Problems with FamilySearch

[Steve Hayes]

For the last few years I've been using FamilySearch a lot, comparing
our records with ones on their family tree, and trying to verify
everything.

But they recently seem to have acquired a new source, "Cumbria Parish
Records", which they are showing in their "Hints". It actually seems
to be an index rather than a transcription, and has far less
information than their "English Birth and Christenings" resource,
which is a transcription rather than an index, and often has a link to
images of the actual parish records where you can check the accuracy
of the transcription.

I spent several hours trying to disentangle a couple of families that
seem to have got entangled as a result.

They were Mark Elwood who married Mary Jackson and was born in
Branton, Westmorland in 1794, and Mark Ellwood (or Elwood) who married
Mary Mauncey (or Mouncey) and was born in Appleby in 1`796, son of
William Ellwood and Anne Simpson.

Censuses show that the children of the former Mark and Mary Ellwood
were born in Arkholme or Dalton in Furness in Lancashire, while those
of the latter Mark and Mary Ellwood were born in Long Marton in
Westmorland and Lazonby in Cumberland.

But the new "Cumbria Parish Records" index shows them all as having
been born in "Cumbria, England. United Kingdom", as a result of which
the two families have god thoroughly entangled in FamilySearch's
family tree, and no doubt in the family trees of several of their
users.

I don't know if family history societies have enough clout to persuade
FamilySearch to withdraw the "Cumbria Parish Records", or at least not
to display it so prominently in the "Hints" to prevent the contagion
from spreading further and degrading their whole family tree effort.

Even their "English Births and Christenings" resource is not devoid of
pitfalls, as it is the product of many different volunteers
transcribers, and it appears that some of them thought that if a
person was baptised in a church they must have been born in it as
well, but often the images are linked so one can correct them.

In the case of the Lancashire records one can often find better
transcriptions on the Lancashire Online Parish Clerks web site, but I
don't know of an equivalent resource for Cumberland and Westmorland,
the other constituents of the present-day Cumbria, which did not exist
in the time of more of the events in the "Cumbria Parish Records"
resource.

[john]

Post by Steve Hayes
For the last few years I've been using FamilySearch a lot, comparing
our records with ones on their family tree, and trying to verify
everything.
But they recently seem to have acquired a new source, "Cumbria
Parish Records", which they are showing in their "Hints". It actually
seems to be an index rather than a transcription, and has far less
information than their "English Birth and Christenings" resource,
which is a transcription rather than an index, and often has a link
to images of the actual parish records where you can check the
accuracy of the transcription.
I spent several hours trying to disentangle a couple of families
that seem to have got entangled as a result.
They were Mark Elwood who married Mary Jackson and was born in
Branton, Westmorland in 1794, and Mark Ellwood (or Elwood) who
married Mary Mauncey (or Mouncey) and was born in Appleby in 1`796,
son of William Ellwood and Anne Simpson.
Censuses show that the children of the former Mark and Mary Ellwood
were born in Arkholme or Dalton in Furness in Lancashire, while
those of the latter Mark and Mary Ellwood were born in Long Marton
in Westmorland and Lazonby in Cumberland.
But the new "Cumbria Parish Records" index shows them all as having
been born in "Cumbria, England. United Kingdom", as a result of
which the two families have god thoroughly entangled in
FamilySearch's family tree, and no doubt in the family trees of
several of their users.
I don't know if family history societies have enough clout to
persuade FamilySearch to withdraw the "Cumbria Parish Records", or at
least not to display it so prominently in the "Hints" to prevent the
contagion from spreading further and degrading their whole family
tree effort.
Even their "English Births and Christenings" resource is not devoid
of pitfalls, as it is the product of many different volunteers
transcribers, and it appears that some of them thought that if a
person was baptised in a church they must have been born in it as
well, but often the images are linked so one can correct them.
In the case of the Lancashire records one can often find better
transcriptions on the Lancashire Online Parish Clerks web site, but
I don't know of an equivalent resource for Cumberland and
Westmorland, the other constituents of the present-day Cumbria, which
did not exist in the time of more of the events in the "Cumbria
Parish Records" resource.

