The Reconstitution Process

The reconstitution process consists of two basic phases: data collection and data processing. Only when the reconstitution process is complete can data analysis begin.

The data collection phase for this project began in Australia. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints20 has microfilmed hundreds of millions of documents relevant to tracing genealogies of people of all denominations, principally in North America and Europe, including Great Britain. They are mainly baptism and marriage registers over a century old, but also include census and other records. Copies of these microfilms are available throughout the world for a small fee to any researcher who requests them. In the present project, many records on these microfilms were accessed in Australia before the fieldwork phase of the project.

19 _{For example, there were 111,481 marriages in England and Wales in the period July 1837-June 1838.}

Records on microfilm were either transcribed verbatim into Excel spreadsheets, or a précis was made of the key features of the record that were relevant to this project. For example, in Bastardy Examinations, it was not necessary for this project to transcribe every detail recorded of how the conception of the child took place, who consented to what and the relative ‘moral character’ of the parties. The crucial pieces of information for this project were the relevant dates and the identifying information of all the parties involved.

When all the relevant records that were available on microfilm in Australia had been accessed, the fieldwork began. Original paper records in the appropriate county record offices were accessed in England during fieldwork conducted in Wiltshire, Somerset and Dorset between January and August 2007 and between April and June 2008.

Original paper records viewed at record offices in England were either transcribed verbatim into Excel spreadsheets or photographed at the record office. Later, photographed records were transcribed into spreadsheets either by the present author or by a team of volunteers interested and experienced in family history in southwest Wiltshire. These transcribed records were later put on the internet for free public use21.

Millions of line-by-line transcriptions for hundreds of other parishes in Wiltshire, Somerset and Dorset were downloaded by the present author from file-sharing websites of family historians, which are described in Section 3.4. These were combined into a single baptism index and a single marriage index. The original full transcriptions were retained. The consolidated index meant that millions of records of baptisms and hundreds of thousands of records of marriage could be searched simultaneously. For example, if there was no

independent information on a person’s birthplace, the consolidated baptism index could be searched for hundreds of parishes in Wiltshire, Somerset and Dorset. In a similar way, the marriage index could be searched for an earlier or later marriage of an individual, or the marriage of parents or grandparents. The two indexes contained Anglican, Catholic and various Protestant Dissenting records, as well as workhouse records of birth.

The second phase of the reconstitution process was data processing, including record linkage. Information from the relevant data sources was used to create new individual records in the database described in Section 3.5.2, or to add further information to records already in the database. For example, an individual record might be created in the database from a marriage certificate, then other information about the individual’s baptism, children, occupation, residence, death and burial might be added to the record as these were processed.

Records were created for every person who was married in Stourton or Kilmington in the research period, as well as every person who was baptised in either of the parishes (regardless of birthplace) or born in either of the parishes (regardless of where they were baptised, or if at all). Records were created for every person who was present on census night in either of the parishes (Section 3.4.5).

Four generation pedigrees were then traced for all people married in Stourton or Kilmington in the research period, using the wide array of data sources described in Section 3.4. Genealogies frequently extended to nearby parishes and further afield.

When an individual who married in Stourton or Kilmington was widowed at the time of marriage, their previous marriages, and any children thereof, were traced. All marriage partners were traced until death, and any subsequent geographic moves, additional children and later marriages were recorded.

The most frequently used data sources were church, census and civil registration records (Section 3.4). Other sources of data described in Section 3.4 were used when the required information (for example, birthplace, marriage date or parentage) could not be determined from the three main data sources, or where contradictory or ambiguous data had been acquired. When data sources provided contradictory information, one version of the information was selected based on the relative reliability of the data sources, although the alternative version was also stored in the database. For example, if a man claimed that his birthplace was Stourton but his Catholic baptism record specified his place of birth as Penselwood, then he would be recorded in the database as having been born in Penselwood, with Stourton as an alternative birthplace. In analyses in this project, only primary birthplaces or dates were used and alternatives were ignored.

Some people had a great deal of information entered about them into the database, including religion, literacy level, state of health, pedigree, level of inbreeding, criminal history, occupation and economic circumstances, whilst others had only a single item of information, such as date of baptism or presence in the parish on census night. The level of detail sought was dependent upon the analysis for which they were a subject. For example, someone who was a spouse in a marriage in Stourton or Kilmington would have extensive information sought and recorded about them, whereas a person who played a more

peripheral role, such as being a witness at a wedding, or being a godparent to a child, might have little information recorded.

The sources of data described in the next section were entirely documentary. No biochemical or genetic testing of descendants or any human biological material was undertaken. It was assumed that the father of any child was the man who believed it to be so. Modern evidence suggests a paternal discrepancy22 rate of between 0.8% and 30%, with a median of 3.7%, across a range of studies, with younger and poorer parents more at risk (Bellis et al. 2005). No attempt has been made to allow for paternal discrepancy in this project.

3.4 Sources of Data