Читать книгу Collins Tracing Your Family History - Ryan Tubridy, Anthony Adolph - Страница 21

‘What was your grandfather’s mother called?’

‘Oh, I don’t know.’

‘I think it was Doris.’

‘No, no, Doris was his sister. His mother was Milly!’

Another tip: if they can’t remember a date of, say, when someone died, try to get them to narrow down the period in which it could have happened.

‘When did your great-grandmother die?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Well, do you remember her?’

‘Oh yes, she was at my wedding.’

‘So she was alive in 1935. And was she at your first child’s christening in 1937?’

‘Oh no, she died before then.’

Be sensitive, too, to changing social attitudes. Fascinating though it may be to you, the very elderly may not want to talk about their parents’ bigamous marriage, so if you want any information from them you must tread very carefully. One man’s black sheep, after all, is another’s hero.