* Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

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carbon14mike
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Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by carbon14mike »

Hi

I'm hoping I could avail myself of the forum's experience in resolving a couple of questions I have in relation to, well, best practice I guess.

My tree has hit the 2000 individual mark and I thought it might be a good idea to have a proper review of how I got here, tidying up citations etc. In particular, I'm currently re-entering my early ids using Method 1 for all Baptism, Marriage and Burial records to make everything consistent (I only became aware of how much Ancestral Sources could offer after a few weeks of research and have used it for all supported entries for some time now.)

There are a couple of things I'm unsure about:

1. The use of <whole record> and <name> citations : I'm aware that I should use <name> citations for all entries that have the person's name on it and <whole record> for "proof of existence" but wouldn't the source list be the same for both ? - no matter how I look at it, a source for birth, baptism, marriage, burial, death, census would necessarily need both a <whole record> and name citation ? Is this correct ? Wouldn't that lead to unnecessary duplication ?

2. Place of residence for Parish Baptism records pre-1812 : I, of course, know the baptism Parish but, more often than not, residence is not listed, and just as equally, the mother is often not mentioned. For example, "Baptisms at Acklam 1758 - John the son of Nathan Ward Baptized Apr 9". From other evidence, John's mother was Elizabeth Hollin who married Nathan a few years earlier.

In terms of residence, what is the best way to handle this ? Should I make the (fair) assumption that the Ward family were living in the Parish since I have no other residence information, and add a Residence fact for child and father for that place (but mark Assessment as Secondary ?) or, leave out Residence altogether ? Further, if I assume the family were living in the baptism town, should I also assume that, by inference, mother Elizabeth would also be resident at the town, even though she is not listed at all. That would mean linking the mother's residence fact to a source that does not even show her name.

Maybe I'm overthinking things, but would appreciate advice on this one.

Many thanks.

Mike
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AdrianBruce
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by AdrianBruce »

You're not over-thinking - a little analytical thinking always helps me to get things straight - and usually to reduce what I was tempted to do. Mind you, I did have a career in programming...

Caveat - for various reasons I don't use Ancestral Sources - partly, I think I'd got set in my ways by the time it came out - so I can't swear if AS would make a difference.
1. The use of <whole record> and <name> citations : I'm aware that I should use <name> citations for all entries that have the person's name on it and <whole record> for "proof of existence" but wouldn't the source list be the same for both ?
For me (not using AS), I only enter a citation against the <whole record> and <name> if I am recording those things for the first time or am updating them. I'll make things simple by trying to illustrate a sister of my ancestor, so the research only goes in one direction - let's say that I find her first, as a child, Mary Anna, in a census with her parents. That gives me her existence and her name, so the census is cited against her <whole record> (showing her existence) and her name. In all likelihood I will never cite another source against her <whole record> - I've shown her existence, why worry about proving it again? If I find another census 10y later with her name as "Mary Hannah", then I'll probably record "Mary Hannah" as an alternate, secondary name and cite the new census against the "Mary Hannah" name.

If I then find her baptism and it's only baptising her as "Mary" then I'll cite the baptism against both "Mary Anna" and "Mary Hannah" with "Text from Source" just showing "Mary" because it's compatible with both. Others might insist on another alternate, secondary name of just "Mary" and cite the baptism only against that.

If she's "Mary Hannah" from then on, in all subsequent censuses, marriages and other vital events, I doubt I'd bother to cite those sources against the name, any more than I'd cite it against her <whole record>. I've got the supporting sources recorded once or twice - why multiply? (I do have multiple citations for birth details because these vary so much from censuses, baptism, etc.)
2. Place of residence for Parish Baptism records pre-1812
- if there is no residence mentioned, then I will not record one - not even as the parish - not against the child, father or (possibly implied) mother. The baptism gives you an indication but there are plenty of cases where baptisms take place elsewhere - the family might live in a village outside the parish-church-town, for instance, or there are cases where baptisms take place some distance away - if the parents were (say) Primitive Methodists, they might go some distance to have their child baptised.

Other people will have different views!
Adrian
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by tatewise »

Welcome to your first FHUG posting Mike.
  1. Have you investigated the AS Tools > Options > General settings and associated Help.
    I think default does NOT create <whole record> citations and only create name citations for new & changed names.
    There are several alternative options, but I agree that duplicated citations should be avoided.
  2. As a general rule Residence facts should not be added if they simply duplicate the Place/Address and Date of an associated Fact.
    So Census & BMD facts that have Place/Address and Date of residence need no Residence fact.
    But an Electoral Roll source record would typically be cited by a Residence fact.
    If there is evidence of residence at the same address over a period of time, then some users like to include a Residence fact with the Date set to that Period.
    As always these things are a personal choice, but the evidence for the Residence of the Mother not mentioned on a Baptism record is dubious.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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carbon14mike
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by carbon14mike »

Adrian, Mike,

Many thanks for your explanations and advice - that clarifies things greatly for me.

