Getting started on your family tree

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Mother & Child - Public Domain
Mother & Child – Public Domain

Introduction

The easiest and quickest way way to discover your roots is to hire a professional genealogist. This is also expensive. In these posts, I will share my family research experiences as an amateur, but enthusiastic, researcher.

A family history search is often a painstaking and frustrating journey. The task is even more difficult in Ireland where so many records have been lost or destroyed over the centuries. The joy of discovering your ancestors and finding out more about their lives cannot be overstated!

Advice for beginners

For complete beginners, I suggest that you gather as much information as possible from older members of the family. Ask them to write down or talk about anything they can remember from the past – relatives, place names, events and family stories. Perhaps, with their agreement, you could record their anecdotes.

It is amazing how many people and incidents can come to light that had previously been forgotten. These memories can suggest where to start your research and will provide vital clues to locations of interest.

As you begin to uncover your ancestors, they will not just be names on a page but living people with lives and characters of their own. I have found this is also an enjoyable experience for an older relative – a jaunt down memory lane with a young companion!

Useful Sources of Information

Now follow the link below to see our growing archive of posts & hints on Tracing Your Family Tree:




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