A Gotcha When Searching the LAFRANCE Collection

Every second Tuesday afternoon the Ottawa Public Library and the Ottawa Branch of Ontario Ancestors hosts a one hour in-person Genealogy Drop-In session where we have folks popping by looking for help in their family history and genealogy research. Most of the times the questions are answered right then and there. However, in a few cases it can take a bit of time to actually figure out the right answer or solution to a genealogical mystery. Such was the case from a few weeks ago.

One benefit for genealogy and family history researchers who have an Ottawa Public Library card is that we have access to Généalogie Québec via the library site from the comfort of one's home. One of our patrons had been exploring the Généalogie Québec site but they were having problems locating records they thought should be there. They had already discovered the images they were seeking in the "Quebec, Canada, Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), 1621-1968" collection on Ancestry. However, they wanted to replicate finding those same records on Généalogie Québec as a test of that site.

Screen capture taken 3 Feb 2024 of "The LAFRANCE (Baptisms, burials and marriages)" search page from Généalogie Québec.

Going through the Ottawa Public Library portal and agreeing to the terms and condition of the Généalogie Québec site we are presented with "The LAFRANCE (Baptisms, burials and marriages)" search screen. There we can search by individual, couple, or parish. That is what the patron had been doing when trying to locate the baptism record for Nelson Deschamps from 1918. Yet no baptisms were appearing.

I knew we were missing something but there wasn't enough time to figure it out at that time.

Fast forward two weeks and it happens that both the patron and I were there early for the drop-in. So I asked for the details again. This time, without the pressure of doing real-time searching, I was taking my time and actually paying attention and reading to what is on the screen.

Screen capture taken 3 Feb 2024 of "About the LAFRANCE" section from "The LAFRANCE (Baptisms, burials and marriages)" search page from Généalogie Québec.

That is when I noticed this very important line from the "About the LAFRANCE" section:

Every Catholic baptism and burial from Quebec between 1621 and 1861

Of course we couldn't find a baptism from 1918 since the collection for Catholic baptisms only goes to 1861 in LAFRANCE.

I had forgotten to do what I constantly remind others to do: learn what a collection actually covers. I felt so silly!

I knew I could browse the Drouin Collection records but that can be very time consuming, especially if you don't have an exact year or know the parish where the baptism took place. Also, even though many parish registers have a name index either at the front or back of the year's register, quite a few don't.

So I went to the "NBMDS (BMD Index)" page on Généalogie Québec. Of course, this time I checked the "About the NBMDS tool" section first. There we find that it is an index of about 1.2 million records of  Catholic and Protestant baptism, marriage and burial records, most of which are from the province of Quebec. It even states the years and regions covered.

In this specific research case, the record found on Ancestry stated the baptism place was "Thurso, Québec (Quebec), Canada". Thurso is in the Outaouais region of Quebec and is one of the regions that the NBMDS index covers. So in theory we should be good.

Screen capture from 3 Feb 2024 of item 2 returned of a search using the NBMDS tool on Généalogie Québec looking for Nelson Deschamps.

There he was, just like I had hoped. Even better, the transcribed information actually made sense.

Screen capture taken 3 Feb 2024 of the transcription for the baptism record for Joseph Alfred Nelson Deschamps from the "Quebec, Canada, Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), 1621-1968" on Ancestry.ca.

As you can see above, the transcriber of the entry for Nelson's baptism record on Ancestry has Nelson being baptized before he was born. That's not going to happen in the Catholic church.

Yet the NBMDS index entry for Nelson's baptism on Généalogie Québec doesn't link to the image. So we have to do a little bit more work.

We need to go to the Drouin Collection records on Généalogie Québec and browse the parish registers.

Screen capture taken 3 Feb 2024 of the Drouin Collection records landing page on Généalogie Québec.

In this specific case I drilled down the folders via Quebec > Fonds Drouin > T > Thurso > 1910 > 1918

Screen capture taken 3 Feb 2024 of the Drouin Collection records browsing the folders to "Québec/Fonds Drouin/T/Thurso/1910/1918/" on Généalogie Québec.

Now all we have to do is look at the various images from 1918 to locate the baptism of Nelson Deschamps that, according the Généalogie Québec index entry, took place on 25 Apr 1918. Very quickly I came across the same image found in the Ancestry collection.

Genealogy Quebec, https://www-genealogiequebec-com.ezproxy.biblioottawalibrary.ca/en/tools/drouin-collection, Drouin Genealogical Institute, 2024, Drouin Collection - Québec/Fonds Drouin/T/Thurso/1910/1918/, d1p_00170648.jpg; image of page with baptism of Joseph Alfred Nelson Deschamps, B. 15.

