How often have you run into a brick wall in your family history research? Silly question, I bet. Which brings me to one of my absolutely favorite uses for online genealogy - the backdoor approach. Cluster genealogy on steroids is the way I like to think of it, although many of you probably use this backdoor technique on a regular basis. Basically, you utilize the power of searchable online databases to investigate all possible family connections for your ancestor, including relatives that you may not already know about. The ability to search across the records of an entire state (or even country) at once, plus search on fields such as occupation or parents' names not present in a traditional index, offers unique research options that just aren't practical in the world of genealogy archives, libraries and microfilm.
What do you do, for example, when every surname variation that you can come up with doesn't turn up your ancestor in the census? A common census search technique used by many online genealogists is to search by first name only, in combination with the approximate date and place of birth (or other search fields as necessary to bring the results down to a reasonable number to wade through). For more recent census records where household members are indexed, I often search by the first name of one of the children, along with the first name of a parent (first the mother, and then the father). This technique can be especially helpful when the family is not living in the area where you expect them, or in cases where a woman may have lost her husband and then remarried (and possibly even lost the second husband) all within the 10 year gap between census enumerations (especially when the children of the first husband took the name of the second upon their mother's remarriage).
Alternatively, consider a situation where you're trying to track down the married name of your ancestor's sister. Often you'll find she married in the area where her family lived, or discover her in an online marriage index. But when that doesn't work, one of the many online death indexes may come to the rescue. Search databases such as Georgia Deaths, 1914-1927 (free at pilot.familysearch.org) by parents' names, or the California Death Index (available by subscription at Ancestry.com) with the combination of the sister's first name and mother's maiden name, and you just may locate these errant married female siblings. This is also a good way to locate family members you may not have previously known about, such as siblings who were born and then either died or moved out of the household between census years.
Using batch numbers and parents' names to search for family baptisms in the International Genealogical Index (IGI) at FamilySearch.org is yet another type of backdoor technique commonly employed by genealogists. Because a "batch" often includes the records from a particular parish (or at least a portion of them), searching for the mother's name, father's name, or both may turn up several baptisms of the couple's children. To locate the appropriate batch number(s) for your parish of interest you can use a Web site such as Hugh Wallis' IGI Batch Numbers - British Isles and North America. Alternatively, if you locate a baptism for your ancestor in the IGI, click on the batch number on the results page to search that batch for additional family members.
What great examples of using online databases for "backdoor genealogy" do you have to share? Please post them in the comments below, or post them on your blog and share the link in the comments so we can all benefit from each other's creative searching.
Kimberly! Yipee! Yipee! Yipee! I used your suggestion of entering just a first name, year of birth, place of birth to find my great grandmother, and grandmother at Ancestry.com. For years I have been trying in vain to find them. Eureka! They popped up in Manhattan in 1910 Census! The index of their name was incorrect (”Katemock” instead of Kaczmarek.) I sent in the alternate name suggestion to Ancestry. Thank you for that great tip!
I’m not sure I would call your examples brick walls. Having searching problems happens, but they are not brick walls. If you can’t find your ancestors in a census, that means you know their names which means no brick wall. Basically what you’re describing is a method of widening a search.
Good point, Martin! But a “brick wall” to you may also be very different than a brick wall to someone else (especially someone brand new to genealogy). You describe a “brick wall” as a point where you don’t know the ancestor’s name to search. Well, isn’t that what genealogy is all about? We don’t search for our unknown ancestors by name, we search for their descendants, neighbors, siblings, etc.
my great grandfather was listed in the 1860 census, birthplace unknown, parents names unknown. Died sometime between 1860 1863,(family history handed down) his wife,(widow) re married in 1863. M brick wall, don’t knowwhere to go. Also he was listed as 45 yrs. of age in 1860 census. Have never been able to connect him with anyone else with same name or names. Help
To: KW Research again for him with various name spellings in 1850 census indices because he would have been about 35 years of age based upon what he stated in 1860 census.
Kimberely: Thanks for the awesome tips, I will try them out. I look forward to all of your e mails!
I recently got thru a “Brick Wall” by getting a death certificate on my husband’s Uncle we knew nothing about, that led to his parents, then to the census with a whole bunch of siblings that we didn’t know existed! Oh happy day! I believe I got the idea from one of your tips.
Have a good day!
Thank you for your tips and I have used them all. However, I am Afrfican American from GA and it is just hard to find records. I have used the family stories heard from the front porch as a child and found many to be fairly accurate. I habve hit that “Brick Wall” after learninf that my family had land taken away doing the depression. Yes, I’ve seen land records, but they just don’t tell the story. Keep looking…for bits and pieces to fill in the gaps.
Carole
Why don’t you ever mention Genesreunited? It allows members to make contact with other tree owners who have the same ancestors in their tree. At $20.00 per annum AUD it is by far the cheapest form of genealogy and is available for those of us who are handicapped either physically or by lack of spare time and can’t go trapesing around cemeteries, libraries etc. Technically it is not the way a lot of genealogists like to operate but, don’t knock it, it works. Their web address is
http://www.genesreunited.co.uk
KW – this is similar to what I have for my earliest ancestor in a family branch. My suggestion is to look for any children’s names – they may have been mentioned in a will – and that should connect you with other relatives. If you can find more info on his wife’s family, especially her parents, you might find your great-grandfather’s family lived nearby. This is a lot of “ifs”, I know – and if he was born around 1815 you might not find much in written records, depending on where he was born. If you know the wife’s new last name you have a good chance at finding her children at least. Good luck.
I have seen several comments about searching the siblings in order to find an ancester. What if you don’t know the siblings names? I have even tried
checking his wife’s family with no luck. Most people on the census has people of the same surname living near them. Not my Brick Wall. He lives near his wife’s family. So how can you find a father and mother?
I want to thank you for this new back door site, as I found my grt-grandfather who I have been looking for for several years and a lot more. GREAT!
thank you so much for the info on putting in first name only…after 3 years of trying i have finally found my grandparents in the 1930 census…it is indeed remarkable.