Family talk:James Runciman and Edith White (1)

Various problems [27 May 2021]

1. Until 1894 Ely was in the county of Cambridgeshire, between 1894 and 1965 it was in the county of the Isle of Ely, in 1965 it returned to Cambridgeshire.
2. In WeRelate we sort our place database on the basis of where a place was in 1900. In order to maintain the identification of a place like Ely when it is used as part of Cambridgeshire, it is written "Ely, Isle of Ely, England|Ely, Cambridgeshire, England".
3. "Cambridge" was never a county in itself.

4. The exact date of a birth, marriage or death obtained from FreeBMD (or a copy of FreeBMD used by FindMyPast) only gives the quarter in which the event occurred. It does not give the date. If a certificate has been obtained, the precise date is available, but the entry should be noted "as per certificate". If you know the exact date from another source, the FreeBMD information is only secondary, so long as one corroborates the other.
5. All English Registration Districts are in our place database. Remember, a registration district often covers a much larger area than the place in its title. FreeBMD has an index of all registration districts and their composition from 1837 onward. This index is available as a link from every query page.
6. Census information should be entered on a person's page, preferably not on the family page. A census is an event and should be listed along with birth, marriage and death information, not just as a source. WeRelate has recently added the possibility of copying a complete census entry including all reference information from one individual to another. This is a real boon.
7. A census reference contains

• the regulation series number (RG_) which only changes with the decade
• the piece number (PN)
• the folio number
• the volume number
• the page
• the line (maybe)
• the household (maybe)

Personally, I find that Ancestry does a better job on this than FindMyPast.
8. Avoid entering personal addresses and email addresses of contributors (for their sakes)

9. Try making "Sources" instead of "MySources". WeRelate has a source database. For English censuses the titles all start with "England. " followed by the year and the words "Census Returns for England and Wales". Type "England" into the Source name box and the rest will come up as a prompt. For other types of sources there is a hint "Find/Add" at the end of the Source name box that only comes up if you use the "Source" choice.
10. Use commas to break up the columns of information for each person in the census. The large box in the Source entry group has a built-in carriage return; the Notes box does not, neither does the Personal Information box below.

11. Lastly, good source provision never comes automatically from gedcoms. This is why we suggest that gedcoms are used for small groups of individuals at a time.

--Goldenoldie 08:24, 27 May 2021 (UTC)