It seems that I will have to add three or four citations to prove my statement.

+7 votes
344 views
Has anyone else had this problem? How do you put it in the biography?

Here is the problem. Edwin and Eleanor, who lived in Christchurch,  were married in 1907. I got this from the official New Zealand Births Deaths and Marriages site. i wanted to flesh out this bare statement so looked for a newspaper write up, but nothing in  "Papers Past". My next place I looked at was "The Wilson Collection' - an index to all sorts of things, and it told me "Knox Archives Dunedin" That site sent  me off to the web page for St Paul's parish in Napier.. and there was their marriage.

How do I prove to a reader of this biography that all these steps were necessary?
WikiTree profile: Nell Bollington
in Genealogy Help by Jean Price G2G6 Mach 5 (55.7k points)
edited by Jean Price

2 Answers

+12 votes
I'd pretty much put all that in the biography, but I might break it down a couple of ways.

First, the final results I would place in the biography. Edwin and Eleanor, who lived in Christchurch, were married in 1907 (and where if possible) and then add <ref>citation</ref>.

Then, I would add a == Research Notes == section, and describe what sources were evaluated for the information you obtained, and which ones you were unable to find a source. Someone may later go along behind you, and find the source under a name with a slightly different spelling and it helps to know what steps were taken sometimes to follow in your footsteps, so to speak.
by Scott Fulkerson G2G Astronaut (1.6m points)
+6 votes
I have a more complex example from the 17th century.  I came across a statement in a document in a private archive that someone I was investigating (Mary Temple) had married Adrian Scrope.  Adrian Scrope was a regicide, descended from the family of Baron Scrope and at the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 he was tried, convicted and executed for treason.  He has had his life documented in chapters and references in books and had a detailed wikitree profile but no mention of a second wife.  So in order to validate the statement from my document I had to get more evidence.

The justification eventually took about ten documents including letters, wills, apprenticeship records and more over a period of 50 years.  The research also discovered extra children and some modifications to previously accepted dates.

I put the analysis into a space page https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Mary-Temple-Scrope which refers to transcriptions of some of the documents.  I then referred to this page from the profiles of Adrian Scrope and Mary Temple.  

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Scrope-126

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Temple-3516
by Peter Mason G2G6 (7.0k points)
edited by Peter Mason

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