Good evening from Germany

[Jan van Oosten]

Hi,

My name is Jan. I'm a Dutchman living in Germany. I got interested in genealogy in 2010 when my son had to make a family tree for school and asked my wife and me for help. I realized I didn't even know my grandparents' full names (apart from the one I was named after), because they all died long before I was born. My wife knew a lot more about her ancestors, so in order to prevent my son's family tree from being very lopsided, I started doing some research. And before you know it I was trying to decipher 17th century legal documents. Well, I'm sure you all know how addictive it is.

Last year, I discovered that I had two English ancestors seven generations ago. Unfortunately, I don't know where in England they were from. I'm hoping to find out eventually.

[christanel]

Hello Jan and welcome to British-Genealogy the home for genealogy addicts. and no, we are not looking for a cure.

Lop sided trees are not a good look and by now, after a lot of research, yours sounds as if it has grown the branches needed to even up the sides. Great work.

Take a look around the forums and when you feel ready either post a query or join in helping others solve their mysteries.

Christina

[almach]

Hi Jan,

Welcome to Brit - Gen where we hope you'll find some answers to your queries; do post the names and approx years of birth of your ancestors and we shall certainly try to find them.

[Jan van Oosten]

Hi Christina and almach,

Thank you for the welcome. Since the UK is new terrain for me, I have a general question first. If I want to search parish records for a marriage or a baptism in the first quarter of the 18th century, which website should I use (bearing in mind that I don't even know what county to search in)? Before I post the names of my ancestors here, I would like to have a go at finding them by myself first. In the end, I will probably need your help anyway, but I feel that I should try

[Lesley Robertson]

I would start with Family Search, the free LDS site.
You could use something like Ancestry or Find My Past, but they're both pay sites.
Are these people actually English, or British? In the first half of the 18th century there were a LOT of scots arriving in the Netherlands after the 1715 and 1745 rebellions.

[Jan van Oosten]

Two of the three people I'm looking for have Northern English last names, the third one does in fact have a Scottish last name. She was the bride of the couple whose marriage I'm looking for. I suppose the marriage could have taken place in Scotland, too. Or elsewhere in the Netherlands, come to think of it.

[Lesley Robertson]

The records of the Scots Kirk in Rotterdam go back that far.....
The Princes of Orange had Scottish bodyguards, and there were quite a few scottish merchants around.
Since this sub-forum is really only for introductions/welcomes, why don't you choose a more suitable one (maybe General British or Brickwalls) and tell us more about them, maybe someone can help.

[Jan van Oosten]

OK, I will post my query in Brickwalls.