The Original Record

When we are researching our family tree, we all want to build an accurate picture of our family history, with proven connections and links. When we begin genealogy, we all learn about the basic and well-known records - birth, marriage and death certificates; before civil registration, church and parish records; censuses... and so forth. These records that we find, whether online, in archives, private collections or otherwise, paired with educated, logical interpretation and analysis of the infomation and evidence within those records, then evaluating and tying those records together to form a proof argument, is the sole way we can build up that family tree with any certainty, or correctly. More frank researchers may say "genealogy without documentation is mythology", but they are not incorrect.

Genealogy is addictive, and therefore in an over-eagerness to build a family tree "faster", the largest mistakes that beginners to research make is restricting themself to one database (like Ancestry or FindMyPast), and ignoring the vast body of unimaged, unindexed records that exist, along with a heavy or sole reliance upon secondary sources: transcripts, indexes, (or worse) other user-created family trees.

This problem is not helped, and probably furthered, by the popular "click, click, click" view of genealogy that is espoused by newcomers, and presented in adverts, and even on TV shows. When building our family tree, we need to have the strongest body of evidence possible to back up our conclusions. Therefore, whenever possible, when a primary source does survive, we should always strive to find the original record and analyse from there.

What exists?

There exists a myriad of sources with useful genealogical information, in various hands and repositories on, and (mostly) off, the internet, and therefore, as mentioned in the introduction, it is crucial not to limit yourself to a single online database, whether that is Ancestry, FindMyPast, or MyHeritage, for example, to name a few of the most popular. For sure, they contain vital records and information that are now more easily accessed than ever, but these are just the start of the picture. The larger issue is that the vast majority of records that contain useful genealogical information are not online, transcribed or imaged. In fact, the vast majority of records with useful information are not even indexed yet. This issue has led innovative genealogists like Graham and Emma Maxwell of Scottish Indexes to start indexing as many Scottish historical records that erstwhile were not indexed.

This information regarding what is online and what is not, leads us to realise that to research well, get a full picture of our family history, to break past brick walls, or even to complete a reasonably exhaustive search (the first step of the Genealogical Proof Standard, which you can read about here), we have to go beyond the relatively few sources online. Going beyond those involves taking time researching the records that may exist about our ancestors, and in conjunction, researching the area local to our ancestors, which may tip us off to what local collections may exist. We would definitely benefit from taking time to understand the broad historical context, local and social context, that our ancestors found themselves in.

Finding out about what does exist beyond the internet can seem daunting, especially when there exists so much that is not online - The National Archives reckons that they have online only about 5% of what they actually own! Fortunately, a huge amount of excellent webpages and genealogy guides exist, online and in print. Some examples include the FamilySearch Wiki pages, Ancestral Trails by Mark D. Herber, Genealogy - Essential Research Methods by Helen Osborn, and many, many more. Contacing local history societies, local family history societies, attending seminars and webinars, and especially taking genalogy courses, are of great aid to expanding our education and skills.

If we wanted to view records with useful genealogical information as a mathematical set, the amount of imaged original records [surrogates] that are online < the number of original records that have been indexed on online databases < the number of records indexed on archive catalogues < the number of records that actually exist.

Different types of source

All this talk of records and sources, but what is an original source vs a derivative source? An original source is the original document that was created at the time of the event. A derivative would be a transcript, or finding reference to the said original document in an index, for example. Both of these types of sources contain information, at least some of which will be evidence. Much ink could be (and has been) spilt surrounding the intricacies of defining genealogical primary and secondary sources, and the differing classes of evidence contained within, and the changing class of source depending on the angle you are using said source for.

Why do we want to find the original sources? Derivative sources can be created long after events have taken place; perhaps they've gone through the process of being copied or transcribed, all of which takes us a further step from the original record, and has introduced another stage in which errors and misinformation can creep in. Although derivative sources can contain evidence, the strength of that evidence will always be weaker than the evidence contained within the original source that the secondary source was created from.

To illustrate, an original death certificate usually works as a primary source of information regarding the date that our person died. If said death certificate also includes a date of birth for the person in question, which later British death certificates and certain State death certificates in the USA do, then this same death certificate would be a secondary source of information for said person's date of birth. If we then were simply getting that information from a transcript, such as contained on Ancestry, then there are multiple steps there that information could have been incorrectly transmitted, then incorrectly transcribed. Thus the evidence gleaned from such a transcript is, at the very least, suspect.

Original source

Derivative source

Uses of derivatives

Derivative sources are not inherently bad, they can be highly accurate, and additionally, they can be essential tools for helping locate original records or piecing together puzzles. In fact, in some cases, where original records no longer exist, derivative sources can be all we have left to go off, and they are most useful compared to original sources then. You will need to assess and evaluate the value of this derivative source, which merits a whole post in of itself, but as always, the key is meticulous analysis and research into the source itself - why, when and how was the derivative created?

A brief comment on analysis

Once you have found and gotten your hands on the original source, it might be tempting to accept everything contained as gospel, but as we have seen earlier in the example of death certificates, we cannot do that. The census provides a nice illustration as well; the sheets we see today (before 1911) are not the same as the original sheets our ancestors would have filled out - the information they provided was then compiled into enumeration books, the originals afterwards destroyed, and that is the information we can see today. 

We therefore need to put on our analysis caps and go deeper. Understanding the background regarding the creation of the documents we are using, and obtaining the documents themselves, are but the first steps in analysing and obtaining all possible evidence from each document. This will be another subject for a future post.

Conslusions

As we have seen, though tempting to follow derivative sources and speed through our research, every step removed from an original document introduces further uncertainty, the risk of errors, and reduces the quality of our evidence. Only by returning to the original documents, or as close to them as possible, can we then begin to properly analyse and evaluate the information and evidence before us, and thus build up family trees that stand up to scrutiny.

Seeking out original sources takes time and skill, as well as the patience of having to wait for them to arrive, or be contacted back by archives! However our rewards far outweigh our sacrifice, we have confidence, and will most certainly learn information and bits about our ancestors' lives we wouldn't have known otherwise, if not finding the answers to some of our greatest brick walls.

If you would like assistance locating original records, reviewing your existing research, or untangling conflicting evidence in your family tree, I would be delighted to help. As a professional genealogist, I specialise in evidence-based research grounded in original documentation, ensuring that your family history is built on firm foundations rather than fragile assumptions.

Luke Gibson

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Luke Gibson is a genealogist based in Edinburgh, Scotland and a member of the Association for Professional Genealogists and the Scottish Genealogy Network. He is also in the process of becoming the editor for the Glasgow and West of Scotland Family History Society