IN my opinion, cross-posting to six newsgroups

england.genealogy.misc
soc.genealogy.britain
soc.genealogy.computing
alt.genealogy
free.uk.genealogy
soc.genealogy.misc

is bad form, especially when several are irrelevant


Trees are only as good as the data and the compiler. You cannot rely on
other trees unless you can verify the original source. The trees on
Ancestry, Findmypast, etc are of a similar quality

Those compiling and publishing trees just assume data they have is
correct or make guesses all the time. In the 1990s, I shared a few trees
with other individuals but I stated I didn't want it shared further. I
usually added a piece of incorrect data as a trace. My wish wasn't kept.
With the advent of online family trees, that incorrect data has now been
propagated many times in the online databases.

There is nothing wrong with the Cumbria Parish Records on FamilySearch.
They are just not as specific as you would like. I suspect you will find
more detailed BMD versions on one of the subscription services?

Why are you complaining about the quality of work of different volunteers
transcribers and volunteers in family history societies? Without their
work you wouldn't even have a lot of what you do have.

Now you've done the work of verifying the data, I hope you have
corrected the records for others?
https://www.familysearch.org/blog/en/fix-incorrect-record-links/

Search https://www.ukbmd.org.uk/index.php or GENUKI
https://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng for information on the available
records for Cumberland and Westmorland

Cumbria Archive Service
https://www.cumbria.gov.uk/archives/Online_catalogues/default.asp

Cumbria Archive Service - Church of England Parish Records
https://www.cumbria.gov.uk/archives/Online_catalogues/Ecclesiastical/parish.asp

Cumbrian Church of England parish registers
https://cumbria.gov.uk/elibrary/Content/Internet/542/795/6637/4246111910.PDF

Cumbria Family History Society
https://cumbriafhs.com/cgi-bin/cumbria/cfhs_main.pl?action=cfhs_parish_records

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

[]

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
I spent several hours trying to disentangle a couple of families
that seem to have got entangled as a result.

[]

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
Censuses show that the children of the former Mark and Mary Ellwood
were born in Arkholme or Dalton in Furness in Lancashire, while
those of the latter Mark and Mary Ellwood were born in Long Marton
in Westmorland and Lazonby in Cumberland.

We've all got tangled families! (My own are Neaves in [a small part of]
Norfolk, and Weightmans in Shilbottle [Northumberland]; in especially
the latter case, I don't even have the benefit of locational differences
- there were two couples with the same names, having children in the
same parish, over an extended period. Disentangling those is a
nightmare!)
[]

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
I don't know if family history societies have enough clout to
persuade FamilySearch to withdraw the "Cumbria Parish Records", or at

[I doubt it (-:!]

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
least not to display it so prominently in the "Hints" to prevent the
contagion from spreading further and degrading their whole family
tree effort.

[]

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
transcribers, and it appears that some of them thought that if a
person was baptised in a church they must have been born in it as
well, but often the images are linked so one can correct them.

An equally bad assumption is the birth _year_. (More below.)
[]

Post by john
IN my opinion, cross-posting to six newsgroups
england.genealogy.misc
soc.genealogy.britain
soc.genealogy.computing
alt.genealogy
free.uk.genealogy
soc.genealogy.misc
is bad form, especially when several are irrelevant

While not disagreeing in principle, I think the main problem here is
that there are too many 'groups which in practice cover the same area
(whatever their charter says - assuming they even have one; even if they
do, it's unlikely to specifically state the difference between its group
and another, especially if written before the other existed);
soc.genealogy.britain and free.uk.genealogy, for example, and
alt.genealogy and soc.genealogy.misc . I don't have any _solution_ to
this problem: ideally it would be the closure of one, but I'm sure each
would have its advocates. (Also, the only one of that list that Steve's
post might be irrelevant to _to me_ would perhaps be the computing one;
YM obviously does V, and I'm sure other readers would/will pick
different ones.)

