G2G: Question about parental verification on WikiTree [closed]

Question

I have a 5th great grandfather who married a woman named Susannah. They had 10 children. There is no marriage record and no birth records for any of the children. They immigrated to Maryland from England around 1725 or 1730. His eldest son was Daniel born around 1720 in England. Their second eldest was John about 6 years junior. 

There is a suspicion that Susannah is not Daniel's mother based on a comment made at court when she requested her eldest son administer her husband's will for her. She names her son John. 

My question is, does this require that I remove Susannah as Daniel's mother? I thought we could identify a parent as uncertain. 

I would very much like to keep her as Daniel's uncertain mother until further proof arrives, such as a marriage  or birth certificate. 

Is there a rule or permission one needs?

Thank you.

Comments

Was Daniel still alive at the time Susannah asked the court for her eldest son John to administer her husband's will?

And how positive are you that Daniel was born about 1720 and six years prior to John?

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I think it should be mentioned here that it's not all that unusual to encounter inconsistent bits of data about 300-year-old people.  I think the preferred approach is to explain the inconsistency in the Bio (just as you have done in the question) and mention what would be needed to resolve it and why you chose the approach you did.  That may prevent a helpful editor from correcting your work later without any evidence.

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Hi Dennis, thank you. This has been done. Despite my research notes and my request to keep Susannah as his uncertain mother, a collaborator continues to edit his page with language that insists she is not and in my latest attempt to add her back on, a comment telling me to stop adding her. I am not her PM.

I am really just looking for WikiTree's policies.

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People, especially women, died quite frequently as young adults.

You say you don't have evidence to contradict her own statement about who her eldest son is.

It seems that, per the best available evidence, she is not his mother. I don't think she should be set as his mother until the best available evidence suggests that she is. I don't understand why your desire to keep her as an ancestor should trump what the record reflects.

P.S. just this very morning I ran across a case of this in my tree, and am working to have the mother removed from the earlier children of one of my ancestors. Do I want more ancestors??? Of course I do. But I don't want to latch on to people who aren't my ancestors, and I don't want to perpetuate information that is contradicted by primary contemporaneous records. I hope wikitree is not becoming a place where this is the way we lean, because I would feel compelled to keep arguing about it each time it occurs in my tree.

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So how do we deal with non-biological parents on WikiTree. If indeed she is not his biological parent, yet she raised him, is she not permitted to be connected to him and identified as uncertain?

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There is a non-biological setting for parents.

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Again, IF Daniel was still alive at the time Susannah went to court asking for her eldest son John to be executor of her husband's estate, then I would concur that Susannah was not mother of Daniel.

BUT if Daniel was deceased at the time of the court request, then Susannah COULD have been mother of Daniel

OR if it's possible that Daniel was actually YOUNGER than John, then Susannah could have been mother to both (hence my question: how do you know he was six years older?).

Answer 1

You can mark the mother as 'uncertain' on Daniel's edit page.  There's nothing wrong with that; in fact, I think it's quite common.

Comments

I don't understand why there is nothing wrong with setting relationships that are contradicted by primary sources. It seems like an archetypal example of the definition of wrong in the field of genealogy.

Answer 2

Thank you all for your replies. I have decided to attach her as an Uncertain parent, possibly even a non-biological parent. But since she did raise all of the children, I believe it is fair to keep her attached until more research is done.