DUNK genealogy....how can so many get it wrong on Ancestry

[Ringrose]

I have a several times great grandmother Elizabeth Dunk born around .1730s and who married a John Nightingale in 1770 in Hawkhurst.Trying to find her birth I downloaded a will of Robert Dunk 1764,from Ancestry.From the clues in this will it was obvious that he was her father.In this will four children are mentioned in his first marriage and quite a few more in his second .One of these siblings in the first marriage Ann married a John Marchant and these were both witnesses at her wedding...proof enough.
There are more than 20 trees on Ancestry which with a little more research on Ancestry would come up with the right answers.All the trees give Roberts second marriage to a Margaret Heath or Margaret Heath Powell as taking place in Hawkhurst.With a few minutes research all these owners of trees would find a Clandestine marriage for Robert Dunk of Hawkhurst to a Maragaret Powell in London in 1848 in London.
It really amazes me how so many just take it for granted that all trees are right.
Perhaps any Dunk researchers who have put their tree on Ancestrymight like
to look at Ancestry and Roberts Will and marriage
Ringrose

[lizdb]

Happens so often.

Have something similar myself. Loads of trees with incorrect info, claiming that their ancestor Charlottes father was a Robert and giving a huge tree going back from that Robert.  All very good - my tree back from Robert agrees with what they have found. Just one problem - I also have a copy of the Roberts Will, which clearly gives info about HIS daughter Charlotte, her married name, her husbands name etc. And that is very clearly not the Charlotte that the many many trees are descended from! Apart from the married name difference, "their" Charlotte died in childbirth, and this Will for the person they are claiming to be her father was written well after that date, mentioning his daughter Charlotte with a lot of detail as she was very much alive! And she is on my tree, and I know that all the stuff from Robert backwards therefore are her ancestors, and not those of the other Charlotte who had died pre Roberts Will.
So their trees may be correct back to Charlotte, but everything they have beyond that may be correct in itself, is not their ancestors!
And of course, everyone has copied it.
I can see what they have done. They have an approx. year of birth for their Charlotte, and the only one matching that on familysearch is the one who is the dtr of the Robert - so they have claimed it without any further evidence to back it up. See it so often!  But sorry, the familysearch one is NOT theirs, their ones christening must not be on that site.  So important to collect all the evidence you can, to confirm findings from as many angles as possible, especially when you get back to pre 1837 and pre census era.

[Ringrose]

Totally agree and isn't that part of the challenge of finding your ancestry by proper researching .Sometimes it takes years and sometimes quite quickly.There can't be much fun in not making your own discoveries.
Today my husband has just received a will which he thought to be a direct but some of the people mentioned he's never heard of so it's back to the drawing board .
Ringrose

[AJ100]

Agree totally with everything that's said. Other people's trees and especially trees on line are notoriously unreliable. For that reason I will trust only parish records - and even they can be wrong. But they are the nearest think to accurate that there is.
No help, of course, if you cannot get hold of them, but a request on here does help, as a lot of people have found.

AJ

[finnisfinder]

 AJ, you have helped me a lot, I'm grateful for that.
 
 I had trouble with someone who would not accept that a male was actually male. He did have an
 unusual Christian name, one that is common now for girls! However this man was recorded as
 female on the tree and the wife Jane became John!

 I have Zachariah Dunk in my tree born 1800 Ramsgate who married Elizabeth Spratling. I have
 never found a connection  with other Dunks in Kent.

 Finnisfinder

[AJ100]

Thank you for your kind remarks, Finnisfinder. I had a quick look and there is only one Dunk recorded in any of the Deal/Walmer parishes. 14 Nov 1802 Edward Blissenden DUNK, s/o Richard & Elizabeth. Probably no connection whatsoever.

Regards

AJ

[StanleysChesterton]

It probably comes down to cost.  Cost of proof. 

If you can see somebody who seems to match -v- £100 of subscriptions and £100 of various CDs and £100 of assorted certificates/etc .... then why not run with it, especially if it's your GG-grandfather's first wife's brothers child from his 3rd marriage.... or similar.

[JohninSussex]

 AJ, you have helped me a lot, I'm grateful for that.
 
 I had trouble with someone who would not accept that a male was actually male. He did have an
 unusual Christian name, one that is common now for girls! However this man was recorded as
 female on the tree and the wife Jane became John!

 I have Zachariah Dunk in my tree born 1800 Ramsgate who married Elizabeth Spratling. I have
 never found a connection  with other Dunks in Kent.

 Finnisfinder

Talking of female-sounding males, Matilda Sampson's will  (see my signature) names her gardener as Zara Dunk.  His wife was Elizabeth so I wonder if that is your relative?

[AJ100]

Sorry, didn't mean to say tree - I'm not related at all. I meant to say parish records. Apologies for misleading.

AJ