Post by john
Trees are only as good as the data and the compiler. You cannot rely on
other trees unless you can verify the original source. The trees on
Ancestry, Findmypast, etc are of a similar quality

To be fair, Steve wasn't complaining about trees, but a specific
dataset. I think we all agree, trees are dodgy at best. (It doesn't help
that the various tree-hosting sites don't AFAIK have any way of
recording how _reliable_ you consider a "fact" [or its source] to be; I
don't _think_ the GeDCom standard does, and as that's what most use for
uploads, I can't really blame them. [Many home genealogical _softwares_
_do_ have a "quality" field: for example, the one I use, Brother's
Keeper, has [for sources rather than facts - a "fact" can have several
sources, of differing quality]: 0 ["Unreliable"], 1 ["Questionable"], 2
["Secondary or fairly reliable"], and 3 ["Primary or very reliable"].
Others, I'm sure, have similar, but no automatic way of _sharing_ that
field.)

Post by john
Those compiling and publishing trees just assume data they have is
correct or make guesses all the time. In the 1990s, I shared a few trees
with other individuals but I stated I didn't want it shared further. I
usually added a piece of incorrect data as a trace. My wish wasn't kept.

It rarely is )-:.
[]

Post by john
Why are you complaining about the quality of work of different volunteers
transcribers and volunteers in family history societies? Without their
work you wouldn't even have a lot of what you do have.

To be fair, I think in the case of the one I've highlighted - the
assumption that the birth year is the same as the baptism year - I
suspect the fault, in FindMyPast at least, is in the software provided
to the transcribers or keyers-in-of-others'-transcripts: the birth year
is so universally shown as the same as the baptism year in FMP's
transcripts that I suspect it's filled in by default for the
transcribers/keyers, rather than them doing it.

(Where I've seen the actual images, I'd say it's far fewer than 10% of
cases where the birth date is shown at all. If anything slightly higher
after the advent of printed forms as quite a lot of vicars seem to have
added it in the left margin on those - but still the exception rather
than the rule. For handwritten records, it's very uncommon [and
recording of the _place_ of birth almost unknown].)

Post by john
Now you've done the work of verifying the data, I hope you have
corrected the records for others?
https://www.familysearch.org/blog/en/fix-incorrect-record-links/

With FMP, if I am inputting any _other_ correction to a baptism record,
I generally blank the birth year, giving as justification that the
original image makes no mention of it; whether that blanking gets
through, I have no idea.
[]

[Jenny M Benson]

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
To be fair, Steve wasn't complaining about trees, but a specific
dataset. I think we all agree, trees are dodgy at best. (It doesn't help
that the various tree-hosting sites don't AFAIK have any way of
recording how _reliable_ you consider a "fact" [or its source] to be; I
don't _think_ the GeDCom standard does, and as that's what most use for
uploads, I can't really blame them. [Many home genealogical _softwares_
_do_ have a "quality" field: for example, the one I use, Brother's
Keeper, has [for sources rather than facts - a "fact" can have several
sources, of differing quality]: 0 ["Unreliable"], 1 ["Questionable"], 2
["Secondary or fairly reliable"], and 3 ["Primary or very reliable"].
Others, I'm sure, have similar, but no automatic way of _sharing_ that
field.)

But surely your rating in your quality field is only of meaning to you.
I don't care how reliable or otherwise you think your data ia, if I
choose to "take" it from you I will make my own judgement about it. I
very rarely accept information from other people's trees without
checking Sources myself. If others aren't so bothered ... well, I was
going to say "who cares?" but I suppose most of us DO care about the
amount of bogus information which is put about.

[J. P. Gilliver (John)]

Post by Jenny M Benson

Post by J. P. Gilliver (John)
To be fair, Steve wasn't complaining about trees, but a specific
dataset. I think we all agree, trees are dodgy at best. (It doesn't
help that the various tree-hosting sites don't AFAIK have any way of
recording how _reliable_ you consider a "fact" [or its source] to be;
I don't _think_ the GeDCom standard does, and as that's what most use
for uploads, I can't really blame them. [Many home genealogical
_softwares_ _do_ have a "quality" field: for example, the one I use,
Brother's Keeper, has [for sources rather than facts - a "fact" can
have several sources, of differing quality]: 0 ["Unreliable"], 1
["Questionable"], 2 ["Secondary or fairly reliable"], and 3 ["Primary
or very reliable"]. Others, I'm sure, have similar, but no automatic
way of _sharing_ that field.)