Re the AS Defaults for whole record and name citations, I was aware but changed them while learning the plugin and inadvertently left them recording for "all individuals involved in the entry" for a long while, which has contributed to my confusion.

One more small question then, Mike ...
2. As a general rule Residence facts should not be added if they simply duplicate the Place/Address and Date of an associated Fact.
Would that mean that (in general), if a Baptism at, say West Witton, Yorkshire, includes "Abode: West Witton" in the Parish Register, then you would not record a separate Residence fact for the family members ? Or maybe only if the abode was elsewhere ? Or is this again down to personal choice ?


Thanks again.

Mike
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by tatewise »

Firstly, assuming you are using Method 'splitter' Source records, then a transcript of the Baptism record will be in the Text From Source field and an image attached to the Media tab.

So the details of where the Baptism was held and the Abode are recorded there.

If the Baptism place is different to the Abode place then a Residence fact would be reasonable.
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

2. As a general rule Residence facts should not be added if they simply duplicate the Place/Address and Date of an associated Fact.
Umm. No.

As a general rule, I create Residence facts if I have have specific evidence for them -- so if a Baptism record records the Abode of the parents, I create a Residence Fact to record that Abode, alongside the Baptism fact, even if the Abode and Baptism place are the same (which rarely happens because most people don't live in the church/chapel where their child is baptised) or similar (village X, Parish Church in village X). (Apart from anything else, it can be useful to see the sequence of residences of a family without having to delve into the source records).

If however (and I think this may be what Mike was trying to say), the Baptism record doesn't explicitly name an abode, I won't record a residence as I have no evidence for where the parents were living.
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by AdrianBruce »

ColeValleyGirl wrote:... As a general rule, I create Residence facts if I have have specific evidence for them -- so if a Baptism record records the Abode of the parents, I create a Residence Fact to record that Abode, alongside the Baptism fact, ...
Me too.

What I was going to add is to be very, very scared of using FamilySearch baptismal indexes for residences, even if you fully intend to replace them with the "proper images" later. FamilySearch have this habit of using the church place-name as the residence place-name, even when the residence is explicitly mentioned.

Using FamilySearch baptismal indexes for other things like date of baptism and names of people, is a calculated risk, which I'm usually happy to take in the knowledge that I'll try to get the image later. After all, I can misread parish registers just as well as other companies! ;)
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by carbon14mike »

Many thanks to all for your inputs.

Like Helen, I have always added a residence fact if I have direct evidence in the Parish Register, regardless of the fact that it may be at the same Place as the Baptism itself. No evidence, no RESI fact. My initial question re making assumptions has been answered thanks, I assumed it would be unwise and can see that it would be a dangerous thing to do. I never draw absolute conclusions about residence from an index in any case and always study the original document if it's available.

Thanks again.

Mike
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by tatewise »

I agree with the foregoing.
I was trying to generalise to all facts, rather than focus on the Baptism with Abode case, that cannot satisfy my same Place/Address and Date criteria, and had not been mentioned prior to my generalisation. In fact the OP had stated more often than not, residence is not listed.
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by davidf »

carbon14mike wrote:Hi
Further, if I assume the family were living in the baptism town, should I also assume that, by inference, mother Elizabeth would also be resident at the town, even though she is not listed at all. That would mean linking the mother's residence fact to a source that does not even show her name.
If there is no evidence of the mother in the baptismal register, I would not infer her residence (she might have died in childbirth and infering a residence could cause confusion later on).

Assuming the family were living (rather than visiting) in the baptismal town is also potentially dodgy. Often the mother would "go home to Mum" for her first childbirth, and it is possible that the child was baptised in the maternal grandmother's parish rather than in the parents' parish.

Assuming or inferring is usually dangerous - why do so without evidence? It might be wrong!

David
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

If there is no evidence of the mother in the baptismal register, I would not infer her residence (she might have died in childbirth and infering a residence could cause confusion later on).

Assuming the family were living (rather than visiting) in the baptismal town is also potentially dodgy. Often the mother would "go home to Mum" for her first childbirth, and it is possible that the child was baptised in the maternal grandmother's parish rather than in the parents' parish.

Assuming or inferring is usually dangerous - why do so without evidence? It might be wrong!
My thoughts exactly.
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Re: Whole record versus name citations and my Baptism dilemma

Post by LornaCraig »

If there is no evidence of the mother in the baptismal register, I would not infer her residence (she might have died in childbirth and infering a residence could cause confusion later on).
Similarly, even the father might have died. Sometimes a baptism record will refer to a deceased parent, as in "son of John Smith and his late wife Mary" or "son of the late John Smith". But otherwise, unless you know the couple went on to have more children, you can't necessarily assume that either of them was still alive. I have a case where both parents were named but I am fairly sure, from other evidence, that the (alleged) father had died shortly before the child was born.
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