On Mon, 13 Jun 2011 14:20:25 -0400, Bob LeChevalier <[email protected]> wrote: >In passing, I think a clearer definition of what identifies someone as >a "stray" is needed. > >I don't know how to express it in terms of your database, but one area >of "strays" I have been trying to deal with are people living in a >household on a census who are not obviously members of the family of >the head of household. These include roomers and boarders, and prior >to 1880 may include family members with different surnames whose >relationship isn't apparent (like inlaws and nieces/nephews). In >rural areas there are people working as laborers who may be local, or >may be from some other county or state. Farther back, there are >teachers and merchants who show up in households where they lived for >only a short while but then moved on. I suppose the question to ask is whether the database would have enough information in it to enable someone searching the database for a person to find them if they are there. for example, if a person was born and married in one place, but you cannot find a record of their death there. As for definitions, here are some used by some family history societies: Stray Definitions In their purest form "Strays" are persons who were born within the County with a reference recorded outside of the County of birth. The 13,000+ strays recorded for Cambridgeshire do not necessary fall into this pure format. There are various categories. Stray Born in the County of Cambridgeshire with an event recorded outside of the County Out of County Marriage A person resident within Cambridgeshire but married outside of the County Transient A person moving from/to Cambridgeshire e.g Settlement Examination or Removal Order Settlement Papers. The parishes were required to look after their own poor. This could become a burden. So when someone wanted to move into a parish and they appeared to be unable to support themselves - i.e. a single woman expecting a child - the parish tried to determine if that person could claim welfare from the parish. If not they were sent back to their own parish. There are at several forms for settlement papers. Examination papers, settlement certificates and removal papers. Settlement Certificates record the movement from a place, county to another place, county. Settlement Examination Papers detail the place a person was living, county and the place they would like to settle at. Removal Orders detail a place, county where a person had settled and the place, county to which they were being lawfully removed to. Academic A person who by residence is associated with Cambridge University but not the County Military A person serving with the Cambridgeshire Miltia or the Armed Forces relating to Cambridgeshire but not necessarily a resident of Cambridgeshire Manorial Records and Wills Persons mentioned as witnesses, beneficiaries, bondsmen, etc. within Manorial Records, Wills, Inventories, etc. These persons may be resident within the County or external to it. Other Ad hoc references to persons living or born in Cambridgeshire who are mentioned in various articles or documents http://www.cfhs.org.uk/Strays/ That site does give the kind of information they collect for strays, but it doesn't fit in the ten field allowed for the YahooGroups databases, so I'm asking what people think is the most important information. Here's another definition from the English Fenderation of Family History Societies: So what is a Stray? This is a person who is described in a record as being from, or connected with, a place outside the area in which they normally lived or were born. Here are a few examples: A family may have emigrated and their burial recorded overseas on a headstone which states where they came from in the UK: there may be a newspaper obituary giving details of other members of their family left back home: a girl who went into service then married many miles away from her parish: a soldier serving in the West Indies or in India, or one killed in action: a family awaiting removal from one parish back to their original birth place: the baptism of a child belonging to a Militia man stationed far from home: seamens tickets: convictions and transportations: and many, many more interesting records covering all dates to the present century. Just imagine how it will feel to finally find that Great Uncle Charlie was buried in South Africa during the Boer War when the last record you could find was the 1881 census record! How long were you looking for him? How many blind alleys did you go up? This project could help solve such problems of disappearing ancestors for so many family historians, worldwide. http://www.ffhs.org.uk/projects/strays.php <some examples snipped> >I don't want to send this without noting another kind of stray: wives. >Without a marriage record, virtually every married woman is a stray of >a kind with no obvious link to ancestors unless the family has inlaws >present in the household. And yet surely one would not want a strays >database to include all married women whose maiden name and parents >are unknown without something distinguishing them from other sorts of >strays. I had one yesterday. A family where the father was born and died in Cumberland, UK, and most of the children were born there, moved around a lot, and some of the children married and settled down elsewhere. The 1841 census shows the wife as not born in the same country (yet most "public" online trees show her as being born there, yet someone has found a record showing that their marriage took place in the neighbouring country of Lancashire. The record of her death would show her as a stray from Lancashire. The record of her marriage would show her husband as a stray. And so on. -- Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa Web: http://hayesfam.bravehost.com/stevesig.htm Blog: http://methodius.blogspot.com E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
"Steve Hayes" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected] > > So what is a Stray? This is a person who is described in a record as being > from, or connected with, a place outside the area in which they normally > lived > or were born. > But how far away does "outside" mean? The next parish? The next county? And how long is 'normally lived"? I have ag labs in my databases who seemed to specialise in having each of their large number of kids in a new parish.... I think that strays indexes are wonderful things, and I'm building indexes of Whitsome & Hilton (BEW) strays myself. Because these indexes are for a limited area (one parish) and my own use, I can afford to be fairly loose with my definition of "stray" but it all got out of hand until I limited the definition to people who moved away from their birth/baptism parish(which means that every child in some families is regarded as a stray from a different parish to its siblings You are never going to satisfy everyone, but it's still worth doing. I think that you should decide on a definition that suits you (out of parish, out of county, or whatever), state it clearly on page 1, together with any other ground rules you need to make the thing manageable, and stick to them. Lesley Robertson