1851 & 1861 Scottish Censuses on Ancestry.com today ....

Post by **emanday** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 3:32 pm

Russell wrote: .................scanner asking is this text or an image?
................. Text You really mean that

................. Help Mummy (wailing)

................. sound of blowing fuse
Russell

Sounds about par for the course

I've actually typed up an A4 page and printed it in the time it took for OCR to scan the same document and the operator to get a third of the way through "fixing" it

Don't think I was too popular with the guy who'd authorised buying it

pinkshoes · Post by **pinkshoes** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 4:07 pm

Optical character reader eh - well that would certainly explain a lot.

The advantage of Ancestry is that you can be pretty vague in your search terms, and be prepared to trawl through endless pages in the hope that you'll pick up something from the more bizarre entries. For instance, looking for Duncan McGregor (yes Sarah I'm hanging in there yet), I found a family of Myrezors. Strange as it seems, there is no such family on SP

, but sure enough there's a McGregor family that fits the bill.

It can have you tearing your hair out for sure, but surely patience is one of the virtues of us yins. Just as well really

Its no substitute for SP, but it is a good starting point.

Found something else that might help people looking for Mc's - again searching for McGregor (Robert this time) I found a whole bunch of people by the name of Robert M Gregor (maybe a short sighted optical reader at work). Something else to think about when searching.

Best wishes
Pinkshoes

DavidWW · Post by **DavidWW** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 4:31 pm

M' was at one time a widely used alternative to Mc and Mac, so it might be a misread McGregor, or it might just be M'Gregor

Mhic was also in use.

Always but always search on M*c.............

David

pinkshoes · Post by **pinkshoes** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 4:38 pm

DavidWW wrote:M' was at one time a widely used alternative to Mc and Mac, so it might be a misread McGregor, or it might just be M'Gregor

Mhic was also in use.

Always but always search on M*c.............

David

Yes I've found it's essential on SP to use wildcards but I'm not sure if ancestry goes in for that sort of thing, rather I think it adopts a more chaotic approach to searching

Never knew about Mhic!

Best wishes
Pinkshoes

Post by **SarahND** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 10:10 pm

pinkshoes wrote:Yes I've found it's essential on SP to use wildcards but I'm not sure if ancestry goes in for that sort of thing, rather I think it adopts a more chaotic approach to searching

I do think it is an advantage to be able to search on any tidbit of info, though. I finally found James Giles in the 1861 by putting "landscape" in the occupation (after trying "artist", "portrait", "painter", all to no avail

) I am doing a mini-study of people by the name of Giles (and all available versions that the OCR might see

) who were artists of some sort. It is easy to find them by putting key words in the occupation box. Well... "easy" maybe is putting it too strongly, since only the word "academician" and "landscape" came through correctly

But I did find a "Photographic Artist & Comedian" in Edinburgh, all spelled correctly!!

Regards,
Sarah

Bertha · Post by **Bertha** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 10:26 pm

Character recognition, hmm!
I wonder if I will find my Ross family under Do! On Sp, the census page for 1851 had John Ross,Margaret Ross and several children only the children have Do after their christian names as is the norm when everyone has the same surname.
I can't actually find them any where in St Cuthbert's Edinburgh on Ancestory but they are definitely there on SP. Have even trawled through quite a bit of the parish as you can put in the parish number but still no join. Just as well I was only checking out Ancestory to see how it worked.
Mind you can't find John & Margaret and young Elisabeth (Betsy) anywhere in the 1841 so still hitting a brickwall.
Will now give the Ross'a a rest and hit the buttons for some other rellies.
Happy hunting
Bertha

pinkshoes · Post by **pinkshoes** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 11:38 pm

SarahND wrote:
I do think it is an advantage to be able to search on any tidbit of info, though.
Regards,
Sarah

Completely agree Sarah - sometimes you only have that one snippet to go on and it can come up trumps.

It's just a wee bit disconcerting to look down the index and see all these very exotic looking names, but I'd much rather have found "Myrezor" for McGregor and be given the opportunity to test my powers of deduction than be met with 0 matches

Best wishes
Pinkshoes

Ted · Post by **Ted** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 11:47 pm

Tisk, tisk everyone - in the excitement of the thread we have forgot wur manners ! - a new member in wur midst an' we forgot oor welcome - Susanna - a hearty welcome to TS - long may ye remain wi' us.

Best regards

Ted & all yer new pals on TS

pinkshoes · Post by **pinkshoes** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 11:51 pm

Oh my goodness - Susanna, huge apologies

Welcome to TS and thank you for very useful first post.

Best wishes
Pinkshoes

DavidWW · Post by **DavidWW** » Fri Dec 01, 2006 12:01 am

Ted wrote:Tisk, tisk everyone - in the excitement of the thread we have forgot wur manners ! - a new member in wur midst an' we forgot oor welcome - Susanna - a hearty welcome to TS - long may ye remain wi' us.

Best regards

Ted & all yer new pals on TS

Tsk, tsk, indeed

A hearty welcome to Susanna on her first post.

Orraverybest

David