But surely your rating in your quality field is only of meaning to you.
I don't care how reliable or otherwise you think your data ia, if I
choose to "take" it from you I will make my own judgement about it. I

We all only have limited time. If a quality-of-sources fact rating was
evident on trees, some of us would pay heed to it - in combination with
our general level of trust of the person whose tree we were looking at,
of course. For example, if I was looking at _your_ tree, _and_ was in a
hurry, I _might_ not be quite as rigorous (e. g. check only a transcript
rather than an original document image) for a fact where you'd been able
to allocate a high quality rating, than one where you'd allocated a low
one. But it's academic as there isn't a quality field in online data,
AFAIK. (And we're not connected AFAIK either, though I'd love it if we
were!)

Post by Jenny M Benson
very rarely accept information from other people's trees without
checking Sources myself. If others aren't so bothered ... well, I was
going to say "who cares?" but I suppose most of us DO care about the
amount of bogus information which is put about.

That's connected to the question of public/private trees. Some of us
feel the more good data is out there, the more the bad will be diluted;
others don't see why they should make the results of their work freely
available (and possibly misused). I can understand both views. [Actually
that might well be my epitaph!]

[Steve Hayes]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2020 14:18:57 +0200, john

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
For the last few years I've been using FamilySearch a lot, comparing
our records with ones on their family tree, and trying to verify
everything.
But they recently seem to have acquired a new source, "Cumbria
Parish Records", which they are showing in their "Hints". It actually
seems to be an index rather than a transcription, and has far less
information than their "English Birth and Christenings" resource,
which is a transcription rather than an index, and often has a link
to images of the actual parish records where you can check the
accuracy of the transcription.
I spent several hours trying to disentangle a couple of families
that seem to have got entangled as a result.
They were Mark Elwood who married Mary Jackson and was born in
Branton, Westmorland in 1794, and Mark Ellwood (or Elwood) who
married Mary Mauncey (or Mouncey) and was born in Appleby in 1`796,
son of William Ellwood and Anne Simpson.
Censuses show that the children of the former Mark and Mary Ellwood
were born in Arkholme or Dalton in Furness in Lancashire, while
those of the latter Mark and Mary Ellwood were born in Long Marton
in Westmorland and Lazonby in Cumberland.
But the new "Cumbria Parish Records" index shows them all as having
been born in "Cumbria, England. United Kingdom", as a result of
which the two families have god thoroughly entangled in
FamilySearch's family tree, and no doubt in the family trees of
several of their users.
I don't know if family history societies have enough clout to
persuade FamilySearch to withdraw the "Cumbria Parish Records", or at
least not to display it so prominently in the "Hints" to prevent the
contagion from spreading further and degrading their whole family
tree effort.
Even their "English Births and Christenings" resource is not devoid
of pitfalls, as it is the product of many different volunteers
transcribers, and it appears that some of them thought that if a
person was baptised in a church they must have been born in it as
well, but often the images are linked so one can correct them.
In the case of the Lancashire records one can often find better
transcriptions on the Lancashire Online Parish Clerks web site, but
I don't know of an equivalent resource for Cumberland and
Westmorland, the other constituents of the present-day Cumbria, which
did not exist in the time of more of the events in the "Cumbria
Parish Records" resource.

IN my opinion, cross-posting to six newsgroups
england.genealogy.misc
soc.genealogy.britain
soc.genealogy.computing
alt.genealogy
free.uk.genealogy
soc.genealogy.misc
is bad form, especially when several are irrelevant

How is genealogy irrelevant to genealory NGs?

It is good Usenet etiquette, since none are irrelevant.

