When you find an error on someone else's tree, do you tell them?

[greeneyesgudge]

Hi I often do point out errors but there has been an ocassion were I thought they had got it wrong but in fact I had and they helped lead me in the right direction .its useful to point out things your unsure of as it helps U and them .im more then happy if someone wants to correct me as i want to find my TRUE ancestors not the wrong ones otherwise what's the point in doing a tree

[Viktoria]

I`ve just had to correct someone for whom I have great respect. They have done an enormous amount of research on the family members who emigrated but have almost nothing on the ones who stayed in England, including my G.Father and G.Grandmother . I have beeen able to fill in a good number of gaps.
 I was notified that more people had been added to the family tree but was surprised to see some elementry mistakes, for example three people included in a family when at the 1911 census they were many  miles away. In any case the true family had only two children, not five.
I thanked them for the extra info but asked a polite quesrion as to wndering why the family had some members in one place and others in another when they were all young children?
.As a result all the family have been removed , which is a shame as four are really connected and true relations, more to me than the  person doing the extended tree, being my  father`s  aunt, uncle and first cousins
. To the tree compiler they are the neice, nephew by marriage and great neices of their  great, great, great grandfather. Now they have all been removed  even the correct ones. I`ll have to send another message although I did make it clear who were O.K and who not ,albeit in a friendly way .
Perhaps when they have time to look at things again they will see both errors.
This does not really affect me but as has been pointed out if things are not 100%  accurate they are valueless.     Viktoria

[LizzieW]

I pointed out some errors in someone's tree, relating to descendants of my 3 x g.grandfather somehow joining up with that person's ancestors.  The person I contacted was very grateful and said he'd just copied the information from other trees on Ancestry and hadn't realised they had the wrong information.  As I had all the BMD certs, I knew my info was correct, but it just shows that what some people call research, is just copying without knowing whether it is right or wrong.

[joboy]

Its all good fun though isnt it? ....... I subscribe to ancestry but have no tree there but appreciate what they provide in the 'factual' areas such as 'probates' or 'land tax' and similar from which I have gleaned a lot of vital information for my own needs.
When I say I have no tree on ancestry it is not quite true as there is one there but stolen from genes R a few years ago which,when I discovered it, I put in a spurious name and that tree has gone off in all directions much to my ongoing amusement.
Dont take it too seriously.
Joe

[Kaybron]

I have recently been in touch with someone who I am quite certain has incorrect information on her tree.  I have birth, death and marriage certificates, a newspaper article relating to a coroner's inquest and electoral registers.  I have spent a considerable amount of money buying certificates to back up research whereas this person has only based her information on Census data up to 1911 and a marriage certificate that is online.  The marriage certificate does have an error, that being the groom's father's name has been incorrectly written.  William Thomas instead of Thomas William and that has major problems for this person in her tree.  We have exchanged several emails and I have posted material ($18 postage paid for this) to back up my research and still we are at odds as to who has the correct information.   After much thought, I have finally sent away for a certificate that will most certainly show that the person who she believes is her great grandfather actually died aged 12 years.     

[Ringrose]

Only yesterday I contacted an Ancestry member about a tree on which my great great aunt had the wrong parents.This member was grateful as the tree was dated back to being done in the 1980s and he was puzzled by it.Anyway I have proof of the right parents and an now in contact giving him the right info with BMDs
Ringrose

[aghadowey]

Came across an online tree the other night which explained what happened to a 'missing daughter' Marie J___ (I only had her in census with parents). Marie to have married and had lots of children, details of husband and children included on tree and I got quite excited... until I saw the 1891 census entry. Ummm, husband had 4 stepsons with same surname as Marie. Yes, husband married a Marie J___ (I think a widow) who had 4 sons. 'My' Marie J___ is still missing.

[fastfusion]

fastfusion passes a coin.... give it a flip...

heads u tell  them

tails u dont

some folk will appreciate it that u have found an error...  some will ignore you, and claim u are wrong...
the others will make comments back that will make u wonder as to whether u should have borthered in the first place and to humble old me ....  well if its wrong its wrong and if the proof is there most sensible rational decent warm kindhearted folks will listen to rational reasoning of proof... i best not discribe the others

 

[tillyminto]

I found out that someone (in the USA) had copied a photo of my Gt uncle who had died in WW1 to their tree, different name.

When I contacted them they apologised and explained that they thought my relative looked like a really nice guy and as their ancestor had been in the RFC they thought it would be nice to 'humanise' him and give a face to him!  They did delete it though.