Barking Up the Wrong Tree: Apologies and Bigamy

26 October 2012

Apologies and Bigamy

This week I found out that all the work I do to format the green boxes is for naught. Anyone not viewing the blog in Firefox is probably seeing a mess. Sorry! I'll try to keep the attempts to create columns to a minimum from now on. Now back to our regularly scheduled post.
Comments after the jump.

JAMES MADISON ROBERTS
(1834-1915)

MARRIAGES and Children

1852 MARRIAGE to Mary E ???? (1836-1852)
1859 MARRIAGE in Texas to Mary Frances Baker (1836-1914)
1861 Josiah Roberts born in Alabama to Mary A (B: 1848)
1861 William Hays Roberts in Texas to Mary Frances Baker
1861 Evan Roberts in Texas to Sarah Elizabeth Tally
1866 MARRIAGE to Nancy Roberts (1847-1912)
1868 Ada Roberts in Mississippi to Nancy Roberts
1869 MARRIAGE in Texas to Sarah Elizabeth Tally (1849-1929)
1870 Eugenia Roberts in ???? to Sarah Elizabeth Tally
1870 Eugene Roberts in Texas to unknown mother
1872 Walter Prewitt Roberts in Texas to Nancy Roberts
1872 Walton Roberts in Texas to Sarah Elizabeth Tally
1873 Albert Talley Roberts in Texas to Sarah Elizabeth Tally
1874 Willie Roberts in ???? to Nancy Roberts
1874 Albert Roberts in Texas to Sarah Elizabeth Tally
1876 Edna Roberts in Texas to Sarah Elizabeth Tally
1877 D. W. Robert in Texas to Sarah Elizabeth Tally
1879 Allie Roberts in ???? to Nancy Roberts
1887 MARRIAGE to Levonia (B: 1848)

ⓑⓐⓡⓚⓘⓝⓖ ⓤⓟ ⓣⓗⓔ ⓦⓡⓞⓝⓖ ⓣⓡⓔⓔ

On the positive side, James wasn't turned in a zombie and there aren't records from each of the different families attached to his profile. (Hey, I'm trying to find the good in some of these messes.) The records attached to James are all related to one wife, Sarah Elizabeth, and I think they are correct. There are two oddities though. Here are two of the records. See if you can find the problems.

1870 US Census
James, age 37
Elizabeth, age 21
William, age 8 (male)
Eugenie, age 6/12 (female)

1880 US Census
J M Roberts, head of household, age 47
S E Roberts, wife, age 31
William Roberts, son, age 19
Plus 5 additional children ages 3 - 10.
Note: William's name is transcribed as Evan. The original is illegible but there is a capital W.

1900 US Census
J M Roberts, head of household, age 67, married 41 years
Elizabeth Roberts, wife, age 51, married 41 years

So either James was married before Sarah Elizabeth or they really did marry when Elizabeth was 10 and she gave birth at the age of 12 or 13. If it's the former that means one of the other wives could be the first wife. But if the tree owner is involved in clickology rather than genealogy they'll never get it sorted out.

If you come across an online tree that you think should be featured here please send the link to buwtree(at)gmail(dot)com.

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2 comments:

Canyon WolfMonday, 29 October, 2012
Check out the Big Thunder trees if you want a good laugh - I never took the time to figure out who started it but it is prolific at Ancestry. Here is one of the many

http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/11654831/person/36812521

We covered this tree in our "Fake Family Trees" discussion here
http://www.nedoba.org/gene_fake.html#thunder

Nancy Lecompte
Research Director for Ne-Do-Ba
www.nedoba.org
www.nedoba.blogspot.com
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Blog Reviews

Barking has been "deemed offensive to [Ancestry.com's] brand" and is banned from their Facebook pages. In Ancestry's "Community" comments with links to Barking are censored.
Dear Emma, Hannah, Jemima, Mary Jane, and all of her other personalities agree that I use "the banner of 'education' to actually mock, deride and laugh at [Ancestry's] own customers" and I "can make [my] point concerning tree inaccuracies & cock-ups and their effect on our 'hints' system without being downright unpleasant and sarcastic about it."
Allen says, “your cute little blog is a waste of bandwidth at best”
Ann thinks I'm "...copying and pasting mistakes on trees and calling it a blog" and that my readers are "mean-spirited people...who like to have a laugh at the expense of others."
Sue was really offended by the “...continual stream of sarcasm and constant poking fun...What a nasty taste in my mouth your blog left me with. Unpleasant, sarcastic and jeering at people who you obviously see as your intellectual inferiors. Won't be reading that again.”
And finally from Les, "You truly are a horrible woman, pointing out mistakes is one thing but blatantly laughing and taking the p is completely out of order."

Why?

Researching our family histories we are bound to make mistakes. Hopefully we are quick to correct them. Unfortunately some people refuse to read or think before adding information to their family trees. Some trees have been abandoned so the errors are there for eternity. Here we will laugh, mock and shake our heads at the carelessness, stupidity and/or ignorance of those errors.
All examples are taken from trees published online.
I'll also post tips occasionally, though the messed up trees are a great example of what NOT to do.
If you have an online tree to suggest for a future post please send me a link: buwtree(at)gmail(dot)com

The Fine Print

1. Copyright: Barking Up the Wrong Tree is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License and is owned and administered by Loretta Gillespie.

2. Content: Barking Up the Wrong Tree is responsible for the content of this site, not including visitor comments. Barking Up the Wrong Tree reflects the personal views and opinions of Loretta Gillespie.

3. Credit: Credit is not given to tree owners to protect the clueless. A tree owner who discovers their tree on this site should correct their mistakes so no one else realizes they were once a clickophile.

4. Accuracy and Validity: While there are helpful pointers on Barking Up the Wrong Tree a majority of posts are intended to be humorous. The disastrous trees are copied exactly as they appear on Ancestry.com. These trees are being used to show others what NOT to do.

5. Images: Attempts are made to source images used despite the fact that the trees they are taken from do not include source information.

6. Comments: Barking Up the Wrong Tree will exercise its right to delete comments which are deemed to be spam, offensive, childish or just plain stupid.

7. Liability: The content at Barking Up the Wrong Tree is not to be taken as fact nor absolute. Barking Up the Wrong Tree contains posts that are humorous and posts that are research tips. Barking Up the Wrong Tree is not responsible for anyone who cannot tell the difference between the two. The sites that Barking Up the Wrong Tree links to via hyperlinks are not under its control. Those sites are responsible for the content of those sites. If you do not find the humor on Barking Up the Wrong Tree to your taste then stop reading. If you choose instead to send an email to the owner it may be published on Barking Up the Wrong Tree and mocked publicly.

Thanks to Thomas MacEntee for allowing the use of the GeneaBloggers terms as a template.