On this day in 1801, 1st British census is held, revealing a population of approx 10 million people Kind Regards Mike Kostiuk Family Tree Folk Bringing genealogy to life * E-mail: [email protected] ( Office phone: 01977 791657 : Website: www.familytreefolk.co.uk

Hi, I need the advice of you knowledgeable folk of Yorkshire ancestry. Well, no, not really. But as it concerns a distant family branch, served by a distant mailing list, I can ask the question here without risking embarrassment to a distant relative. This relative has sent me a professionally commissioned genealogy done almost 20 years ago, and into which an extra generation has been squeezed on the basis of what I believe is an incorrect assumption. These are the basic details. Jane Smith's father was a John Smith. There were two John Smiths and the only reference differentiating the two is a description of one as 'the Elder' on their respective burial records. Jane Smith's mother's name is the same as the elder John Smith's wife's name. There are no christening, marriage or children records for the younger John Smith. Although possible, it would be a tight squeeze for the younger John to fit in the gap between the elder John's wife's birth, 1683, and Jane's birth, 1726. And the only marriage record for a John Smith, in 1708, makes this more unlikely. Yet the family historian states 'The description ('the elder') almost certainly identifies John the elder as the father of John, the father of Jane'. I have always believed that Parish Record descriptions such as elder/younger, or senior/junior are used purely to differentiate between two people of the same name, in just the same way that two similarly named people might be described as being from Uptown/Downtown. The two might very well be father and son, but THAT IS NOT THE INTENTION of the description. What d'ya think? Should my relative ask for her money back? Dom.