The 1937 Family Tree

Whoever compiled and drafted the Family Tree in 1937 (titled Genealogy of the family of Roberts of Sheffield 1937) is still a mystery to me. My best guess is that it was Charles Augustus Roberts, the younger brother of my great grandfather, Vincent Littlewood Roberts. They were both doctors, as was their father. Charles would be 72 years old in 1937, the right age for a retirement project. And I believe the reason why Vincent came into possession of the original (a spectacular handwritten huge piece of thick tracing paper) was that he was given the task of filling in the details of his children and grandchildren. But the following extract shows that this was never done.

I can only guess that Charles must have died, otherwise he would have made sure his brother completed the tree and sent it back to him. I will try to search for the death certificate of Charles.

So, from the family tree, I have been busy entering the data on Family Historian for all the descendants of Jacob Roberts who was born in 1726. I have left the descendants of his brother Samuel, hoping that his latest descendant, Sir Samuel Roberts of Cockley Cley Hall, will at some point do the same. The 1937 chart is a Descendant Tree and from this, and other information, I now have 166 individuals on the programme. I can now start inputting the details of the 30 individuals of the Ancestor Tree (or Birth Brief) that I researched in 1999/2001 that started with Dad and ended with his 16 great great grandparents. And that is only my father's ancestors, it will be a while before I start on mum's side of the family.

Going back to the 1937 Family Tree, I did find some flaws with some of the dates while carrying out my research. My guess is that Charles entered the dates from information from his family. One day this will all need checking with sources such as birth, marriage and death certificates, census information etc.