FTM 2005 How do I correct this mistake ?

[colin taylor]

I have Samuel son of John born 1803 and Samuel son of Samuel born 1803.
One Samuel remains in Lyme Regis as a carpenter the other goes to sea.
Both are on my tree but I have just recieved a death cert which says Samuel who went to sea is the son of Samuel.
I have put him as the son of John and the carpenter as the son of Samuel..

Is there a way of allocating these two Samuels to their correct parents or do I have to delete all descendants and start again
Cheers
Colin

[Elaine ..Spain]

No need to delete descendants and start again.

The first thing you need to do, before moving anyone around, is to make sure you have an up-to-date back up of your tree!

I am going to take the easy way out and refer you to the FTM online help information, which explains what you need to do.
Basically you are detaching the child from the wrong parents, and then attaching him to the correct parents.
Detach/Attach command

It's a bit scary when you do it for the first time - but as long as you have a backup copy of your tree, then you can always go back to that if you do something wrong!

Shout if you get stuck.

[colin taylor]

Thank you Elaine,
I will have a go on another tree with which is now obsolete.
Cheers
Colin

[colin taylor]

I tried but it did not work....see note 4 detaching a person is reversible by simply re-attaching them in the SAME place later.
What I did on my obsolete tree was detach William then detach Thomas to leave a space for William etc I managed to re.attach Thomas where William shoud be.. OK but when I look in the index to find the William to put him where Thomas was there is no William there at all perhaps the holding area for detached persons holds only one person
No problem though. it was an obsolete tree and I have gained knowledge
I will copy and then delete and re-enter in the correct place
Cheers
Colin

[Elaine ..Spain]

You should be able to detach someone and leave them detached if you want to. They will become a "floating" part of your tree - that is they will not be attached to anyone. You can normally see if you have any "floaters" by viewing an All-in-One tree - floaters are normally on their own at the bottom of the page.

You should be able to detach both children - leave them both as floaters - then get one of them and attach to the right parents and then do the same with the other.

Sorry it doesn't seem to be working for you.