The Family Detective

I belong to the Cotter Clan. The last surviving male from my branch recently told me "you're definitely a Cotter". I never realised how much interest or information there was out there about my Cotter family. A great deal of the information carefully checked over and redistributed by one amazing Daffyd Cotter. The following profile is mostly put together with information supplied by Daffyd. As I have time I will include some of the stories I've learnt about Michael, including his time as a convict, the time he spent in goal, his family, being held up by bushrangers, and his death. 1809 or 1812 - born in or around Fermoy, County Cork, Ireland - (Father was James) 20th May 1830 - stole a sheep from a William Hennessy. Occupation listed as Ploughman & Reaper 21st May 1830 - arrested in Rathcormac with the stolen sheep 17th August 1830 - tried and found guilty for theft sometime between August and November 1830 - sentenced to seven years transportation to N.S.W. ...

I use ancestory.com ... it's been useful, but I don't take their "hints" as gospel .. I use those as, just as suggested, hints! I take the information presented and then I go out and prove it to myself by finding other proof. One such example is my great grandfather John Lang. His death certificate tells me his mother's name was "Sarah Belford". This put a stop to my searching. I couldn't find any records for a Sarah Belford that would fit in with the details I knew about his father Henry, or John himself. I kept getting hints to other trees that listed her ... Strangely, when I look at some of the Ancestory.com family trees they have Sarah Belford as John's mother, and the trees just stop there. Some have gone on to find a Sarah Belford that "sort of fits" and then have a whole knew family history from some Sarah Belford attached to the Laing tree. But I found her .. proved through more than one source that her actual name was Sara...