Ancestry.com - Am I missing something?

[Sashimito]

I made a free ancestry account a few years ago so I could find and get a copy of my dad's birth certificate (we are NC).

Recently I decided to get a membership for a month to find out some family history. However, all I've been able able to do is make my family tree from the little information I have. I found the birth record for one auntie but none of the other siblings of my parents.

I had assumed I would be able to find other links, or trees that were already made. Would the links only work if I do a DNA test?

I'm sure someone who knows more about Ancestry.com will be along shortly, but from my personal experience, Ancestry works better (as in you will find more documents) if you start slightly further back. So for my family tree I found lots of records until around 1920 and earlier, but very little more recent stuff. I'm from a different European country though and it may well be different for UK records. I assumed it was probably connected to data protection issues but didn't look into it any further.

Your siblings and parents will be too recent. These records aren't publicly shown to protect privacy. The most you might find is birth records (like on free bmd). Start fleshing out your grandparents and work backwards.

Are your family Scottish? I don't think Scottish records are on Ancestry.co.uk

I find it a bit hit and miss, 2 lines of family loads of info came up and I went back to 1550s, I think as the family had been in the same area for 300 years and was well documented.
Other lines found very little, I presume it depends how many documents/parish records have survived.
Scottish records were the least likely to be found

Look up census returns.

Also free BMD can be a useful searching/researching tool

www.freebmd.org.uk/

It relies on others having added their trees and made public. Ancestry does not always have the most comprehensive records for each area.

Are the other siblings of your parents already deceased? If they are still living you won't be able to get anything about them at all, unless someone in their family has uploaded a family tree and you can identify a previous generational match eg you have the same great grandparent. You could then agree to share information. But that's quite a long shot.

The most recent census is 1911 on Ancestry. Findmypast.com has the 1921 census, if you think any of your relatives might have been born by then?

I've been doing this a lot recently. I'm not sure how much of my experience is relevant to you but for what it's worth 1939, 1921 and 1911 censuses are great as you can see everyone in the house on the date but none from the years after that are public. War records are also good as they have info like address, next of kin, previous job. I found probate records from the 20th century helpful as it has main benefactor so you can see if it's the right person sometimes. Also death records seem to have extra info sometimes - always look at the original document if it's on the website as the details aren't always transferred to the record. Original documents like wedding certificates are good because they have witnesses on so you can see other family members. Familysearch.org is free and also has family trees but people sometimes get things wrong so you can't rely on them 100 percent. I used Findmypast (which doesn't have others' family trees) as well as Ancestry. I got all my info from these three websites. It took a while using any scrap of info I could find - each one took me a bit further.

Most trees that people have put together on ancestry are absolute rubbish tbh. I've been using ancestry for over 10 years and the number of people who seem unable to read details is shocking, let alone apply any logic to search results.
Most people just see a name that look a match and stick it in without any verification.

I forgot to mention findagrave.com. This helped me a couple of times.

I agree with PP. Do not rely on other people's trees, check it out yourself. Ancestry gives 'hints', l think many people must accept them without much checking. They don't seem to realise that two people may have the same name , sometimes very close birth dates too.

I was lucky enough to have a family bible for one branch of my tree and l have made sure it is correct. But l notice many errors on other trees that connect to this..
I am not on Ancestry. com but Ancestry uk which l believe better for uk??

That's right about Ancestry hints IMO. I got sent tons and almost every one was a red herring.
There are also electoral registers on some of those sites. They were like wading through treacle but I did find a couple of marriage partners that way.

Thanks for all your responses. I'm glad to know I'm not missing anything as such. I will have a look at the other websites which have been recommended.

Nearly all my family history will be Irish.

With regards to people doing dna tests and then finding out they have relatives who were previously unknown, where would they be getting this information, if not from ancestry?

Well as you know the Irish public records are a bit sketchy thanks to

posted too soon

Thanks to the GPO fire the Irish Censuses of 1821, 1831, 1841, and 1851 were burned. So, too, were just over half of all the Anglican Church of Ireland registers deposited there following the dis-establishment of the state church in 1869.
In addition, the majority of wills and testamentary records that had been proved in Ireland were reduced to ashes (although transcripts of many testamentary records survive). All pre-1900 documents from the legal courts were lost, as were local government records for the same period.

My family is Irish and I started with getting a basic oral history from all aunties and uncles and the like. Local church records have proved very useful. As others have alluded to the 'hints' are to be treated with extreme caution, people just get too excited and accept all sorts of incorrect data and the screws up your tree.

Hi Sashimito, Ive been somewhat addicted to this subject for a number of years, had an Ancestry account for around 6.
The DNA test can open a lot of doors, but also bring as many questions as it answers.
Verify ALL sources, at first the information seems as if its not there, its just hiding usualy - theres often more than one way to skin a cat.

I absolutely agree with this! I always verify everything for myself after an early experience with a tree that seemed to go a long way back, but didn’t stand up to even rudimentary inspection. It said I was related to Princess Diana, though

@DanseAvecLesLoup I actually didn't know anything about records being destroyed. Thanks for the info

Casualty of the Irish civil war, another reason to blame the English.

The DNA test aspect is essentially separate and different to the genealogy parts of the site that existed first. If you take an Ancestry DNA test and an unknown relative has also taken an Ancestry DNA test then you would show as a DNA match on both your results. The website would give you a "degree" of how you are related, eg if you are cousins, second cousins, etc etc.

You could then opt to contact each other, I think, if you both agreed to it.

Ancestry works best with a DNA test, at least that's how you are linked to more distant relatives.
I enjoyed being linked up with quite a lot of distant cousins some of whom emailed me.

@DanseAvecLesLoup The English are blamed for a lot (and rightly so) but I always find it a strange thing to get my head around. I'm English but my heritage is completely Irish.

Thanks again for responses. I'm considering taking a dna test but need to think about the skeletons it will most likely unleash.

We have similar backgrounds! Both my parents are from Ireland and came to UK in 1947, before I was born. It can be very difficult to find records esp on Ancestry. Family Search - run by the Mormon church - may be a better fit for you. It is free up to a point. Good luck!