Gilkes Family of Northamptonshire

Introduction

This must sound really pretentious - tips from the master - but it isn't meant to be that at all. I'm writing this for people just starting, happening on this site by chance, which is just possible; search engines throw up the most ridiculous sites for what seem like sensible entries. I wish I'd been told one or two simple tips before I blundered into my research, as it would have stopped me having to re-do so much work.

If any of this helps anyone I will be really pleased and if anyone can give me better tips on any subject I'd be grateful to hear from you. I am writing it down for myself as well; I still do things the 'wrong' way out of habit and I hope this will fix things in my mind.

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Make forms

You will be looking at Census returns, Burial, Baptism and Marriage records for the most part, so make yourself separate forms for each event, setting it out in the pattern that you are likely to find in the records.

Each event is recorded in a different way and so it needs a different form. Draw them out with pencil and ruler if needs be or, preferably, use Tables in Word for Windows.

A simple Census blank like this will get most of the information on. For families before the 20th Century there may not be enough space, so either increase or simply print several on an A4 sheet and 'ditto' the one below. When I began I was in such a desperate rush that I often didn't bother with all the details, but having the form pre-printed makes it easier to be more patient.

The information given with weddings is usually the fullest, even with the earliest records and fairly comprehensive marriage forms are well worth making. Having said that, any pro forma makes the collecting of data easier, but the real benefit comes from ease of storing and retrieving the information.

I set off with a notebook and pencil and wrote down all types of information in long lists. I filled 3 reporters notebooks in quick succession, but still have not managed to fit all of it on a tree. Finding some of that information is now a major task - all because it could be anywhere rather than on 'the Christening sheets', for example. A period of time preparing before starting on the Never-ending Search will pay real dividends as time progresses.

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Record it all

I'm probably a really bad researcher and nobody else would ever start as I did. I looked only for instances of the family name and jotted it down. If I found an indirect event, say a wedding witnessed by a family member, but not of a family member, I wrote, for example, "Joseph Gilkes was a witness to the wedding of someone from Bugbrooke in 1817".

I realise now that the whole event could have told me so much. People witness weddings for various reasons – they might just be friends, but they could be relatives that you didn’t know about; a female could be a relative under her married name, giving you a clue for another search. A male could be a cousin, giving you the married name of a female from the previous generation and so on.

When looking at wills of old people the witnesses can be revealing and the list of beneficiaries can span several generations and give you surnames to search for. Sometimes this is an excellent opportunity to find where relatives went; I have found locations in London, Birmingham and Huntingdon of ‘missing’ children of some of my families.

If you have made good forms to take with you, copying every scrap of information from a record is not too much of a chore. Some of it will never amount to much, but on the odd occasion, your whole search might be rescued from stagnation by a name copied down months before.

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Write down references

David Smith contacted me the other day. He's the man with a greatest known database of Gilkeses - bar none - and also a very thorough researcher. He sent me some information, which I will share with you, as it shows what is meant by writing down references.

I wonder if he is the George Gilkes who died in 1871 ( FRC death ref Gilkes, George, Windsor district, Vol. 2C page 296, June quarter 1871, age 47).

When you start off you probably think that what you are doing will never be of interest to anyone else, or affect anyone else's study, so you write things down to suit yourself. Later, along comes a contact, and what is satisfactory to you isn't to him. And, what is more important, is not satisfactory to YOU when you want to look back and find out more details.

National archives can be recorded as shown and parish registers with code, fiche number, or page number, or entry number, and full details of the entry.

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Just Keep Trying
My brother phoned me one day and said he'd looked unsuccessfully on the 1901 Census site for our Gran. Knowing that he can sometimes do 'odd' things with computers I told him to hang on and....failed to find her myself.

She was Emily Maria Brown and, knowing that girls often called themselves different names I tried Maria, Emma and Mary and soon ran down a possibility, who turned out to be 2 years older, although born in the same small village. After a visit to the library and a check on the Parish records, I eliminated Mary Brown, housemaid.

Having found Elijah Gilkes as Elyah Gilkes I next tried possible mistranscriptions such as Enily and Emyly, but with no success. I was beginning to fear she may have had a 'dark secret' to conceal, but had no idea what it could be.

I decided to go again with Emily Brown and the age 19; there were 36 possibles. I 'knew' she was from Mears Ashby, a village between Northampton and Wellingborough and had been a housemaid at Bugbrooke when she met my Gramp, so one of the 36 stood out - Emily Brown from Corby, working in Wellingborough as a housemaid.

I had just found 2 relatives with wrong birthplaces and when I checked, the transcriber had simply copied the line above for both of them, making them both wrong. I had my explanation - or so I thought. When I got a copy of the original I checked and...the mistake was at the source. My Gran had been entered as born in Corby, the woman above as born in Mears Ashby, but I have no doubts it is the right girl that I have found. And the much maligned transcribers were totally innocent - this time!

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