Edwards Genealogy of Colonial Virginia

I see this stuff over and over again in public trees, posted and re-posted by the thousands. If there's anyone pulling their hair out over these things, here's some red flags to look for that will strongly suggest you're looking at weak research: People in the 17th and 18th centuries with middle names . Yes, some people did have them. But most didn't. Bad genealogists seem to love adding middle names to their colonial ancestors, even if no middle name appears in any record for the individual. Evidently, if they find records of people that are confusing or inconsistent--one guy is named William Smith and another guy from someone else's genealogy with the same wife is named Robert Smith--they will simply add the new first name as a middle name: William Robert Smith. VOILA. Problem solved! People in the 17th and 18th centuries with birth and death dates . This mostly pertains to the colonial south, where parish records are few and far between.