Help to find family members after finding out real dad has died.

[DollyRose]

There is alot involved with this situation. Any help is appreciated.

Not sure we're to start as the whole thing is actually quite astonishing and upsetting. It's quite a long story but I'll try give the basic facts.
My dh learnt that the man he thought was his father is actually his step dad. His mum lied to him for a few years. I think due to domestic violence she thought it would be better. I don't know. However his real dad commited suicide, and she decided to tell him. This has had a real impact on his mental health. I've never known a family like it and you would never guess this is happening if looking in from the outside. For whatever reason his whole family continue to lie. Where he was buried, how he commited suicide, where he lived. It's like no one wants him to know anything. This is his father's side BTW.
I managed to find his death certificate. I just have no idea where to start to try help my dh get some answers. He has spoken to aunts who are very vague. We know he has an uncle but where do I start in finding him? He has a very common name. We are hoping he may have answers into his biological dad's life. Obviously there's alot to this background but hoping finding this man he can help.
Thank you.

Have you tried ancestory or similar sites?
Your DH must be a mess. :( What a horrible situation.

Hi, we're moving this thread over to our Family History topic, at the OP's request.

Do a dna test from ancestry, you can buy them online, amazon does next day delivery. Takes a few weeks to process but once it's done he will be able to see exactly where he comes from and any relatives also on there may provide vital answers he needs to move forward. Birth and death certificates can also be found on there. Good luck

Might be clutching at straws but would a commercial ancestry DNA test help at all? I don't know if they follow the patriarchal line though so you'd need to check that out.

Some things to consider:

Does your husband have his long form birth certificate?

Was his step dad put down as his birth father?

Where does it say your husband was born?

Where does his mother's family live/where was she born?

How old was his mother at his birth?

Does he have any older siblings?

Even with extremely common names provided you have an approximate age and location perhaps with a little corroborating evidence such as a sibling's name, it's no harder than something unique.

I'm happy to have a look round on Ancestry etc for you (I'm fully kitted out with genealogy subscriptions including My Heritage, Find My Past, Ancestry etc).

Good luck either way.

I would start on ancestry.

The birthdate should be on the death cert. From that you should be able to find mothers name (without paying) or you can order the birth certificate to get the fathers name. On ancestry you can search for BLANK but add mother and fathers name and an approximate date. This might give you some results of siblings. From this you might be able to find wedding records, professional registers, telephone registers.

General points to remember:

1. Work systematically.
2. Try not to jump onto someone elses family tree. Just because someone has written it online doesnt make it true. Follow the documents or..
3. Dna as mentioned by a pp might help in this senario but only if the uncle has got his dna registered.
4. It might also be worth getting onto the online newspaper archives.

On the death certificate, who reported the death, maybe start with them ? Good luck

What a awful situation for your dh.

Lots of good advice from pp. My absent Df died of suicide in January 2019. He was no contact with all his biological family which included his 4 brothers, 3 sisters and 4 adult children (there maybe more of his children that we don’t know about) We were all stone walled by his wife when trying to gain information surrounding his death ( I kind of understood her perspective as she clearly had a awful lot to deal with)
As my dad died of suicide there was a coroner’s report which as his children we were entitled to see. We gained a awful lot of information about his life & death from it. It definitely helped myself and db’s. Your dh should also be able to gain access to his fathers report. It was hard but it gave us facts after been lied to repeatedly.

I really hope your dh gets some answers

Thank you for the replies.
Yes it's an awful situation I just don't understand why his paternal family are avoiding any questions he has. I don't know if it has to do with him looking very like his dad and it hurts or whether there is something they don't want him finding?
I saw this first hand he went to visit his nan (dad's side) and any time he asked about his dad, she would completely ignore and say for example "oh look what's happening in the news"
He did briefly try ancestry but I think at the time just got lost.
If anyone could help with that, that would be great.
As not to drip feed we was told by his mum circumstances around his death was quite tragic and resulted in him commiting suicide after his wife did. Apparently this was reported in newspapers but Im at a lost in searching for that article. Would I have to travel to the area this happened in order to search for local newspapers. This was I think 23 years ago.

With the DNA aspect people have mentioned. Would this only work if other members have also done the test?

@AnnieOH1
Thank you
I do have all these details I think.
If it states his uncle will it say where he lives now or is this information not available now. We have used social media to search but as its a common name so many results came up.

You might check at your local library services as they will usually have access to ‘paid for’ databases such as newspapers and similar. Of course the actual libraries are closed now, but might have online services available. The staff are often very helpful advising where to search, though again this might not be available at present.

@icanttakethiscrapnomore

Im so sorry for what you've been through. I hope you've found answers to help you.

We have the death certificate now which was completely different to the various deaths we have heard so far.
My dh feels if he finds the wife's family they understanbly won't want to discuss due to her also dying. I also don't think they would no much about his side of the family as they had moved away.

@DollyRose - there are some records like telephone directories, electoral roll etc but for living people they're not necessarily that up to date on Ancestry. However they do give a good grounding to then check other databases like local newspapers, social media, 192 etc.

As an example at Christmas time a friend received a card off a neighbour with just their first names, John and Sally. We couldn't say if they were on the little road my friend lives on, the close or the drive. However given about an hour between different sources I tracked down their address, full names, telephone numbers etc. It's actually quite frightening to think how easy it is if you know how!

Have you checked for the birth father's full name in any local newspapers? Or national newspapers for that matter.

