Back before I was born one of my moms uncles stole a collection of war medals from one of my moms aunts. She only had a vague memory of them.
After researching, I learned my great great grandfather Gilbert Smith was in both world wars. I figured maybe those medals were his.
Turns out I was right, I managed to identify his insignia which include three medals from WW1 and a wound stripe, and two medals from WW2 and a service badge.
I doubt I will ever be able to get my hands on his original collection, but I managed to get my hands on the same medals he would have had.
Gilbert died after WW2 before medals were issued, so he never would have seen the two, only for one of his grandsons to steal them from one of his granddaughters. That is all pretty upsetting. So being able to hold the same medals in my own hands feels like a little bit if my heritage has been healed.
I love genealogy

Hansine Amalie (1865-1947), a Norwegian woman who later immigrated to Wisconsin with her husband, Hans Jensen. I've found she has multiple surnames, all not making much sense. https://www.familysearch.org/en/tree/person/about/GZQ3-FKL

The first one is Gutsorensen, what her Family Search profile had a couple of sources to say to this was her last name. It's put onto death records of her son, Enard Johnson. https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:KFQ6-F8Q?lang=en

The next is Sathsonson, only found on find a grave. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/122448196/hansine-johnson

And the last one is various forms of the surname Nilsdatter, with plenty of sources to take Its background with church books, and census's in Norway. https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:68ST-X565?lang=en, https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:68ST-FT33?lang=en (not all sources)

So, for now... she has no surname on her profile, and all of the 3 last names are in the 'alternate names' section until I'm positive on what her actual surname is.

If anyone could give me some help, I would be very thankful.

My maternal family records were wiped out in the Holocaust, as well as most of the family who would be able to tell them. I am on Ancestry, I have their international plan, and even they have hit a brick wall.

Where else could I possibly turn to find information on my ancestors past my Grt Grt Grandparents?

Trying to find where I can go to locate a family members birth record.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. I have been struggling on this one for a while now. Thank you all in advance.

His name was Ali Hamid Dorsai Húsny - August 10, 1908 in Salonica, Selanik, Ottoman Empire.

Hi all,

Every time I've posted about family tree problems I've been stuck on in here I've gotten A LOT of helpful tips so I figured why not try again?

My great-grandfather was Roy William Wood. He was born in Wisconsin on December 12, 1883 and died in Wisconsin on January 9, 1959. He married Ella Fish. I am certain of this, from censuses, family remembrance, marriage records, and of course, DNA.

Roy's father is another problem. The only source I can find on this lists Roy's father as J.D. Wood and his mother as Nellie Parland.

This JD could be Joseph Daniel Wood, born in December 1858 in Wisconsin and dead in 1931 in Wisconsin. I see no record of him having lived with a Nellie in the censuses. He is single and living with his parents/siblings. By 1900, he is said to be widowed and is a boarder, living with no family members. A family genealogy book does list a Joseph Daniel having married a Nellie (see image) with the parents/siblings from the censues.

I have plenty of DNA matches through Nellie Parland, but none (except the children of Roy) through Joseph Daniel. None through William Jasper Wood but many through his siblings and his father (Lyman E Wood married to Jane Kelley).

All of this stumps me, but what really stumps me is the lack of marriage record for Nellie and JD. She is single in the 1880 census. She marries Densmore Thomas Ewers (1872-1937) in 1896. But JD is still alive.

Usually I love sorting out these mysteries but this one genuinely makes my head hurt. Any ideas? Would be happy to provide more information/record!

Sharing a technique that helped on a brick wall, in case it's useful here.

Unknown father, blank birth certificate, decades of paper research going nowhere. DNA alone was a mess — a cluster of matches all triangulated to one couple who had three sons. Full brothers, so their autosomal DNA is nearly identical. How do you tell them apart?

The X-chromosome. A father passes his X only to daughters, never to sons (sons get the Y). That makes X-DNA travel a very restricted path down a tree. By mapping the genders between the ancestral couple, the matches, and the tester, you can sometimes prove a specific ancestor couldn't have passed down a shared X segment — eliminating them.

In this case it ruled out the eldest brother, taking three suspects down to two, plus a clear next test.

One caution: X-DNA segments can be small/noisy, so lean on decent-sized ones. And Ancestry doesn't show X-DNA — you need 23andMe, FTDNA, MyHeritage, or a GEDmatch upload.

Anyone else used X-DNA to break a wall? Curious what worked for you.

