Why is FamilySearch abridging its Civil Marriage records for England and Wales?
Until fairly recently, FamilySearch records in the "England and Wales Marriage Registration Index, 1837-2005," collection mirrored what is found both on Find My Past and FreeBMD websites. They showed the names of all other individuals who appear under a particular reference shown in the official records of the General Register Office for England & Wales.
Suddenly, and as illustrated through the links provided, FamilySearch has unhelpfully "clipped" their records, so that only one other name - having the exact same reference - is offered as a "Possible Spouse".
To describe the example I am illustrating through the links below, Adam Alderson's marriage was registered at Tynemouth in 1902 - the record suggesting (on FMP, FreeBMD and previously on FamilySearch) that his spouse was either: Christopher Anderson, Mary Brown or Elizabeth Jane Nicholson. However, the current FamilySearch record only names Christopher Anderson as his "Possible Spouse".
Although the citation for this record is
"England & Wales Marriages, 1837-2005," database, findmypast (http://www.findmypast.com : 2012); citing 1902, quarter 2, vol. 10B, p. 482, Tynemouth, Northumberland, England, General Register Office, Southport, England"
, surely Find My Past has not suddenly withdrawn permission for "its" (albeit public) records to be shown on FamilySearch in the correct manner?
Perhaps a moderator would kindly escalate this issue (passing on this specific example, as just one of the millions of records affected) in a hope that FamilySearch will revert to how it had always shown these records, until the sudden change.
FamilySearch version:
https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:263P-RQV?treeref=G173-NFG
Find My Past version:
https://www.findmypast.co.uk/transcript?id=BMD%2FM%2F1902%2F2%2FAZ%2F000005%2F055&tab=this
FreeBMD version:
Incidentally, the original records show Adam Alderson married Mary Brown!
Update: I see from the dictionary definition I have probably used the wrong word ("abridging") in my title. I find the definition of "abridge" is
"Shorten (a piece of writing) without losing the sense"
whereas, as there were certainly no single-sex marriages in England back in 1902, the current presentation on FamilySearch completely loses all sense!
Answers
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Haven't we been here before with exactly this problem?
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Yes, but following the suggestion by Áine at my recent post about the FamilySearch version(s) of the England & Wales Census collections - see
I thought I would raise the matter with a specific example, in a hope the issue will be passed on and action taken to correct what is proving a most unhelpful current presentation of these records.
Obviously I remain pessimistic about any change taking place. As you know, a third issue that affects us researchers of E&W records is the FamilySearch "England and Wales, National Index of Wills and Administrations, 1858-1957" collection, where - after about seven years (is it now?) and numerous reports - every executor / administrator is still shown incorrectly as a "Beneficiary"!
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Indeed we have, a long discussion here:
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Whoops, sorry - old age has certainly crept up on me, in that I hadn't managed to find that previous post (with examples, too!) and that Ashlee had indeed stated she would pass on. I honestly wasn't intending to be "bumping" the issue - so thanks, Mandy, for the link and sorry again (Ashlee) for raising the matter again.(Although I see it has been 7 months since I first raised this, so hopefully it is working its way "up the list".)
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@Paul W No worries. I've recently had to recreate old threads about unresolved problems. The earlier threads have been shut, so no "Is there a status update, please?" is possible. We have to start over from scratch.
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And now this very issue of showing one spouse where there should be two, has led to @ColinM0288 getting a completely frazzled brain while trying to understand why the distinctively named Florence (Louise) Brushett is present twice (under 2 PIDs) in FS FamilyTree. Once married to Stanley George Smith (as per an Ancestry record, by the way) and a second time to Henry Hodge.
The answer is unfortunately simple - the FS marriage query response should read "Florence Louise Brushett married one of these people - Stanley George Smith, Henry Hellyer Hodge" (as FindMyPast does). Instead it reads "Possible Spouse - Henry Hellyer Hodge". Just the one.
Until now I felt that this was only potentially a time-waster - now we have proof that it really is. I think that the data is clear that the person who honestly entered the Henry Hodge data did so in August 2022, so the corruption dates back at least then.
See the post below in the England Research Group.
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@Paul W I am happy to report that the England and Wales Civil Marriage Registration has been greatly improved. I would like to say "fixed" but the list of possible spouses includes those of the same gender. I have asked engineers if that can be cleaned up, but at least we can work with it for the time being.
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I was about to say what excellent news - and it is to a certain extent, in that all the names indexed against a particular reference are now to be seen when undertaking a search. Sadly, what the engineers haven't fixed is the appearance when these items are added to profiles as sources. As illustrated, there is still only the one other name that appears when viewing the source. The "workaround" is to click on the URL, whereby the other names are revealed, but it is disappointing those names are not clearly visible on the main page of the source, too.
On the "Possible Spouse" issue, that is obviously a nonsense suggestion when no single-sex relationships are probably included in this England and Wales Marriage Registration collection (legislation on this matter not coming into force until recent years). So, whilst the "Possible Spouse" term could perhaps be changed to "Other names on this record", I am far more concerned that the other recorded names should be clearly displayed, even when added to a profile.
In case the remaining problem is unclear, here is an illustration.
Here is Lewis Betjemann with the three other individuals listed against reference 1c 422:
But here is how the source appears once attached to his profile - with still only the one alternative spouse (who, in this case, does happen to be the individual he married, so not the perfect example, whereby the one name often does happen to be an individual of the ****):
I discovered that clicking on the (URL) link to the record does make the other names "reappear", but still think it would be good if the engineers could go that little bit further in making this a "complete fix".
As you can see, the page produced after clicking on the URL (above) has the same information as the one illustrated in the first screenshot:
Obviously, it would have been better to use an example where the single name (as shown in the second screenshot) is a male, and I'll now try to find one, but meanwhile, I think I have illustrated the main point - of all the names needing to appear on each of these pages, instead of two still remaining hidden when viewed as a source.
However, an excellent major step in getting these records restored to their previous state. Thank you so much for your help, and the work of the engineers.
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Ah, here's a better example.
Firstly, how the record now appears when found in a search:
Unfortunately, as the "Possible Spouse" is the (male) first named alternative, this is how the item appears as a source….:
Until one clicks on the URL link, and happily can now see the full record again:
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@Paul W When I tried attaching the source it does show all possible spouse names.
It could be you attached the record before the problem was corrected which would mean it is taking the data at the time of the attach and not dynamically showing the data. Let us know if it still continues to omit the others on the record for you.
Source Linker, of course only shows the principal person on the record.
Thank you for communicating so well when you provide feedback. It is appreciated.
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The problem appears to have been resolved - literally overnight!
If you look at the screenshot below, you will see the difference from the one of the same source I posted yesterday. From the Sources section, only William Thomas Bastian was shown as a "Possible Spouse", whereas today all three names in the original record are now shown. I looked back to sources I added to other profiles in 2022 and these, too, have been similarly updated.
Again, many thanks for your help in getting this put right - I imagine that last stage (of being able to see all "Possible Spouses" immediately upon opening the source) was probably being implemented within hours of my December 11 post!
Screenshot showing the contrast between what I see today and how the source was displayed yesterday:
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