[john]

Post by Steve Hayes
On Sat, 15 Aug 2020 14:18:57 +0200, john

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
For the last few years I've been using FamilySearch a lot, comparing
our records with ones on their family tree, and trying to verify
everything.
But they recently seem to have acquired a new source, "Cumbria
Parish Records", which they are showing in their "Hints". It actually
seems to be an index rather than a transcription, and has far less
information than their "English Birth and Christenings" resource,
which is a transcription rather than an index, and often has a link
to images of the actual parish records where you can check the
accuracy of the transcription.
I spent several hours trying to disentangle a couple of families
that seem to have got entangled as a result.
They were Mark Elwood who married Mary Jackson and was born in
Branton, Westmorland in 1794, and Mark Ellwood (or Elwood) who
married Mary Mauncey (or Mouncey) and was born in Appleby in 1`796,
son of William Ellwood and Anne Simpson.
Censuses show that the children of the former Mark and Mary Ellwood
were born in Arkholme or Dalton in Furness in Lancashire, while
those of the latter Mark and Mary Ellwood were born in Long Marton
in Westmorland and Lazonby in Cumberland.
But the new "Cumbria Parish Records" index shows them all as having
been born in "Cumbria, England. United Kingdom", as a result of
which the two families have god thoroughly entangled in
FamilySearch's family tree, and no doubt in the family trees of
several of their users.
I don't know if family history societies have enough clout to
persuade FamilySearch to withdraw the "Cumbria Parish Records", or at
least not to display it so prominently in the "Hints" to prevent the
contagion from spreading further and degrading their whole family
tree effort.
Even their "English Births and Christenings" resource is not devoid
of pitfalls, as it is the product of many different volunteers
transcribers, and it appears that some of them thought that if a
person was baptised in a church they must have been born in it as
well, but often the images are linked so one can correct them.
In the case of the Lancashire records one can often find better
transcriptions on the Lancashire Online Parish Clerks web site, but
I don't know of an equivalent resource for Cumberland and
Westmorland, the other constituents of the present-day Cumbria, which
did not exist in the time of more of the events in the "Cumbria
Parish Records" resource.

IN my opinion, cross-posting to six newsgroups
england.genealogy.misc
soc.genealogy.britain
soc.genealogy.computing
alt.genealogy
free.uk.genealogy
soc.genealogy.misc
is bad form, especially when several are irrelevant

How is genealogy irrelevant to genealory NGs?
It is good Usenet etiquette, since none are irrelevant.

I suggest you look at those newsgroups.

It seems you don't as otherwise you would not
have bothered to post to them. The chances
you would get a response are negligible.

https://alt.genealogy.narkive.com
https://free.uk.genealogy.narkive.com
https://england.genealogy.misc.narkive.com
https://soc.genealogy.misc.narkive.com

[john]

Post by Steve Hayes
On Sat, 15 Aug 2020 14:18:57 +0200, john

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
For the last few years I've been using FamilySearch a lot, comparing
our records with ones on their family tree, and trying to verify
everything.
But they recently seem to have acquired a new source, "Cumbria
Parish Records", which they are showing in their "Hints". It actually
seems to be an index rather than a transcription, and has far less
information than their "English Birth and Christenings" resource,
which is a transcription rather than an index, and often has a link
to images of the actual parish records where you can check the
accuracy of the transcription.
I spent several hours trying to disentangle a couple of families
that seem to have got entangled as a result.
They were Mark Elwood who married Mary Jackson and was born in
Branton, Westmorland in 1794, and Mark Ellwood (or Elwood) who
married Mary Mauncey (or Mouncey) and was born in Appleby in 1`796,
son of William Ellwood and Anne Simpson.
Censuses show that the children of the former Mark and Mary Ellwood
were born in Arkholme or Dalton in Furness in Lancashire, while
those of the latter Mark and Mary Ellwood were born in Long Marton
in Westmorland and Lazonby in Cumberland.
But the new "Cumbria Parish Records" index shows them all as having
been born in "Cumbria, England. United Kingdom", as a result of
which the two families have god thoroughly entangled in
FamilySearch's family tree, and no doubt in the family trees of
several of their users.
I don't know if family history societies have enough clout to
persuade FamilySearch to withdraw the "Cumbria Parish Records", or at
least not to display it so prominently in the "Hints" to prevent the
contagion from spreading further and degrading their whole family
tree effort.
Even their "English Births and Christenings" resource is not devoid
of pitfalls, as it is the product of many different volunteers
transcribers, and it appears that some of them thought that if a
person was baptised in a church they must have been born in it as
well, but often the images are linked so one can correct them.
In the case of the Lancashire records one can often find better
transcriptions on the Lancashire Online Parish Clerks web site, but
I don't know of an equivalent resource for Cumberland and
Westmorland, the other constituents of the present-day Cumbria, which
did not exist in the time of more of the events in the "Cumbria
Parish Records" resource.

