For an article I'm working on, I was studying a woman's neighbors to see if their records could help me identify her parents. I noticed that the neighbors in a transcription that I used were different from the neighbors on the scans on the archive's website. It turns out the transcription had transcribed the pages in a different order. The person of interest was at the bottom of the page, so the next-page neighbors in the transcription were different from the neighbors in the scans. Further … [Read more...]
About this website
Creating a website like this is a fun activity. There are so many options, so many choices. What do visitors want? What do I want? In this blog I will describe some of the things I encounter in developing and maintaining this website.
Quick Tip – Check for Marriage Booklets in Your Family
21 November 2018 by Leave a Comment
If your family lived in the Netherlands after say 1850, check your family papers to see if there is a marriage booklet ("trouwboekje"). These booklets are given to the spouses during the marriage ceremony and record the information about the spouses. It is then updated when children are born or when the spouses die. See the article about my mother's descent from her father Jan Marijnissen for an example of using a marriage booklet. … [Read more...]
Was Eleanor of Aquitaine my Ancestor? Generation 12 – Laureijs Denijs Peter Pulskens
16 November 2018 by 2 Comments
This is the thirteenth post in a series about my possible line of descent from Eleanor of Aquitaine. In the first post, I explained how I discovered the possible line, and how I am going to verify it one generation at a time. In the last post, I proved that my eighth great-grandmother Jenneken Laureijs Denis Peeters was the daughter of Laureijs Denis Peters, also known as Pulskens, and Anna Cornelis Peters, also known as Coijen. Laureijs Denis Peter Pulskens, son of Aleid Laureijs Colen The … [Read more...]
Ask Yvette – How far can you go back?
9 November 2018 by 1 Comment
One question that pops up regularly in conversations is how far back we can trace our Dutch ancestors. Here's a rough overview that will apply to most people. Research in the 1900s and 2000s is difficult because of privacy restrictions. You will need permission or proof of death to access records of people born less than 100 years ago. Since 1811, the entire population has been recorded in the civil registration. Anybody who died in the Netherlands after 1811 should be in it. Using the civil … [Read more...]
Dutch Genealogy News for October 2018
2 November 2018 by Leave a Comment
Here is an overview of the new sources, projects, and news about archives that were announced last month. Online sources Scans of the aldermen's court of Gilze and Rijen in Noord-Brabant (1602-1811) are available online at the Regionaal Archief Tilburg website. The records of Willem Kolff, the inventor of the artificial kidney, have been scanned by the Kampen City Archives, where the records are kept. The collection can be consulted via Archieven.nl. Several transcriptions of tax and … [Read more...]
Quick Tip – Names are Different in Latin
31 October 2018 by 1 Comment
If your family was Roman Catholic, their church records will be in Latin. These records used the Latin version of names. Since Dutch search engines only find exact matches, you will need to search for these Latin names or use wildcards. For example, my ancestor Jan Smulders appeared in Catholic records as Joannes. His father Hendrik is called Henricus in Latin. Searching for "Jan Smulders" would not have found his baptismal record, but J* Smulders would have. Even initials can change though; … [Read more...]
Quick tip : Upload your DNA to MyHeritage. Now!
24 October 2018 by Leave a Comment
MyHeritage allows you to upload your autosomal DNA results from other companies. This is a currently a free service, but after 1 December 2018, advanced features will be paid. If you upload now, these services will remain free. Upload your DNA now! If you upload after 1 December 2018, you will still see your matches but you won't be able to use the chromosome browser or see ethnicity predictions. The chromosome browser is particularly useful since you can then see if multiple people match … [Read more...]
Was Eleanor of Aquitaine my Ancestor? Generation 11 – Jenneken Laureijs Denis Peeters
19 October 2018 by 2 Comments
This is the twelfth post in a series about my possible line of descent from Eleanor of Aquitaine. In the first post, I explained how I discovered the possible line, and how I am going to verify it one generation at a time. In the last post, I proved that my seventh great-grandmother Petronella van Vlijmen was the daughter of Hugo Dirck Huijgen and Jenneken Laureijs Denis Peeters. Jenneken Laureijs Denis Peeters, daughter of Laureijs Denis Peeters The research to prove the parents of Petronella … [Read more...]
Ask Yvette – Where Can I Find Records For St. Eustatius?
12 October 2018 by 4 Comments
Over the past months, two readers have asked me where to find records for St. Eustatius, an island in the Caribbean. Since more people may have the same question, I thought I'd turn it into an article. St. Eustatius is a special municipality in the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The former Dutch colony is part of the Netherlands Antilles. If you have ancestors from St. Eustatius, here is an overview of the available records. An index to the civil registration birth, marriage, and death … [Read more...]
Quick Tip – Unexpected Nicknames
10 October 2018 by 11 Comments
My grandmother's official name was Catharina Flooren, but she was known as "Toos." That's a common derivative of Catharina, which came about via Catharina > Cato > Toos. Other examples of nicknames that might seem surprising are Mees for Bartholomeus, Elen for Aleida, and Nel for Petronella or Cornelia. Especially before the introduction of the civil registration, you can find people in records under different variations of their names. To find out other forms of a name, you can … [Read more...]
