Dates before 1752 in Forest of Dean Parish RegistTranscripts (General)

by Ralph Cook, Wednesday, December 02, 2009, 14:02 (5545 days ago) @ tjbet

Hi

I agree that for family historians accuracy is important and for those that require it and have the personal resources to meet their criteria for absolute accuracy, transcriptions can only ever be seen as providing a quick and easy guide to which original records they should inspect themselves.

Most of us do not have those luxuries of time and unlimited financial resources. From the outset of my research I was less interested in the precise dates of baptisms, marriages, deaths, addresses etc. than I was in building a picture of the families in my tree and setting them in their historical, economic, geographical and social contexts.

I find it more interesting to know that my ancestors were agricultural labourers, living and working in a particular area, whilst their siblings moved elsewhere or climbed the social ladder than the precise date of their baptisms. Personally I find the search methods available on your site (particularly the opportunities provided by the advanced search facility) superior to anything available elsewhere. I have found people I am looking for on your website by just using an initial, the first two numbers in the century and less than half their surname. It's fantastic and free.

Of the 5,000 people in my tree currently, the families I know know most about are the Haxtons from Edinburgh, thanks to Scotlandspeople online, the Moody's of Gloucestershire, thanks to excellent online transcriptions for North Nibley and the Baileys of Monmouthshire/Forest of Dean thanks to Mike John's excellent site for Monmouthshire and of course your site. For everything else only Ancestry's census collection and IGI have been really helpful because there is nothing to match what you have provided for the areas where my other ancestors and their families originated.

I think you made the right decisions when setting up your search systems and other family history sites could learn from you. Well done, I love you all!

Ralph