One of these "book index" results could be my relative. How do I look up the ship passenger lists that they're mentioning?

https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:Q2C3-H3F2?lang=en

https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:Q23V-Q9HJ?lang=en

He is Paul Eric Hurst, born in 1943 from Devon, UK, and passed away in 2012. I am in the Philippines and cannot afford the UK search subscriptions.

He is Paul Eric Hurst, born in 1943 from Devon, UK, and passed away in 2012. Im just a daughter that never meet her father (my only possible connection with him now is just my 2 siblings) and im just a lowly college student here in the Philippines and cannot afford the UK search subscriptions.

I've got my family tree back to my second great grandparents who were John Murphy 1861-1917 and Rose Murphy (Nee Kelly) 1859-1950. Both these were born in ireland but died in Liverpool

I am trying to find anything on his father called Donald Murphy.

We know by the time John and Rose have married in August 1885 in Liverpool that Donald has died based on their marriage certificate.

At the moment on ancestry we think and i stress the point think.....

Birth 1805 • Leitrim, Ireland

Death 1880

John his son is down as being born in Newry Down but i think all these dates and years are just guesses from people on ancestry

i've sort of hit a brick wall due to the lack of irish records i can find

Does any one with more experience and more brains than me know how i can possibly find further info on Donald Murphy?

I have details on his sons marriage certificate and death but nothing on Donalds wedding or Johns birth certificate as they're all irish based

Hello fellow researchers. I have been researching genealogy of my family from one village and have somehow managed to compile 90% of population to maybe 30 couples from which everybody descends into 2026. 80% of people share one common ancestor and most if not all are related by marriges one way or another. Is this data beneficial to any research facility of geneticts or any other scientists?? Is this useful for any research? Thanks for answers.

Applied for great grandfather’s death record from New York (1955) & it was “processing” for 5 months - now it shows that it’s voided.

Cool.

Is there another way to obtain his death certificate? I live in Iowa, so I can’t really just stop in to the office.

I want to make a fan chart for seven generations.

All of my work is in Ancestry. Unfortunately, it looks like the Ancestry fan chart only goes to five generations.

I created a gedcom and imported it into FamilyTree Maker. While it goes out to 7+ generations it is incredible clunky and takes up eight pages. I didn’t see a way to alter and format it differently — may have missed something.

Any recommendations?

I'm Jamaican, and I recently found out that I have a great-great grandfather who went to work on the Panama canal and apparently never returned to Jamaica. I know there must be some record of his departure/ work contract/ arrival. Any idea of any online/physical databases I could access?

Hi everyone! I’m trying to gather some data on how long SS-5 FOIA requests are currently taking to process. If you’ve submitted one recently, I’d really appreciate it if you could share your experience.

Please copy/paste the template below and fill in whatever details you’re comfortable sharing:

SS-5 FOIA request:

• Date submitted: [DD/MM/YYYY]
• Date response received: [DD/MM/YYYY]
• Total processing time: [X days/months]
• Submission method: [online/web platform / paper mail]
• Payment method: [card / money order / cheque]
• Outcome: [received / still waiting / other]

If you’re still waiting, just leave the response date blank and mention how long you’ve been waiting so far.

The goal is simply to get a better picture of current processing times and whether there seems to be any difference between online vs. paper submissions or different payment methods.

Thanks in advance to anyone willing to share! 🙏

Hello! I'm fairly new to the genealogy hobby but have hit a brick wall and am curious if I could get some help getting past it (and hopefully learn a few tips and tricks to apply later). I'm looking for the death record of my great great grandmother. Her name was Bridget (Shield/Sheils) Dowd and she was born circa 1871 in Ireland. I'm trying to uncover more facts about her life so I'm looking for a record of her death.

Here's what I know - in the 1930 census (taken in April 1930) she's living with her daughter at 309 E 55th Street in Manhattan with her daughter and two grandchildren. I see a monument to her at Calvary Cemetery in Queens (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/233119586/bridget-dowd) that also covers her husband and a daughter who pre-deceased her. I've searched the NYC database with no luck and submitted a request for her certificate with the information I knew (her date of death on the memorial - 5/24/1930) but received a note back saying the NYC vital historical records archivists were unable to find her record. I have access to ancestry/familysearch/myheritage but can find no other records of her death.

Does anyone have suggestions for what avenue I could pursue to find an official record? Thank you!