IN my opinion, cross-posting to six newsgroups
england.genealogy.misc
soc.genealogy.britain
soc.genealogy.computing
alt.genealogy
free.uk.genealogy
soc.genealogy.misc
is bad form, especially when several are irrelevant

How is genealogy irrelevant to genealory NGs?
It is good Usenet etiquette, since none are irrelevant.

A warning.

Don't bother to reply to the original message entitled "Relevance" which
Steve Hayes sent without checking and changing the newsgroup your reply
goes to

Steve Hayes has redirected any replies to alt.troll
rather than them going here at soc.genealogy.britain where he posted it

Earlier this year, I put in a considerable effort helping him out with
his "Where is Ingleton?", "Looking for Emma EDE, born 1858-1860" and
other queries

I won't be helping him with any future queries he might have or replying
to any of his comments here or in any other newsgroup as I will no
longer see his postings

[Steve Hayes]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2020 14:18:57 +0200, john

Post by john

Post by Steve Hayes
I don't know if family history societies have enough clout to
persuade FamilySearch to withdraw the "Cumbria Parish Records", or at
least not to display it so prominently in the "Hints" to prevent the
contagion from spreading further and degrading their whole family
tree effort.

Trees are only as good as the data and the compiler. You cannot rely on
other trees unless you can verify the original source. The trees on
Ancestry, Findmypast, etc are of a similar quality

No, they are of a far worse quality, generally.

The FamilySteach tree is one that has been gradually improving and
be4coming more accurate as a result of a ciollaborative effort by many
genealogists, but the introduction of defective sources like the one
in the example I gave will turn this around and cause it to degrade
over time instead of improving,

Post by john
Those compiling and publishing trees just assume data they have is
correct or make guesses all the time.

And the new "resources" recently introduced will encourage peopkle to
do just that, and overwrite good data with bad.

Post by john
There is nothing wrong with the Cumbria Parish Records on FamilySearch.
They are just not as specific as you would like. I suspect you will find
more detailed BMD versions on one of the subscription services?

Which I don't use.

Post by john
Now you've done the work of verifying the data, I hope you have
corrected the records for others?

I've been correcting the family tree for others, making annotations
where necessary.

[Steve Hayes]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2020 08:51:00 +0200, Steve Hayes

Post by Steve Hayes
But they recently seem to have acquired a new source, "Cumbria Parish
Records", which they are showing in their "Hints". It actually seems
to be an index rather than a transcription, and has far less
information than their "English Birth and Christenings" resource,
which is a transcription rather than an index, and often has a link to
images of the actual parish records where you can check the accuracy
of the transcription.

Someone from the Cumberland Family Huistoery Society tried to discuss
this with FamilySearch and commented:

"I have had a long series of exchanges with Family Search over this,
initially the responses were standard pro forma answers about how to
use the website which did not answer the question posed.

I have now received from them another standard answer which
essentially says "Thank you for reporting errors in this database
which they will investigate and address, however due to the volume of
work do not expect this to be for at least a year" and have closed
down my query.