Op, be a bit cautious. How would your dp cope if you found something really bad about his dad? A serious criminal record, that he was conceived through rape, whatever, other bad stuff. Once known, you can’t unknow it. And there may be a reason why no-one wants to tell you anything.
I’m not saying don’t try, just think carefully first.

@AnnieOH1
I have googled his name and the location, also circumstances of death that people suggested. Apparently the owned horses which at the time was on a programme like rspca as they had been neglected surrounding the death. I couldn't find anything so Im not sure whether I have to go more locally. I'm in London but this happened in Norfolk. Also it was over 20 years ago.

Would you be able to hire a genealogist to help ?
Not sure of the cost.

Sorry to add , lots of genealogy websites would have tips. Local FB host pages where he lived , ask if anyone knew him ?

With the DNA aspect people have mentioned. Would this only work if other members have also done the test?

They may give pointers to geographical area(s) but you already know this and it's far from precise. Other than that, yes, other members need to have done the test for a match to show up. They can be quite remote though - cousins to the nth degree will show a partial match.

Is there any chance that his dad left a will? In which case, you can look them up once probate's been granted (which it should have done after so long!) - then it's quite cheap to order a copy.

If he didn't leave a will then if he had any assets they should still have been distributed to his next of kin according to the laws of intestacy so I would have thought there should be a way of finding out what was left and who got what.

Is there a chance that they don't want your dh looking into it as he should have been left some money or things and they kept them for themselves? So they're not telling him anything because they're trying to protect themselves rather than actively hide info about his dad from him?

Maybe if he tries talking to his dad's side of the family again, he could use the health aspect - that he'd been asked by his doctor for a medical history and realised he knew nothing on his father's side, hedidn't even know if he was long or short sighted, or had hayfever or (insert anything here that he would like to find out about) and that while you think you are protecting me by ignoring all my questions about my real dad it's actually a really cruel thing to do because it means I can't even begin to look after my own health properly because I don't have the information I need when I talk with the doctor.

And see if that manages to get them to talk a little...

@wibdib
Thank you

This is exactly what I was thinking. How do we go about finding assets. He is obviously not on his birth certificate.

So I managed to find him on Ancestry and his wife that died. It seems her parents have also died so I can't ask them.
He also had another wife and child 2 years after my dh.
Now I found my dh was given £250.00 from apparently the sale of horses after his death. This was given by the second wife with the child.
Sorry so complicated. Never known anything like this.
Now she lived in the same area as my dh but then shortly after death moved to Norfolk so I'm assuming possibly recieved a house due to this child being next of kin yet my dh didn't have his dad on the birth certificate. This son (half brother) also doesn't want to talk about him.

We've heard various different stories from both sides of the family. His side including aunts will not talk about him or his uncle that he's desperately trying to find. Very cruel in my opinion.
I've emailed coroner but they have come back and said they don't tend to keep records past 2006 so will have to wait and see. I've sent a death certificate.

With ancestry how do you start looking for other members. All I know is his name and that he was younger.

This is a free to search site, which might help in some way
www.freebmd.org.uk/

@thepitts
Sorry it won't let me click on your link.

I've just manged to find a newspaper article in Scotland (not sure why it was reported there) I could upload the image but not sure if that could help anyone help me find family members.

@DollyRose if you want to check out to see if he left a will and it went through the probate process, this is a good place to start: www.gov.uk/search-will-probate

Not all wills go to probate but if they do, they are registered by the government for posterity. so worth a try for your dh's dad and maybe his wife and even second wife (do you know if she is still alive?).

Sometimes when writing a will, if you don't want to leave anything to somebody that you might be expected to leave something to, for example a child or sibling or partner, one of the bits of advice given is to leave a small and specific bequest and explain why so there can be no arguments once you are gone - the person can't argue that they had been left out in error for example.

It might be that your fil had a really small estate or it might be that he ended up with a small bequest just to ensure that he didn't try to get more later on. If the later is the case, whilst it might not be easy reading, it might be that the will contains some interesting or useful information.

I do feel for your dh - as you say, it's really cruel of those involved to not tell your dh the info while they can.

It's really not nice if the family to not help you, did your DH receive the money ? Have you found out who should have distributed it ?

sorry the link didn't work, can you copy and paste in your browser...
Freebmd/births marriages and deaths, is one of the first sites people use when starting to research their family history, a very useful resource.
Hopefully it will help you.

Thank you all so much.

So what I gathered is when fil died my dh was given £250.00 for the sale of a horse. Which to me means he had a few assets. This was given by his second wife with the son (half brother) I guess as he would be next of kin since dh wldudnt have his dad on his birth certificate. This lady died a few years ago also and half brother doesn't want to talk to dh.
He died in his 30s so I think it's very unlikely he had a will.
So if you don't have a will where do you find this info from?

He tried to contact his aunt yesterday to ask about his uncle and she just said stop talking about it and she doesn't know. I think he's in Germany.
This aunt told my dh police had given her his dad's ring (I'm not sure if that's what police do) and he ask if he could have it as his wedding ring so he could have a part of his dad there. She said no. I just feel so helpless and upset that a family could do this. I come from such a loving family so really can't comprehend the treatment.
It's either because they miss fil so much and he looks so like him or they have things to hide.
I have found a few newspaper articles online but all are quite different. I have emailed someone who did his family tree that had fil wife and him in it but not sure if he will reply.

With regards to info on the uncle I only have his name county he was born and know he was younger then fil.