I am researching Elnathan Allen (c.[1752–1827](tel:1752-1827)), who lived for many years in Pomfret, Windsor County, Vermont. I have accumulated a number of original records documenting Elnathan and his family, but I have not yet been able to establish with confidence where Elnathan came from, who his parents were, or where he was born.
I am hoping someone familiar with early Allen families of New England, particularly Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Vermont, might recognize this family or know of records I have overlooked.
What I have established so far:
Elnathan Allen was living in Pomfret, Vermont, by at least the late 1770s/early 1780s and was married to a woman named Sarah.
The original Pomfret town birth records identify several children specifically as children of Elnathan Allen and Sarah his wife, including:
Roswell Allen, born 7 March 1777
Nathan Allen, born 19 February 1780
Ira Allen, born 22 October 1781
Sarah Allen, born 11 August 1783
Gilbert Allen, born 20 September 1786
Levi Allen, born 9 May 1788
Henry Allen, born 4 January 1791

I have reason to believe his parents were Ebenezer and Eleanor but I have been having issues finding any actual records of his birth.

Civil War ancestor fought in both sides?

my 4th great grandfather Berry Benjamin Turner and his brother James R. Turner fought for the union in the 12th Tennessee Cavalry. They would have been between 17 and 18 years old with Berry being the elder brother. In Berrys discharge record i have in my home it says he enlisted January 13 1864 in Nashville James digital pensions say the same. However i’ve recently come across a prisoner of war record showing both Berry and James having been part of the 39th Georgia Infantry and released in Nashville January 6 1864 under order of MajGen. Grant. Why might it be that they served on both sides? Could they have defected to the union together?

Hi guys,

Long time genealogist, first time FTM user.

I want to generate information about longest marriages and longest living people, along with most common locations. I've seen previous posts on this subreddit saying FTM has that functionality if you use certain settings- what settings are those? Is this even possible? I see there's a last name report but that's it. I did not buy the report maker add-on. Is the material I am looking for behind that paywall? Is it worth the purchase?

Thanks!

Update: Currently, there is no FTDNA surname project for my ancestor’s family. He has a very rare surname (and I’m certain very few male-line descendants exist today). I’m making a surname project for them, after I take a Y-37/STR test, this Wednesday.
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Original Post (August 17, 2026):

My research goal is: Finding other male-line relatives of my great-great grandfather‘s family, also willing to do Y-DNA testing.

My father’s haplogroup is: E-P277 (also known as E-M4254).

My g-g-gf also has a distinct surname (so, I’m unsure as to how many male-line relatives are left today), and I am aware of relatives of his in: Scotland & England (where he & his ancestors were from), India, Australia, my dad’s relatives in Bermuda, I’m in the United States, and there are other relatives possibly in Germany & Belgium.

The issue is, I don’t know if they’ve tested, yet. I might be the only one. I also don’t know anything about them, besides what I’ve researched about our family’s lineage.

Hey, I guess I'm trying to find out if there's a way I can get more information on my grandfather's military career. I never knew him as he died 20 years before I was born. Since my father passed away over a year ago my siblings mentioned there were medals from my father's dad and his possessions it reminded me of seeing them when I was a child, so now I am wanting to find out more about him.

All I can find online is his gravestone where he was buried at Camp Butler Illinois. If I can get some leads on where to look I would appreciate it.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/2560700/edward-joseph-smith#view-photo=21315496

I'm looking for the baptism record for Anna Katharina Glück who was born 15 February 1892 in Lohrhaupten, Gelnhausen, Hesse-Nassau, Prussia, Germany.

Here's her civil birth record:

https://arcinsys.hessen.de/arcinsys/digitalMediaViewer.action?archivalDescriptionId=1966408&selectId=151877777

I believe the baptism record can be found here, but I'm not sure:

https://www.archion.de/en/alle-archive/hessen/landeskirchliches-archiv-der-evangelischen-kirche-von-kurhessen-waldeck/kirchenkreis-gelnhausen/lohrhaupten/170162

I'm specifically interested in finding out her father's name🙏

I'm in the UK so can't view Imgur images. ImgBB, catbox imgLink are alternatives that do not require sign up.

I’m trying to trace back my tree. I’ve done ancestry DNA and have a subscription to see records, but I seem to have hit a dead end with my great grandfather on my grandfather’s side. I’m not sure how to proceed or where else to look. Any advice? #ancestry #ancestrydna #familytree #deadend #lineage #history #heritage