Taken from the manuscripts of Rev Charles Kerry (vol 10)

Family Trees, Pedigree, or lineage – are they the same, different or simply different things to different people?

A family tree is something that I produce when I am researching. It is a rough drawing of who sits where in the family group, on occasions, the group has overlaps, siblings marry siblings, strengthening the relationship or connection with two families.

It might have some basic information, perhaps a birth date, a source might appear as an abbreviation, a place where something happened represented by an initial or two. For me this is a work in progress, it helps me think and I frequently have more than one version – each version is dated. The versions appear as I perhaps move notebooks, or perhaps I take one individual, then move them to a page of their own and build their tree.

The image at the top of this post is repeated below in a larger format.

Taken from the manuscripts of Rev Charles Kerry (Vol 10).

I talked yesterday about the Budd family. This is a pedigree that was drawn by the curate of Puttenham Surrey, Charles Kerry. Kerry kept a series of manuscripts, which included things told to him by parishioners, information from parish registers and little antidotes, for example, he refers to my several times great grandfather, Richard Budd as having a fine tenor voice. Richard Budd was born in 1742, there is no way that I can think of that I would have known that fact, had someone note written that down. It is the little details like that, which takes a pedigree and turns it into something resembling a family tree.

Here is another example of a family tree created using pen and paper….

Butcher “Tree” – created Julie Goucher, 1993

Drawn in the format of a rough mind-map it puts people where they should be, adds in varying information – dates, places, occupations, legal/inheritance/taxation information. 

A pedigree is names, dates and perhaps places. It is a document that shows the ancestral pathway of an individual, their parents, siblings, and ancestors. If you look back at the first image, you will see that under the Budd family, Kerry mentions the word pedigree. As I said, different things to different people.

A Lineage Society is essentially researching direct descent from an ancestor; ancestry or pedigree; there is a list of some of the Societies HERE. You could think that my research with Henry Budd was an example of this, and perhaps it is, however, what makes it different, is that I have researched the Budd’s which includes some which is not related to me. I have not researched every individual or family with the Surname Budd. Usually with Lineage Societies you provide genealogical evidence with sources cited and pay the subscription fee to join.

A One-Name Study or Surname Study as defined by the Guild of One-Name Studies, aims to research ALL instances of the surname wherever they appear globally and across all dates. There is no time constraints as to when the study goes global – think marathon, rather than a sprint!  The reason for the remit to be global is because of migration.

There are “micro versions” or “focus studies”, where people are researching all of a particular surname in a county, or two, or perhaps all the people with a specific name, for example Henry Budd.

For my own Butcher One-Name Study, I have devised that I will work through material in batches, essentially following counties that are neighbouring, as that typically means migration paths. For me that is Surrey and Sussex which is where my own family hails from. Then I am moving to Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, Devon and Cornwall and so forth. For Countries outside of the UK, I am focusing Australia, beginning with Tasmania, New South Wales and Western Australia. That does not mean I have not deviated from my plan, sometimes the research itself dictates a path way.