 chances in 3 of winning
the prize. Would those odds change if the host opened one of your doors and demonstrated
that there was nothing behind it? Of course not - as there's only one prize, it
clearly can't be behind both doors. So
at this point the chance that the other door you chose is the one that leads to
the prize must be 2 in 3.
In other words, switching doors puts you
in the same highly advantageous position as someone who was allowed to choose 2
doors in the first place. You're not guaranteed to win, but you have doubled
your chances.
The winner of the prize (a one-year
LostCousins subscription) is Mark Hepinstall, who
provided the most convincing solution. I have a feeling that he's going to
discover lots of new cousins over the coming year!
If you're wondering why I posed a
statistical puzzle it's because in researching our family trees we often have
to make judgments based upon statistics. For example, if you search the IGI for
your ancestor's baptism and find only one that fits, you need to be able to
assess how likely it is that the register entry you've found is the right one.
If 90% of the baptisms for that period are in the index, then clearly it's quite
likely you've found the right entry - but if only 10% are in the index then
it's far less likely.
Often it isn't clear how many entries
there are in a particular dataset - not all websites provide this sort of
information. When that happens I tend to use the 'Smith Test', a test I
developed myself, but which usually gives remarkably accurate answers. It's
very simple - I search the dataset for people with the surname Smith, then multiply the number of results by 50 and by 100. The total
number of entries in the dataset is usually somewhere in between.
Tip:
make sure that the results you get all relate to people called Smith (tick the
exact matches only box, or equivalent).
I'll be giving more examples of how
statistics and probability can aid your research in future newsletters.
My earlier article describes how
overseas readers can save on Ancestry subscriptions - but what if you live in
the UK? In this case the cheapest way to get a subscription is to buy Family
Tree Maker 2011 Platinum at around £25 because, even if you put the program
in the recycling, you're getting a 6 month Ancestry subscription for less than a
quarter of the price they normally charge for a 12 month subscription. In other
words, you're saving over 50% and getting a free program.
There seems to be no limit to how many
copies you can buy and how many free 'trials' you can claim, but it's worth
noting that the price of Family
Tree Maker 2012 Platinum has dropped at Amazon
to just £30. It's also worth checking eBay since the price there may be even cheaper.
This where any late
updates will be posted, so it's worth checking back after a few days.
I hope you've found this newsletter
interesting and that you'll make full use of your membership of my site to link
with the cousins you don't yet know (your 'lost cousins'). After all, that's
what LostCousins is all about!
Peter Calver
Founder, LostCousins
© Copyright 2013 Peter Calver
You
MAY link to this newsletter or email a link to your friends and relatives
without asking for permission in advance. I have included bookmarks so you can
link to a specific article: right-click on the relevant entry in the table of
contents at the beginning of the newsletter to copy the link.
Please
DO NOT re-publish any part of this newsletter, other
than the list of contents at the beginning, without permission - either on your
own website, in an email, on paper, or in any other format. It is better for
all concerned to provide a link as suggested above, not least because articles
are often updated.