New Ancestry hints? Are they accurate? Is this really my ancestor? [closed]

Question

Recently Ancestry has introduced a 'potential father' 'potential mother' to its hints.

One such suggests that my brickwall and my troubling connection to the Swafford/Howard/Lee families may be addressed by the merge of Racheal Lamar and my ancestor Rachel Unknown Miller (Unknown-353481).

Anyone else have good luck with these potential hints so far back?  I wonder this is helped by all of hte DNA tests I have done.

Comments

And with Herbert and Michelle who's response popped up while I was typing, well said all!

Answer 1

I agree with Lynda and Dallace on the Ancestry hints.  By all means check them out, but don't believe them without proof.

As for Rachel Lamar and Rachel (Unknown) Miller, the profiles don't provide any reason to believe they match.  The only things they have in common are first name, approximate year of birth, and state of birth.  Neither one shows a source for any of those facts.  I looked in FamilySearch, and found no record of Rachel Lamar marrying Mr Miller.  Miller's son was born in 1827 in Georgia.  If Rachel Lamar was executrix of her father's will in 1840, she would have been recorded as Rachel Miller (Was she? No copy of will or link to it provided.).  Finally, the 1850 US Census showed a Rachel Lamar, age 50, living in Randolph County with Margaret Johnson, 59, and Hannah Lamar, 18.  I think you have to rule her out before matching Lamar-276 to another Rachel.

Comments

This is my thinking as well. I have asked the profile manager for more information regarding the Rachel listed in the will.

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PS. I rewrote the source for Rachel Unknown Miller so that it is easier to reference. Thanks for the heads up to the confusion.

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Thanks for adding the link in Rachel's profile, and thanks for the star, Lance!

Answer 2

These hints as to potential father and potential mother are based solely on other tree information, not on DNA tests. Do not accept any of them without thoroughly checking sources.

Comments

Do you have a source for this response?  

I am curious because I am on of the only people working on this branch of my family. I have never found anyone suggesting this link before.

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It was discussed in several of the good genealogy groups on facebook when the new function first appeared. If you want a source try the Ancestry help pages or send a question to their user support. I can also tell you from my own experience that there is no connection of these «potential» parents to my DNA results and in the majority of cases I can disprove them. Other people have just picked a name and rough date that fits without considering all available evidence. If enough trees show it then it can pop up as a potential parent, however wrong it may be. I have found a couple that were actually correct and the majority were wrong for the lines I am researching.

Answer 3

Hi Lance, I am a member of Ancestry also, I don't pay attention to the new potential father/mother hints because they are coming from other members trees. Unless you really know the person whose tree these hints are coming from. Most of the members in Ancestry copy from other trees and you never know if the information is correct. Just my opinion.

Comments

Do you have a source for this response?  

I am curious because I am on of the only people working on this branch of my family. I have never found anyone suggesting this link before.

Answer 4

I agree with the Dallace & Lynda - the ancestry hints are taken from all the trees, many just copied blindly from each other - combining all the mistakes with it. They are worth looking into and if they turn out to be correct, then you can add the ancestors manually.

Comments

Do you have a source for this response?  

I am curious because I am on of the only people working on this branch of my family. I have never found anyone suggesting this link before.

Answer 5

I must agree with Lynda and Dallace, use the hints as a guideline to  further research. I used to use other family tree sites before joining Wikitree and like 3 at a time. When I updated info. on one them the other two would buzz me with a hint!  Also when someone else entered info. on their tree with the same or similar info and the part of the name etc. was same or similar I would get a hint notification.

I found a few helpful when I conducted research thereafter, but very few. So I would say proceed with caution.

Needless to say I only use Wikitree now, this is the only one world tree that does not allow duplicates and bogus or unsourced information in profiles. Thank you for bringing this to G2G, i'm Sure a lot of members will benifit from this discussion.

Comments

Shaun, I still use Ancestry, as they do have a few sources not available elsewhere.  Also, it's a much friendlier platform for rough-drafting people and families than WT.  Their document hints can be quite useful, but I long ago quit paying attention to their Tree hints.

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This is not the normal 'tree hint' which I have experienced in the past.

I am curious because I am on of the only people working on this branch of my family. I have never found anyone suggesting this link before.

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Thank you Herbert, that,s fine. Yes it is a good site for research, I am quite happy to do research there and do subscribe to it occasionally for research, As I said I just chose not to have my tree there, my choice, nothing wrong with yours either, if it serves you well as a platform for drafting etc. then that is good. yes when my tree was on there then I agree their document hints are excellent!

Answer 6

Are they really just picking any random people who might fit?  Knowing that people are stupid enough to accept any "hint" they might be given?

It's not genealogy, it's a nightmare.