The backbone of every family tree consists of birth, marriage and death certificates and census returns, but more often than not it's the hidden archival treasures that really make an episode of Who Do You Think You Are? stand out from the crowd. As every new discovery is made in the staple family history sources, the WDYTYA? research team try to think what else might be unearthed in additional records.
Were any male ancestors the right age to have fought in the First World War? If so, we should look for surviving service papers for them. Have we got any farmers or yeomen living in rural communities on the 1841 census? We'd better check to see if tithe maps and apportionment books exist for those parishes to help us identify their properties. Were any of these people doing reasonably well financially? Let's make sure that we've searched high and low for wills and probate inventories, and checked death-duty indexes. It's important to look for names as well as all) too.