 

So why would one want to use Généalogie Québec since it can take a bit more effort to see this sort of image when compared to the Drouin collections on Ancestry? 

The first reason is that the Drouin Institute keeps adding more records to their collections on Généalogie Québec. These new record may not make it on to Ancestry or any other genealogy site for quite some time. 

Additionally I've found the transcriptions of the records on Généalogie Québec are of higher quality than what I've come across on Ancestry. If I can't find a record I know should be in the various Drouin collections on Ancestry I will always come to Généalogie Québec to search through their collections. Quite often I will find that "missing" record there. Then when I look at the images on Ancestry for that specific parish and year I will find the name has been horribly transcribed in the Ancestry index.

Finally, although it didn't apply in this specific case, for those with deep roots in Quebec, the LAFRANCE collection is an amazing resource that can save you considerable time in your research.

Lessons Learned

The first lesson is always, always read the about section for any collection. That way you will know what should be covered in any collection. More importantly, you will also learn what isn't in the collection you are using.

The second lesson is to take the time to explore the various tools and collections on a site. If one collection doesn't have what you are seeking, quite possibly another collection will provide you will the answers.

When was Josias Inch and Jane Hoskin married? 1763 or 1764?

With relatively easy to use online genealogy databases and images along with the capabilities of computers to search large amounts of data very quickly, today's genealogy research can be very easy at times. Yet, it can also be challenging at the exact same time. This is one of those cases.

At the Ottawa Public Library Local History & Genealogy Drop-In Club that meets every second Tuesday at the Nepean Centrepointe staff of the OPL and members from the Ottawa branch of Ontario Ancestors attempt to help those researching their family tree by providing guidance and suggestions. A while back we had a question about the Inch family that resided in the Port Hope area of Ontario. Since then we've been working with that researcher every few sessions digging through the records and providing suggestions as to where to look next to answer questions about the family. Recently I ran into her at the Ottawa Stake Family History Center where she was working on researching her Inch family that came from Cornwall, England. She had the basic details of the family in Cornwall from other sources but now she was looking for the records to confirm or refute the information that had been provided to her¹.

But on with the research...

For today's research problem we are looking for the date of the marriage for Josias Inch to Jane Hoskin. According to research by others, they were married in St. Breward, Cornwall, England in the mid to late 1700s.

For records in England I often first head over to Findmypast. Findmypast started in England as the 1837online.com site with images of the General Register Office register pages. While they have branched out from just English collections they have continued to enhance their offerings of England and UK records with new collections being added almost every week.

In searching for Josias Inch in Cornwall within the Parish Marriages of the Birth, Marriage & Death (Parish Registers) collection for England we came up with seven matches with four of those matches in the time period we are interested in.

Screen capture of search results for Josias Inch in Parish Marriages on Findmypast.com

This makes it easy since the first three results all seem to agree that the marriage took place in 1763. The last result is actually the same as the first but just presented in a different format.

The Phillimore Marriage Registers, 1531-1931 collection is made up of the marriage registers transcribed and published by William Phillimore Watts Stiff (later he changed his surname to be Phillimore) prior to his death in 1913. Yes, I could save the image provided by Findmypast to my computer but, from the transcription provided by Findmypast, I learned that the transcribed record for the marriage of Josias Inch and Jane Hoskin can be found in the Cornwall Parish Registers Volume 1. A quick hop over to the Internet Archive and a few minutes of searching I was able to find the complete volume there. Even better, I could download that book to my computer!

W. P. W. Phillimore and Thomas Taylor, editors, Cornwall Parish Registers. Marriages  (London, England: Phillimore & Co., 1900), 1: 22; marriage of Josias Inch and Jane Hoskin, 14 Feb 1763.

Well that was easy. We can stop right there and we are done, right?

Not quite.

There is an asterisk '*' beside the entry. At the bottom of that page we see that the asterisk means that the information is from the Bodmin Transcripts. Why didn't Phillimore just use the parish registers. On page 5 of this volume he explains that between 1753 to 1813 the church marriage records are apparently missing and he made use of the extracts made by Rev. Thomas Taylor, M.A., Vicar of St. Breward. These extracts were created from the Archdeacons' Transcripts held in Bodmin, Cornwall, England.

