The Known Unknowns
The family history is remarkably
complete. We explore here where it has been necessary to rely on the most
probable narrative where certainty has been impossible
This webpage
is still to be written.
From
science to story telling
Genealogy
begins as a scientific enterprise. Whilst the first step in a genealogical
journey begins by gathering stories from relatives, it quickly becomes
necessary to build increasingly complicated family trees. The primary tools in
that exercise are records of births, marriages and deaths, made possible by the
start of parish records in the mid sixteenth century, and cross checking these
with census records, which show how families relate together, and where they
lived. I spent years on that exercise, following up on my father’s work, with
the aspiration to compile a comprehensive genealogy and a full history of one
family. Modern search resources, including the extraordinary power of the
access to records provided by Ancestry
and Find
my Past, both of which I subscribe to, are essential to the exercise.
However the
listing of names and how they relate to each other is only a first step. In themselves,
family trees are not very interesting. What is more interesting is the stories
of the individuals who make up those trees.
I have found
the more interesting research begins when the family tree is complete, or as
complete as it can be, and the time comes to turn to other records, like
military records, medieval records of freemen or poachers, … The journey then
becomes even more interesting by turning to newspaper articles … Then …
exploration of the history of the places where groups of the family lived …
Rory
Stewart’s 2024 podcast on BBC Sounds, The History of Ignorance,
advocates a recognition that there is as much value in ignorance, and
imagination, in art, as in a scientific approach.
Genealogy
becomes most interesting, and more useful, when it is a roadmap through history,
and it can then become a source of inspiration and pattern, …
Standards
of proof
In 2002
Donald Rumsfeld made his well known observation that as
we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know
there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there
are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we
don't know we don't know.
It becomes
increasingly obvious in genealogical research that it is possible to find known
facts from written records, but it is inevitable that no genealogist, nor
historian, is able to tell an entire history with
certainty.
Parish
records from the sixteenth century allow many families to be assembled to a
near complete family record from that time, though inevitably with gaps where records
no longer exist. From the nineteenth century, census records provide the additional
information which makes the exercise much easier, but census records are also
not always complete. Where there is a record of an individuals
birth, marriage, death or circumstances in a census year, it is possible to be
pretty certain of that fact.
Even before
the sixteenth century, the richness
of medieval sources, means that significant elements of a family story can
be synthesised with certainty.
Sometimes
the known facts can be glued together with other facts, to build up the matrix
of the family story.
As lawyer –
levels of evidential proof
Standard of
proof in criminal trials the highest – beyond reasonable doubt – near certainty
– post c1550 parish records
Some gaps
post c1550 and pre 1550 an assembly of medieval records – generally impossible
to achieve certainty, but still possible to use intelligence and imaginations
to achieve a lesser standard of proof, the civil standard of proof, on a
balance of probabilities or more likely than not
Inevitably
there are gaps in evidential record – possibly the realm of historical fiction
to fill gaps by imagining the most likely story of the missing events,
experiences, perceptions …