(UK) Searching for unknown relatives/estranged

[Theburra]

Hello, I am a novice to genealogy and am tracing my estranged family. I understand you can learn of ascendants using the birth and marriage certificates of your parents; however, how would you learn of their descendents (my uncles, cousins etc.)? How would you search only knowing the parent and not the name or any details of the child?

Thanks for any help.

[curtainhooks]

If you have the mothers maiden name, you can search for birth records for a child with the surname of the father and the mothers maiden name of their mum.
This may give several options if the dad and mums name are common (and there could have been multiple babies with the same surname and same mothers maiden name) but if you have the area they might have been born and what year roughly this should give an answer hopefully.
Further back in time (1800s) you can use census’ and other records but in recent years, it isn’t as easy.
Is there any particular person you’re trying to find?
Hope this is some help.

[Theburra]

If you have the mothers maiden name, you can search for birth records for a child with the surname of the father and the mothers maiden name of their mum.
This may give several options if the dad and mums name are common (and there could have been multiple babies with the same surname and same mothers maiden name) but if you have the area they might have been born and what year roughly this should give an answer hopefully.
Further back in time (1800s) you can use census’ and other records but in recent years, it isn’t as easy.
Is there any particular person you’re trying to find?
Hope this is some help.

Hi curtain hooks. It's possible to can maiden names with birth certificates, but what do you mean by search? As most websites want the details of the ancestor themselves.
I'm trying to find living cousins, uncles, aunts etc. and am trying to learn about my grandparents' descendents to start with

[cath151]

Hi,
www.freebmd.org.uk is a useful website.
Just confirming what Curtainhooks has helpfully suggested
Find your parents birth to give surname and mothers maiden name.
Siblings of your parents will have the same combo of surname and mothers maiden name.
It does depend on how common the surnames are, if its a name like Smith for example it could be difficult. You can hopefully work backwards using births and marriage names, though certificates could be essential to make sure you are on the right lines. You can get clues from the area where they were born and rough dates.
Cathy

[Ruskie]

Which country and what sort of time frame?
Scrap that. I neglected to read the title of thread.

[Treetotal]

Hi Theburra and welcome to RootsChat. We can't give names of living relatives on here as it breaches RootsChat Privacy Policy.
You could try GenesReunited where can look for living relatives.
Good Luck.
Carol

[Maiden Stone]

Welcome to RootsChat.
Click "HELP" on dark-brown band. Select "Guidelines for Posting" from menu on Help pages. This includes advice on searching for living relatives.

[Nova67]

Definitely do not mention the names of any living people on here as stated in previous posts.  As for more generic advice you will need to look for the marriage of the couple and then search for any children born with the mother's maiden name around a logical time frame.  You do not need to know their Christian name but this method should tell you.  This relies on the parents being married. This can be done after Sep 1912 (from memory) on FREE BMD:

https://www.freebmd.org.uk/

I think this cuts off around 1987.

Find my Past (a UK-based subscription service) is also excellent for this.

The GRO register also offers "Search the GRO index online". This serves the same purpose.

I would then look on the UK Electoral Roll on FindMyPast or Ancestry.  Ancestry often gives you a time frame for the person's birth eg. Mary Smith (1960-1962) which will help determine if you have the correct person. There are also UK-based people directories online, but the name escapes me at present.

I have had a domestic crisis here this morning so I now must go and do a major clean up.  I was just filling in time until it was fixed, but I hope this has been of help.