How popular are your surnames and how many cousins have you collected?

[ridban]

In all the time I've been doing genealogy, I've only collected one cousin - a fourth cousin once removed, on my dad's side, from Canada.  They didn't know about us here in England, so that was great, and we are still in regular contact  several years later.

With all my English names, though,  not one contact. Sometimes I feel very lonely, genealogically speaking! 

My names are:

Walker, Scott & Alden from East Suffolk.  Not one taker
Lockton from Lincolnshire. Nada
Lovitt from Leicestershire and Lincolnshire.  Not a tickle
Panter from Northamptonshire.  Zero
Cogar from Cornwall. Zilch

Anyone else in the same boat?

Linda

[Sooziecats]

Although there seem to be a lot of Wanklyn's in Herefordshire, I have only been able to contact one person - a second cousin - who we didn't know existed.  No one else in the family seems to be remotley interested!

My Nan was the youngest of 17 children and so my Dad had over 50 cousins just from his mothers side.

I am fascinated with finding out about all my ancestors and how they lived - it can be lonely researching on your own but it hasn't stopped me!

Sue B

[Burrow Digger]

YES

Despite posting frequently on Rootsweb, and here on Rootschat over the last 5 years I have found only 2 distant cousins - one in France and the other in Scotland. Absolutely NO English cousins at all.

Actually the French one is English but he doesnt live in England. He's married to a French woman. And he's more of a 5th or 6th cousin, our ancestors connect back in the early 1800's. 

BD

[corbie]

Hi BD,
   I know what you mean,
      I did find two first cousin's (my Dad's brother's daughter's) through Genes' site and my Aunt in Australia by putting an add in an Aussie newspaper but have never found anyone else looking into any of the families I'm seeking.
   I have been looking into the family for over 40yrs now! I only found them last year so don't give up, you never know what will turn up.
     I've got back to the 1700s with the 'tree' but the recent rellie's are the big mystery!
           Good Luck
                  Sue

[1000xlch]

I have had reasonable success in going backwards  but tracing forwards is another matter.  Have relations who are vaguely interested but cannot get them to either contact me with info or pass my name on to the other sidebranches, especially when the relations see them once a week in the same area and town.  Would be great to link with them to give them inforamtion!  It is the equivalent modern brick wall not the ancient one!    Not found any Smith and Jones yet which are connected!

However will keep trying. 

John Rowley

[wheeldon]

I'm also in the same boat, I have picked up a couple of 4th and 6th cousins but that's it.  The whole reason I started was to find family as my Grandad was sent to an orphanage after his Dad died in WW1, so he knew very little about his family.  It transpires that his family was very large and all living in the same area but no-one has contacted me  - I've put messages everywhere including local papers.

I think we will find that we are contacted more as the years progress and Genealogy becomes a more popular hobby.  The only down side is that all the older relatives that we want to brain pick, maybe getting rather forgetfull.

[behindthefrogs]

I have 95 internet cousins, half of whom I have exchanged information with in the last six months.  I have another dozen who are researching the same name as me in the same place but where we have not yet established a connection but send each other bits and pieces

I also have another dozen who are not online and so need snail mail communications. at which I am now very bad.

In the case of at least three quarters of them I intitiated the contact. They were found by regularly monitoring various sites, with Genes Reunited being the most successful source.  Rootschat has in nine months only yielded one new contact but is far the most useful for exchanging information with other people who aren't cousins.

I would estimate that about half of my attempts to contact new cousins are successful.

The secret I think is to ensure that your name lists are put in the tables which are searched and not to rely on messages posted on boards.  The lack of use by rootschat members of the SIT on this site is the reason that it doesn't yield many cousins.

When searching a site for contacts don't be any more specific on the initial search than you need to be to reduce the number of names returned.  Also don't worry too much about dates being too precise.  Just remember how many variants you have found of some of your dates.  The more common the name the harder it is to find cousins.

David

[Burrow Digger]

Actually I forgot the third cousin who found me. She lives in Australia and is connected to my Scottish family.

I'm choosing not to pay out exhorbitant amounts of money for GenesReunited just on the off chance that I MIGHT make a connection, especially when I have to scroll through heaps of pages of rubbish to maybe find one name. Its not worth my time.  I do wish that we can make contact with members before we have to fork out the cash to look at thier trees. And with all the complaints I hear about GR, I'm satisfied that I'm not missing anything by not joining.  I call it highway robbery. Besides I did put my relatives up on Lost Cousins - which reminds me, I need to add some more names to that.

Besides
If someone really wants to contact me, they can read the message boards and find me that way. 

[Burrow Digger]

Actually I forgot the third cousin who found me. She lives in Australia and is connected to my Scottish family.

I'm choosing not to pay out exhorbitant amounts of money for GenesReunited just on the off chance that I MIGHT make a connection, especially when I have to scroll through heaps of pages of rubbish to maybe find one name. Its not worth my time.  I do wish that we can make contact with members before we have to fork out the cash to look at thier trees. And with all the complaints I hear about GR, I'm satisfied that I'm not missing anything by not joining.  I call it highway robbery. Besides I did put my relatives up on Lost Cousins - which reminds me, I need to add some more names to that.

ABout the SIT - I think someone just needs to advertise it more thats all. I dont consider it "lacking in use" There are hundreds of names there.  And gwoing all the time.

Besides
If someone really wants to contact me, they can read all the message boards and find me that way.   

BD