Family’s history

Most of us have unfortunate brick walls in our family trees – those frustrating relations who seem to have appeared into the world as if from nowhere. Perhaps a person does not feature in the baptism

Everyone has a family history story they can tell, but many people do not think they have the skills to do it justice in a publication. Frequently comments are heard such as, “I do not have any experi

Crime has always been popular with family historians. We all love a rogue (up to a point, anyway), and finding out you’re related to one can lead to some interesting avenues of research. The more seri

This portrait (the larger image) has been copied on Ancestry trees by many people. It purports to be my 2x great-grandfather, Cain Mayer (1841–1881) who was killed in a mining explosion at Chatterley

I was going to start this month’s article by talking about why we love this hobby so much but I realised that this isn’t really a hobby at all. Genealogy/family tree research/ancestor hunting or whate

KATHERINE COBB is a member of AGRA based in Somerset REBECCA PROBERT is professor of law at the University of Exeter STEVE THOMAS is a genealogist with over 20 years’ experience PHIL TOMASELLI is a mi