Deciphering Conflicting Information

Photo by Rasa Kasparaviciene on Unsplash

​As family historians we love finding records about our ancestors. The only thing worse than not finding those records is perhaps finding conflicting information on the records. How do you resolve this? Let’s look at some ideas.

​I’ve lately been delving through an ancestor’s data from Wisconsin. He emigrated from Bavaria Germany and lived in Wisconsin until he died of old age in 1913. I have his marriage record, census records, land records, old soldiers home record, obituary and death record. Plus, a couple of family history books that note his birth and death. However, the challenge lies in his birth date.
 
the records related to Ancestor A’s Birth:
 

• February 7, 1826 – birth date from Marriage Record
• February 7, 1826 – Family History Book
• About 1826 – age 34 in 1860 census
• About 1825/1826 - Age 45 in 1870 census
• About 1826 – age 54 in 1880 census
• About 1826 – declaration of intent to become a citizen.
• Feb 1825 – 1900 census (age 75)
• About 1825 – 1910 census (age 85)
• Feb. 16, 1837 – veterans grave registration form
• February 7, 1823- Obituary from newspaper
• 1826 - Age 61 in 1887 from Civil War Pension request
• 1826/27 - Age 70 in 1897 from Civil War Pension request
• 1822 – Death Record
• 1823 - Death age – 90 years in his burial record
• February 7, 1826- on his gravestone

 
Whew! Well, I was fortunate that most records lean to the 1826 birthdate. However, one thing to look at is what records involved Ancestor A giving the date or his age himself. The top records that stand out to me are:
Marriage Record, Civil War Pension Requests, Intent to become a Citizen and the Census Records. I would consider the Marriage Record, Intent to become a Citizen and the Civil War Pension Records to be primary records. Based on these records I am confident that his birth date is February 7, 1826.
 
Finally, the German birth records for my ancestor’s region have become available online, so I went in search of his birth record. I was able to find a birth record for Ancestor A for the exact date of February 7, 1826, with the correct father and unreadable mother name in a village about four miles from the village noted in his marriage record. The village noted in his marriage record did not have any records that related to his family. I checked ten years before and after that 1826 date and in three nearby villages to make sure I didn’t miss anything. Based on the records in the United States and this recent find, I’m satisfied with my conclusion.
 
 It is interesting that most of the misinformation came from records surrounding his death with his birth year was noted as 1822/23. However, if the same family member gave the incorrect information or it was filed incorrectly at the Old Soldiers Home where he died, I could see how this would happen.
 
If you want to sort your data, build an excel spreadsheet. Or just write down the date and source documents have I have above. It doesn’t have to be complex to help you analyze your data. After you do that, give more weight to documents where your ancestor was the source of the information. In other words, they were present when the document was created. An exception would be the actual birth record, that record is closest to the actual event (if you are looking for a birth date). Hopefully, his parents would have the correct date logged with church or civil records. Death information which includes birth information is given by someone else after the death of the ancestor. We would hope that the death date is correct but other information needs to be verified depending on the informant giving the information. (Just think of how many death records we all have that note the parents as “unknown” or from “Germany” as that information was not always passed down to the younger generations.)
 
I hope this gives you some ideas about how and what to focus on when you have conflicting dates for a specific event. It is easy to go down the wrong path with examining your sources. Good luck deciphering those conflicting dates!