Non-traditional family trees are not uncommon. Although many of us wish for a traditional family, divorce, death, out-of-wedlock births and other circumstances happen to many families. No matter how you feel about what happened or how you feel about the people involved in these events, they belong in your family tree. Your step family genealogy should be recorded to accurately tell your family’s story.
In this series, you will learn how to record these complex family situations clearly in your family tree. In this post, you will learn about recording step family genealogy and divorce events in FamilySearch Family Tree.
The basic concepts for recording non-traditional family trees are the same in most genealogy programs. In this series of blog posts, you will see examples using my favorite programs: FamilySearch and Ancestry, and tips on using these features in other software. Again, most genealogy software has similar features to the ones I will be demonstrating, although the terminology may be different.
Entering information about a step family usually involves the following:
- Adding all the spouses/parents to the tree.
- Creating marriage events for each couple.
- Recording when and where the divorce events occurred for each marriage involved, and/or recording death events for each spouse that has died.
- Adding each child to each set of parents that belongs to them.
- Indicating which child-parent relationships are biological and which are step relationships.
Adding Multiple Spouses
On FamilySearch click on “Add or Find Spouse” if there are no spouses attached. After that click on the “Add Spouse” button to add additional spouses. This is on the “Person” page for the individual in question, near the bottom of the page where spouses and parents are listed. There are similar buttons in the Tree View.
Adding Marriage Events
To add a marriage event in FamilySearch, edit the relationship of the married couple. Click on the pencil button:
Click on “Show All Information about This Relationship” to see the full details in a new page. Then click “Add an Event” and enter the marriage information. Click “Save” when you are done:
Recording Divorce Events
To add a divorce event in FamilySearch, click on the pencil icon to edit the couple relationship like you did to add a marriage event. Then click “Add an Event” and select “Divorce.” FamilySearch doesn’t have “Divorce filed” or “Separation” events, but you can click on “Add a New Note” at the bottom of the relationship page to add a note that explains the details. For both Ancestry and FamilySearch, please add a source or at least explain how you know the information. A quick note that says you were there and saw it happen or the name of the person who told it to you is better than no evidence at all.
The couple relationship on FamilySearch with the marriage and divorce information filled out looks like this:
The procedure is fairly similar in other genealogy programs. If you are generally ok with using computers, you should be able to figure it out. If not, you will need to look up a tutorial. There are so many different genealogy programs out there that I can’t do a tutorial for all of them in one blog post. Here is one video tutorial for Legacy Family Tree. It is different because in addition to the divorce event, it has a “marriage status” feature. Other programs such as Heredis have this feature too. I think the “marriage status” feature is somewhat redundant in this instance, but I can see how it might be useful for recording circumstances such as an unmarried couple with children.
Adding Children to Families
In FamilySearch, scroll down to the Family Members section for one of the parents. Then click “Add Child:”
If the child is already in the Family Tree, click on “Find by ID Number.”
You will need to copy and paste the ID Number for the child you need to add:
Then click “Add Person.”
When you have attached the child to both sets of parents, the child’s FamilySearch profile looks like this:
Defining Relationships
In FamilySearch, you will need to edit the parent-child relationship by clicking on the pencil button next to the child. Do this separately for each set of parents:
Under “Relationship Type,” click “add.” Then choose the relationship type from the dropdown list.
Again, you should be able to do this in most other programs. Some of them have different relationship terms than others. Pick the one that best explains the family’s situation, and add explanatory notes if needed.
I hope this helps you better keep track of your step family genealogy. See my Ancestry tutorial here. Leave a comment if you have any questions.
More tutorials for non-traditional family trees:
- Non-traditional Family Trees Tutorial: Step Families in Ancestry
- Non-Traditional Family Trees: Adoption in FamilySearch and Ancestry
- Non-traditional Family Trees: Homosexual Relationships
- Non-traditional Family Trees Tutorial: Non-married Partnerships (Coming Soon)
For more tips and resources for talking to your children about your non-traditional family tree, see this excellent post by Emily Kowalski Schroeder on Growing Little Leaves: Family Trees for EVERY Family
Hello! I’m working with a family who were born as results of one-night-stands. How do I input the fathers into family search when there wasn’t even a relationship.
Hi! That is an excellent question. The way you would set it up is with two separate sets of parents, where there is only one spouse listed with each set. It would look like this: https://thehandwrittenpast.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/parents-no-relationship.png
From the child’s profile, click “Add Parent” to add a parent who does not have a relationship with the other parent. Make sure you add a note explaining what happened. You should also explain how you know this, such as: “Great Aunt Sally told me such and such,” or “So and so took an AncestryDNA test and this is what they found out…” Always try to be sensitive in your explanations.
If the tree already lists the couple as in a relationship when they actually weren’t, you can edit the couple relationship and click on “remove or replace.” “Remove” will delete the couple relationship, without deleting the individuals. Make sure you write down the ID numbers of the individuals in the relationship so you can find them again to attach to the child.
Of course, if the mother had another husband who raised the child, you could add that stepfather as described above.
Does that make sense? I hope I answered your question.
Hello! I have an ancestor who married five times, each one ending in divorce (only the first union resulted in children). No problem to add each subsequent spouse, with one exception: two of the marriages (#3 & #5) were to the same spouse.
Do I make a note for marriage #3 that this is the same spouse as marriage #5 or is there a different way to handle this? Is there a program that will allow me to show marriage #5 without having to make notes?
Thanks for your help!
Another excellent question.
Whatever you do, do NOT create multiple copies of a person and then add a note that they are the same person as another person in the tree. Not only is this really confusing, it goes against the purpose of FamilySearch Family Tree, which is to have only one record for each person who ever lived.
Here’s what I would do: 1) Connect the husband and wife together in a “couple relationship.” 2) Add the date and place of their first marriage to each other as a “marriage event.” 3) Add the date and place of the second marriage to each other as another “marriage event.” 4) Add divorce events and explanatory notes as needed.
What you will end up with is this: https://i0.wp.com/thehandwrittenpast.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Capture.png
The couple only appears once in the “family members” panel on the person’s profile, but if you click on the pencil to view the relationship details, you will see multiple marriage events. The couple only ever had one relationship, but they had multiple marriage events related to that relationship.