This month the online genealogy service MyHeritage announced that it had added two new features:

  • “AI Record Finder™ revolutionizes genealogy like ChatGPT revolutionized searching the internet: it is an interactive, intelligent, free-text chat to help the user locate relevant historical records about a person of interest in MyHeritage’s vast database of 20 billion records.”
  • “AI Biographer™ automatically compiles a rich narrative about an individual’s life using information from historical records that match the person, creating a Wikipedia-like biography about anyone. Narratives are enriched with relevant historical context using AI and are easy to share.”

I decided to evaluate these new tools for research, using for case studies, two of my relatives:

  • Jane Champion Crespigny (1766 – 1785), my fourth great grand aunt
  • James Kenneth Cudmore (1867 – 1948), my second great granduncle

The result for Jane was disappointing. The MyHeritage AI produced links to unreliable trees, and offered no links to records. (The MyHeritage database does not apparently usefully cover records in England for the period of Jane’s life.)

I generated the biography from my own family tree on the MyHeritage database.

The AI-generated biography lists her birth, death, parents, and siblings. It then goes on:

Biography

Jane Champion Crespigny was born in 1766 to Philip Champion Crespigny and Sarah Champion Crespigny (born Cocksedge) [1][2]. Her father, Philip, was born on April 1, 1738 [1][2], with conflicting records stating his birthplace as either Pauls, London, England or Aldeburgh, Suffolk, England[1][2]. Jane's mother, Sarah, has differing years of birth recorded, being listed as born in 1733 and circa 1743, with her place of birth also varying between Thetford, Norfolk, England and an unspecified location in Middlesex, England[1][2]. 

Throughout her life, Jane had a large family consisting of many siblings. Records indicate that she had at least three siblings named Thomas, Philip, and Anne[1], but other sources expand this list to include Charles,Clarissa Champion, Maria, Harry, Fanny, Eliza, Charles Fox, George, and Dorothy, bringing the total number of siblings to twelve[2].

Jane Champion Crespigny passed away at the young age of 19 on February 13, 1785[1][2]. One record specifies that she died in Hintlesham Hall, Suffolk, England[1].

Two sources are cited:

  1. Source: Young and Ch de Crespigny, managed by Anne Young
    https://www.myheritage.com/person-15000053_359061001_359061001/jane-champion-crespigny
  2. Source: FamilySearch Family Tree collection on MyHeritage
    https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-40001-237287737/jane-champion-crespigny-infamilysearch-family-tree

No records are given, even though my tree entry at MyHeritage does include citations from sources such as The Gentleman’s Magazine and the Norfolk Chronicle. Jane’s baptism record is available through Ancestry.com.

The variations in the number of siblings result from nine of her siblings being from other marriages of her father. Jane was the daughter of Philip’s first wife, by whom he had four children; Philip had four marriages and thirteen children.

The biography is poorly written because it relies only on the FamilySearch tree and my family tree recorded at MyHeritage and refers to no records.

The report adds

Historical Context

Jane Champion Crespigny was born in 1766, a period marked by the intellectual movement known as the Age Of Enlightenment. This era emphasized reason, science, and individualism over tradition and was characterized by significant advancements in philosophy, politics, and society. Her father, Philip Champion Crespigny, would have been influenced by these ideas, which permeated through British society and its colonies. The family's status likely afforded them access to education and the arts, hallmarks of an enlightened upbringing.

In Georgian England, large families like that of Jane Champion Crespigny were common, reflecting societal norms and the lack of effective birth control methods. With at least twelve siblings, her household would have been bustling with activity, indicative of the social and economic standing necessary to support such a sizeable family during this time. The presence of multiple children also served to secure lineage and provide assistance in managing familial estates or businesses.

Jane Champion Crespigny's untimely death at the age of 19 on February 13, 1785, reflects the harsh reality of mortality rates in the late 18th century. Despite the progress of the Enlightenment, medicine was still primitive by modern standards, and diseases could easily claim young lives. Her passing at Hintlesham Hall, Suffolk,suggests she lived amidst the rural gentry, who, despite their relative affluence, were not immune to the health challenges of the era.

All this is conventional historical blather. ‘Contextualising’ the detail of family history by referring to what might appear to form the bigger picture is back-to-front. The bigger picture is usefully constructed from the smaller facts of family history, not the other way around.

The next part of the report looks at Jane Champion Crespigny’s surname.

Last Name Origins

The surname Champion is of Old French origin, derived from the word 'champion', which means 'warrior' or ‘fighter'. It was likely used as a nickname for someone who was a champion in sports or warfare, or metaphorically someone who excelled in any contest. The name was brought to England by the Normans during the Norman Conquest of 1066.

The surname de Crespigny comes from a place name in Normandy, France, possibly derived from an Old Norse personal name and the Gallo-Roman suffix '-iniacum', indicating a landholding. The family that bears this name first settled in England after the Norman Conquest. Over time, the name has evolved, and its bearers have become prominent in various fields, particularly in the military and legal professions.

I had not heard of the possibility that part of the surname derived from the Gallo-Roman suffix ‘-iniacum’, indicating a landholding.

These speculations seem a little pointless against a single hard fact, to which the AI report does not refer, that the family with its distinctive surname came to England in the late 17th century as Huguenot refugees. The rest is blather.

Finally the report highlights some consistency issues

1.Father’s birthplace: ‘Pauls, London, England’ [1] vs ‘Aldeburgh, Suffolk, England'[2]
2.Mother’s year of birth: ‘1733’[1] vs ‘circa 1743′[2]
3.Mother’s place of birth: ‘Thetford, Norfolk, England'[1] vs ‘[2]
4.Number of siblings: ‘3’[1] vs ’12’ [2]

These issues are due to the lack of completeness or errors in the tree at FamilySearch, a collaborative tree. Baptism records make it clear Philip was born in London. Similarly there is a baptism record for Sarah Cocksedge for 1733 where contributors to the FamilySearch tree have apparently estimated her age based on her marriage in 1762. No birthplace is given for Sarah at FamilySearch.

The variation in number of siblings is discussed above.

The lack of coverage by MyHeritage of English records in the late eighteenth century meant that the new tools were of limited use in the AI’s review of the life of my fourth great grand aunt, Jane Champion Crespigny (1766 – 1785).

I am sure the MyHeritage tools will be further refined and, with luck, may become more useful. The results were certainly more accurate than my experiments earlier this year with ChatGPT, a more general Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool (My post of 25 January: Don’t trust chatbots ).

However, I do not feel that I can rely on the MyHeritage tools as a starting point for research. The problem is not false assertions. These can be corrected. It is the tone, content, and direction of the AI’s generated history. Fishing for facts is not history, not even family history. Commissioning a robot to line up dead facts is no substitute for careful, sensitive understanding of what actually happened.

I will review the result of applying the MyHeritage tools to the case of James Kenneth Cudmore in a separate post.

Related posts

Wikitree: Jane Champion Crespigny (1766 – 1785)