Note that most of the entries in this so called Cumbria Database are
in fact from the Furness region of Lancashire, the full list of
records it contains is :

(Film Collection) Parish registers for Blawith, 1709-1902 / Church of
England. Chapelry of Blawith (Lancashire) (Film Collection) Parish
registers for Egton-with-Newland, 1792-1917 / Church of England.
Chapelry of Egton-with-Newland (Lancashire) (Film Collection) Parish
registers for Haverigg, 1891-1911 / Church of England. Chapelry of
Haverigg (Cumberland) (Film Collection) Parish registers for Holy
Trinity Church, Ulverston, 1832-1914 / Church of England. Holy Trinity
Church (Ulverston, Lancashire) (Film Collection) Parish registers for
Ireleth, 1865-1909 / Church of England. Chapelry of Ireleth
(Lancashire) (Film Collection) Parish registers for Kendal, 1558-1907
/ Church of England. Parish Church of Kendal (Westmoreland) (Film
Collection) Parish registers for Kirkby-Lonsdale, 1538-1910 / Church
of England. Parish Church of Kirkby-Lonsdale (Westmoreland) (Film
Collection) Parish registers for Lowick, 1718-1916 / Church of
England. Chapelry of Lowick (Lancashire) (Film Collection) Parish
registers for Osmotherley, 1874-1908 / Church of England. Parish
Church of Osmotherley (Lancashire) (Film Collection) Parish registers
for St. George's Church, Millom, 1877-1909 / Church of England. St.
George's Church (Millom) (Film Collection) Parish registers for
Thwaites, 1724-1911 / Church of England. Chapelry of Thwaites
(Cumberland). (Film Collection) Parish registers for Ulverston,
1545-1911 / Church of England. Parish Church of Ulverston (Lancashire)
(Film Collection) Parish registers for Walney, 1744-1917 / Church of
England. Chapelry of Walney (Lancashire) (Film Collection) The
registers of the church of S. S. Michael & All Angels, Muncaster,
Cumbria in three parts / Church of England. Parish Church of Muncaster
(Cumberland)

So it is by no means a full record for the county of Cumbria."

So the Lancashire online parish clerks is probably a better bet
anyway.

[Steve Hayes]

On Sat, 15 Aug 2020 08:51:00 +0200, Steve Hayes

Post by Steve Hayes
For the last few years I've been using FamilySearch a lot, comparing
our records with ones on their family tree, and trying to verify
everything.
But they recently seem to have acquired a new source, "Cumbria Parish
Records", which they are showing in their "Hints". It actually seems
to be an index rather than a transcription, and has far less
information than their "English Birth and Christenings" resource,
which is a transcription rather than an index, and often has a link to
images of the actual parish records where you can check the accuracy
of the transcription.

I've now incorporated some warnings about this in a blog post on
"Getting the best out of FamilySearch"

<https://hayesgreene.blogspot.com/2020/08/getting-best-out-of-familysearch.html>
or
https://t.co/XRQDD6SXDf?amp=1

It was also prompted by complaints on a Facebook genealogy group from
people who said they had started "my tree" on FamilySearch, and were
enraged when people merged people on "my tree" without their
permission.

If you have any good hints and tips on using FamilySearch, please
write them here, and possibly in comments on the blog post.

[Jenny M Benson]

Post by Steve Hayes
It was also prompted by complaints on a Facebook genealogy group from
people who said they had started "my tree" on FamilySearch, and were
enraged when people merged people on "my tree" without their
permission.

That sounds like people not understanding the whole purpose of FS
FamilyTree. It rather reminds me of a saying that my father used to
use: "you can legislate for the fool, but not for the bloody fool."

I am not a member of the LDS Church and I do no embrace many of their
beliefs but I have met with much kindness and generosity from many
members and I admire much of what they do. It costs me nothing to
garner a vast quantity of valuable data from the FS site and if it is
sometimes a little hard to find or a tad misleading then that is a small
price to pay and not worth my bitching about.

[Steve Hayes]

On Tue, 25 Aug 2020 10:09:49 +0100, Jenny M Benson

Post by Jenny M Benson
I am not a member of the LDS Church and I do no embrace many of their
beliefs but I have met with much kindness and generosity from many
members and I admire much of what they do. It costs me nothing to
garner a vast quantity of valuable data from the FS site and if it is
sometimes a little hard to find or a tad misleading then that is a small
price to pay and not worth my bitching about.

I agree, but I do think it is worth warning people about when in the
hints they show bad data before good, because if people accept those
hints the tree will gradually degrade instead of improving.