Introduction

I’m a Finch, born in Surrey some time in the 1960s but with roots in Norfolk, Sussex, Middlesex and beyond. I’ve spent years working on my family tree and this is where I share my findings, partly in the hope that distant cousins will be able to add to the wealth of stories about my ancestors.

I don’t want this to be a dusty collection of names and dates so I’ve added colour where I can, telling stories about ancestors that I’ve discovered from newspapers and other sources. To contact me email finchfamilyhistory@gmail.com.

Surnames

This site isn’t just about the Finch family. You’ll find a whole host of other families (and a wide variety of spellings of their names).

See all surnames in my tree. In addition, my maternal family is explored on my Wheatland family website.

Site structure

It’s all quite simple really:

The top menu items link to generations of my family by surname with relevant family trees. These pages feature an overview of those ancestors and their offspring.

Blog posts – accessed elsewhere on this page – have been written where I have lengthier stories to tell about individuals in those family trees.

Sources

I’ve used a number of sources to gather information, not least discussions with family members. Most of my records are available on Ancestry.co.uk, attached to the tree I maintain there. I’ve also used records from membership site Find My Past. Other details were found at the Society of Genealogists, both online and in their London library.

Family history societies have been another invaluable source. Sussex Family History Group has an excellent online database. There are two family history societies in Surrey and another in Norfolk that I’ve also plundered for information. The National Archives and the various county archives have been invaluable in taking my research to the next level.

There are many other websites that I’ve used over the years and these are featured on my list of useful websites.