Correspondence is a very important part of genealogical research, especially so in Germany. In Germany there is no central repository of any record, not even for the civil registry. To do successful research, you must know what records exist, what they contain, where they are housed, how to use them in doing research, and what to expect by corresponding (see also Chapter 11 on record repositories).

The first thing you must do before beginning your research is to determine what vital records exist for the particular time period and area that you are working in. If vital records do not exist, then you must determine what other records exist that could give you the same information (see also Chapters 18, 19, and 20 on locating birth, marriage, and death records).

When faced with the responsibility of corresponding for records, many people discontinue research on a line rather than attempting it. Others turn it over to a researcher to handle the correspondence or hire a researcher in Germany to do it for them. There is never really any reason to discontinue research just because it must be handled by correspondence.

The following are important aspects of letter writing that should become a part of your correspondence procedures:

A. If at all possible, the letters should be written in German. If you are not willing to gain a knowledge of the German language sufficient enough to correspond, there are form letters you may use prepared by the Genealogical Library (see Appendix D for a copy of these). With these you can write to the civil registrar, or parish minister and obtain birth, marriage, or death certificates. Even though many officials and parish ministers have had some English in school, there are several reasons why you should correspond in as good a German as possible. Mainly, by writing in German there is less chance of your request being misunderstood or misinterpreted. Even in your native tongue, it is not always easy to explain exactly what is wanted, with correspondence it becomes even more difficult because there is no way to know whether the recipient of your request understands what is being asked for until he writes back. Then you have either paid for what you requested or paid for something you didn’t want and additional correspondence is necessary. If you wrote in English, you could only hope that the person you were writing to would get someone who understood English if he couldn’t.

B. Official titles should be used if they are known. This is not meant to be done as flattery. It is common courtesy to recognize an individual for who and what they are.

C. Letters and request should be both specific and easy to answer, this means giving enough information for the receiver to know exactly what you want without having to read the whole family history to determine it. At the same time you should not be so brief that the receiver has to be a mind reader to determine what is wanted.

D. A comparable amount of money in relationship to the request being made should accompany the request. (Money should be in the currency of the country, usually by bank draft or American Express money order). If you do not desire to send money with your request but wish to wait to see what the costs would be, you should at least indicate a willingness to pay whatever costs there might be.

E. Do not send stamped, self-addressed envelopes. Instead, enclose International Reply Coupons obtainable from any Post Office. (At least two for a return letter, more if request is for more information). About the only thing that United States stamps can be used for in Germany is for a stamp collection.

F. Above all else you should be courteous. Whether you receive information or not, it never hurts to send a thank you note for whatever service you receive.

G. If it is necessary to write and have someone search the records, then it is very important that control is maintained on whatever research is done. Control means that you are the one who determines what is to be searched, how it is to be searched, and in what form the information should be sent. An archivist, minister, or researcher should never be allowed to determine what you should receive. You have every right to determine and require the type of information you want and the form that you want it in. You must make record searchers out of the researchers and not allow them to be anything else. This may seem somewhat strong but there is good reason for it. Too often individuals will write for information leaving it up to the researcher to determine whether or not the information is correct. Often the information a person receives is in an abstract form instead of being a photocopy or an extract of the record. Photocopies are best. If it is not possible to have photocopies made, you should require that the information be sent in extract form rather than in abstract form. The difference between the two is that an extract is a word for word copy of the document and an abstract is where only certain information from the document is copied, if the searcher feels that he needs to insert a comment or explanation in the document, he should set off his own comments by either underlining them or by putting them in brackets. By making a record searcher of a researcher, it keeps him from making conclusions, it is good to get suggestions and evaluations from the researcher but you are the only one that should be determining what conclusions should be drawn. For example, say that your ancestor, Heinrich Schulze, came from Lunburg, Hannover, Prussia, and the researcher finds a birth entry for a Heinrich Schulze in that parish and sends it to you. In this situation there is no way to know whether there were other Heinrich Schulze in that or in other surrounding parishes or not. If there were others, how could it be known that the one your researcher sent the information on was the correct one? The best and surest procedure to follow, outside of traveling to Germany and doing it yourself, is to require the researcher to extract out all of the Schulzes from that and the neighboring parishes and then you can determine for yourself which are and which are not yours. This procedure may seem more expensive, but it is not nearly as expensive as paying a large sum of money out only to discover later that the researcher has followed the wrong line and you have to start over again, it would be advisable also, when hiring a researcher, to have him do a limited search first to see if he will be willing to do it the way you want it done. This too may save you a great deal of money right from the start.

H. Retain copies of all outgoing correspondence. File these with the answers to the letters that are received. Most important, when information is received through correspondence, it should be filed immediately into your note keeping system. Failure to do this may result in the information being lost and time may be wasted and money may have to be sent to obtain it again.