What am I doing wrong?

[TamlaDawn]

WOW everyone!  You seriously all need to go into business and start charging!   
Thank you so much for all of your information.
I have found the 1911 census for "Bertham" as you say, in the right area to meet Edith - she was working in Kensington as a domestic at that time I believe...

The ancestry lady has come back to me and said that she thinks the Sheila Watson in her tree's Mother was Cinnamon and not Page... and she has no idea if hers came from Eastbourne or not?!

Edith lived to a ripe old age, I even remember visiting her in the early 1980's! Think she died around 1984.  She had 2 more children who always thought their parents were married...turns out when they were going through her things they found she had never married their father - still technically married to Bert!
So it seems Bert didn't wait for Edith to die before marrying again!
Nan says she has no memory of him at all...just that he left when she was very small and no one would talk about him - she went to live with her grandparents by the time she was about 10.

I've ordered Berts birth cert, his wedding to Florence and Sheila's birth certs...just for starters!

I'm so thrilled that there MAY be some half siblings of nans out there who may still be alive..and if not almost certainly will have descendants who are :-)

[groom]

The ancestry lady has come back to me and said that she thinks the Sheila Watson in her tree's Mother was Cinnamon and not Page... and she has no idea if hers came from Eastbourne or not?!

Looking at her tree, she doesn't seem to know much about him, I would think that she is related to Florence and just added him as her husband.

You've discovered the beauty of Rootschat - everyone here is helpful and friendly and usually by working together we eventually do manage to find people. Please let us know what the certificates say.

[TamlaDawn]

It's been so helpful and I am so very grateful to you all in giving up your time to spend on someone else's history.
If you aren't all sick of me I shall be pleased to share the certificate findings with you  :-)

[groom]

It's been so helpful and I am so very grateful to you all in giving up your time to spend on someone else's history.
If you aren't all sick of me I shall be pleased to share the certificate findings with you  :-)

Please do, it is nice to get a follow up. Hopefully they will show he is the right one, then if you need help finding his other children, we may be able to help there. Although that will probably have to be done by PMs as they could still be living.

[iolaus]

You've discovered the beauty of Rootschat - everyone here is helpful and friendly and usually by working together we eventually do manage to find people. Please let us know what the certificates say.

And break down some really high and strong brick walls - you all managed to do one of mine which I know I'd never have worked out on my own

[groom]

And break down some really high and strong brick walls - you all managed to do one of mine which I know I'd never have worked out on my own

Often all it takes is a fresh pair of eyes, or someone with access to a different source. Sometimes it helps when it isn't your own family and you come at it from a different angle, so you aren't working from family stories etc.

[ThrelfallYorky]

It's more than simply that fresh pair of eyes.
It's willing hard work, intelligence and thoroughness.
I've had some great help where people on here have kindly not only taken my ideas, given them a good shake-out and dusting, but also done some real research and hunting to help me out. I'm always totally delighted when in some small way I can in my turn help someone else, and humbled by how clev er other members are.
-And this is a pretty good example of many RootsBrains working well together! As usual.

[TamlaDawn]

I totally agree!
All that time spent when people could be doing their own things. I was thrilled and forever grateful.

Certificates still not arrived. ...maybe tomorrow 

[jbml]

The ancestry lady has come back to me and said that she thinks the Sheila Watson in her tree's Mother was Cinnamon and not Page... and she has no idea if hers came from Eastbourne or not?!

Looking at her tree, she doesn't seem to know much about him, I would think that she is related to Florence and just added him as her husband.

Yes ... just because someone else has been there before you, and has posted an online tree, and tells you that "their" Bertram isn't "your" Bertram ... that doesn't mean they are right.

And just because they tell you the name of "their" Bertram's father, THAT doesn't mean they are right, either.

An example of this is a great uncle of mine, who was gay, and moved to America in the 1950s where there was more acceptance and toleration of homosexuality than there was here in England at the time. He never married, and never had children. He died in 2002 and my great aunt, who is still living (the only one of my grandfather's siblings who is) flew to America and scattered his ashes on the Potomac river.

The source of my information is unimpeachable. But somebody else has my great uncle (and my other ancestors in this line ... not particularly well researched and with many errors) in their online tree claiming that he married one of their ancestors and had children. I have e-mailed giving them my information and letting them know that they're following the wrong line. But they have ignored me and their tree still shows my ancestors as theirs.

Now, if I hadn't known everything I do from my great aunt, his sister, I might have approached them saying that I thought we had a relative in common, and when I told them that my great uncle had been gay they'd have said "then he isn't my great grandfather" ... which would be true; but that wouldn't mean that MY great uncle wasn't the man THEY were WRONGLY showing on their online tree as their great grandfather.

So ... if your research convinces you that the man shown in their tree IS your man, then go with that conviction. And if your research suggests a different lineage than that which is shown in their online tree ... go with your research.

Not everyone who posts online has done better research than you ...