What about the other two transcripts for the marriage of Josias Inch and Jane Hoskin? The transcription from the Cornwall Marriages collection was made by the Cornwall Family History Society but we don't know where they got their information. But it does states the marriage took place on 14 Feb 1763 in the parish of St. Breward. The record from "England, Boyd's Marriage Indexes, 1538-1850" was provided by the Society of Genealogists and only states the marriage took place in 1763 in St. Breward. Again, we don't know the source they extracted this information from.

Can we possibly find the Archdeacons' Transcripts somewhere else?

Often the place I turn to for more records is FamilySearch. A search of their catalogue reveals that they have in their digitized collection the "Bishop's transcripts for St. Breward, 1676-1773" that was microfilmed from records at the District Probate Court in Bodmin, Cornwall. What is nice about this collection is that you can view it from the comfort of your own home.

In looking up the details about these transcripts for Cornwall, it seems that the Archdeacons' and Bishop's transcripts might be the same since Cornwall was an Archdeaconry. A Bishop's or Archdeacons' transcript isn't necessarily accurate since it is a copy of the parish register but in our case, with the missing register entries for the years we want, it is the best we have.

Parish of St. Breward (St. Breward, Cornwall, England), "Transcript of the Register Book of the Parish of Simon Ward alias St Bruer, March 1763 to May 1764," marriage of Josias Inch and Jane Hoskin, 14 Feb; FHL microfilm 90,240, item 7, image 770.

But notice a little problem...

The dates for the marriage entries are from March 1763 to May 1764. However, all those other records we looked at on Findmypast from various collections all state the marriage took place in either February 1763 or just 1763. However, in the calender's I've used, February comes before March. If we look closely at the entries we see the months increase until after the marriage of John Colmer when it goes from November to February for Josias Inch's marriage followed by another marriage in the parish taking place in April that was recorded after Josias'. That would mean that according to this transcription they were married in 1764 NOT 1763!

Could we have uncovered a century long error in the records that ancestors of Josias may have been using? I think so. It is a problem I've seen before in transcriptions of parish records since often they go from Lady Day (March 25) to Lady Day².

From this I believe we can safely state that Josias Inch of the Parish of St. Tuly and Jane Hoskin of the Parish of St. Breward were married on 14 Feb 1764 in the Parish of St. Breward, Cornwall, England.

This becomes yet another reason why we always need to hunt down the records that transcriptions are created from.

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1. It is something we constantly harp on in the Drop-In Club. Always read the information on the image and if no image is provided look for source of the transcription. We also stress the need to be organized whether using paper or a computer for your record keeping.

2. Lady Day was, before the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in England and it's colonies in 1752, the start of the new year.

Upcoming Genealogy Presentations in 2019

I have a number of upcoming occasions where I will be giving presentations on the subject of genealogy research methodologies. So if you are in the Ottawa, Ontario, Canada area and you have an interest in learning how to better research your family tree please drop by and say hello.

Yours Truly at the Dec 8, 2018 meeting of BIFHSGO. Photographer: Dena Palamedes

Date	Event/Location	Talk	Cost
Apr 6	OGS Ottawa Gene-O-Rama	Genealogical Miracles	$42 for the day
Apr 11	Ottawa Public Library: Nepean Centrepointe	Doing Family Tree Research in Your Pajamas	Free
May 11	Voices From the Dust	Top Ten Tips and Tricks for Finding Your Ancestors	Free
May 23	Ottawa Public Library: Nepean Centrepointe	Chipping Away at the Brickwall	Free
Jun 1	Ottawa Public Library: Nepean Centrepointe	So you want to start researching your family tree?	Free
Sep 27	BIFHSGO Annual Conference	Exploring your past with Findmypast	TBD

You can also usually find me helping out at the Ottawa Public Library - Nepean Centrepointe branch every second Tuesday at their Local History & Genealogy Drop-In Club.

Talk Announcement - OPL: Managing Your Genealogy Research Project

 

I will be presenting an education session titled "Managing Your Genealogy Research Project" in the Auditorium of the Main Branch of the Ottawa Public Library (120 Metcalfe Street, Ottawa) starting at 7 p.m. on March 27, 2017. This will be a repeat of the well received session I presented at the Carlingwood branch of the Ottawa Public Library in May 2016.

I hope to see you there!

Summary

When we first start delving into our family tree research we often do it in a haphazard way. I will discuss tips and tricks to approach your genealogy research in a methodical manner. The session will touch upon using software or websites to record information, categorizing the information found, and alternate resources to fill in blanks in our research. Using real world examples, I will walk through some of the possible challenges you may encounter and ways to overcome them.