I thought I'd take a departure from my regular post approach today to explain something you may have been curious about. Why do I write the blog address of Family Photo Reunion across the images I write about?
First, let me tell you a little story. My 2nd great grandfather, Søren Gregersen, was born in Voer, Hjørring, Denmark. He converted from Lutheranism to the LDS church and immigrated, along with his wife and a few of their grown children, to Redmond, Utah in the 1880s. His other adult children, including my great grandmother, stayed in Denmark and did not convert. Søren has many descendants in America and elsewhere, and as a result most of my matches on the DNA sites are from this line.
I noticed on FamilySearch Family Tree that someone attached the above carte de visite photograph of a young man to his profile. Søren Gregersen was born in 1823. I had a suspicion that this wasn't my 2nd great grandfather simply because the age of the person did not fit with the style of photograph. How old does he look to you? For this individual to be my 2nd great grandfather, I estimated the photograph would have had to be taken between 1843 and 1855 in Denmark. Cartes de visite did not come onto the photographic scene until around 1859, though they were by no means common and available to the regular person until the mid-1860s. The style of this cdv, with its square-cornered card stock, and ornate studio background, table and patterned carpet indicates a time frame of 1865 to 1875, but it might be later than that. It could not be earlier. The wide lapels of the man's coat would indicate a mid-1870s to 1880 date as well. Of course, many men held onto their clothing longer than fashion would dictate due to economic reasons as men's fashions did not experience the same pendulum swings that women's fashions did. There may be cultural differences in fashion styles, too. Cartes de visites were popular in Denmark until the early 1900s; while in North America, they started to decline in favour in the late 1880s. But both those tendencies point to an even later date. I am also curious about the hat. Is the sitter wearing a uniform of sorts?
I am skeptical of the attribution on FamilySearch for a few reasons, but mostly because there is no source information provided. I am not saying that the individual is absolutely not the person he is reported to be, only that I am unable to evaluate that likelihood based on the information I see. I contacted the person who uploaded the image to the FamilySearch Tree to learn more about it, thinking, perhaps that they might be able to provide a scan of the reverse of the photograph, which might include a photographer's imprint or perhaps an inscription with a name or date.
I received a friendly reply to my note. The FamilySearch poster explained that they had copied it from someone else's online tree. They didn't remember when or whose tree it was. But they were fairly sure it was correct. As I mentioned earlier, there are many descendants of my ancestor. Quite a few of them are engaged in the genealogy hobby. Many have accepted this image into their family tree. At what point does this fellow become my 2nd great grandfather, even if he is not? Is it after it is found in 50 trees? 100? Or should we be skeptical of unsourced information and state that uncertainty when sharing? I'm all for the latter. At the very least, we should provide a bread crumb trail for those who would like to think critically about the artifact.
The story doesn't end there. I decided to contact every family tree owner who has posted this image in their tree, in hopes of finding one person with a physical copy of the photograph. So far, no luck. All have copied theirs from another online tree. However, one of my distant cousins from Denmark helpfully pointed me in the direction of WikiTree, which seems to be where many of the people I've spoken with have found this image. I contacted the poster of the photograph. That person replied almost immediately. The long and short of it is that they also found this photo on a relative's online tree and re-posted it. But they remembered seeing a similar photo in one of their family albums and assumed it was the same photograph. They had intended to compare it with the one in their family album, but they had forgotten about it. They told me that when they locate the photograph from their album, (currently in storage and not an original, but a copy--so no imprint information), they will either provide any accompanying information if it's the same photo or remove the above photograph from Søren's record on WikiTree if it is not. In the meantime, they've posted a disclaimer under the photo entry in WikiTree about this uncertainty. If you have copied this photo of Søren Gregersen into your tree, you may want to add a disclaimer of your own to your files that states this photograph is currently in question.
The earliest online appearance of this photo I can find dates to 2011. The WikiTree image was posted in 2018. The 2011 image was added to a family tree on Ancestry and attached to a person identified as "Soren Peter Gregersen." This Soren Peter Gregersen was born in 1849, Brovst, Denmark. His wife happens to have a similar name to my Søren's wife. Soren Peter Gregersen is clearly not my great great grandfather, Søren Gregersen, who was born 26 years earlier in Voer. The research provided on this tree appears correct, in that it matches the information I found for Soren Peter after a quick look in Danish parish records. Name confusion is a common problem in Danish research. Simply having the same surname is not an indication of relationship.
My hypothesis is that one of Søren Gregersen's (b. 1823) descendants thought Soren Peter's Ancestry tree pertained to their relative, when it did not. There are some questionable online tree entries for my 2nd great grandfather that, among other things, inexplicably include the middle name "Peter." Having researched my ancestor thoroughly in the original Danish church books and censuses, I have not found one document that records my 2nd great grandfather's middle name as "Peter" or “Peder.” I suspect one person posted this image in error, and many re-posted the mistake.
While still only speculation at this point, I am feeling this 2011 attribution is the correct one. In 2021, I sent a note to the person who uploaded this photo to their ancestor Soren Peter Gregersen's profile in 2011. I am hoping someone, one day, will contact me about the image. If they have a physical copy of the photograph in question, that would pretty much cinch it.
I will keep updating this post as I obtain new information. I'm determined to get to the bottom of this photograph yet!
The watermark I place on photos here on this blog ensures that anyone who stumbles across the image can find the original and read about the process used to identify it. Sometimes I don't fully identify an image. If I have reservations (and I often do), I say so. Some people do include this information when they post the image online. Sometimes they even include a direct link to my blog post. Some people don't bother and, instead, crop the photo to avoid the watermark and plop it on their tree without an apparent second thought, even when the photograph in question is not 100 percent proven to be their ancestor. Don't get me wrong. I love it when a photograph can be reunited with a descendant, even if it is just a digital reunion that I know nothing about. But I implore those who re-post these images to responsibly cite the source.
As always, if you are a direct descendant of the photographic subject in one of my blog posts, feel free to contact me about obtaining the original photograph.
If you happen to have the original Søren Gregersen photograph in your possession or can provide more information about its provenance, I would dearly love to hear from you. While I'm extremely skeptical, I would love this to be a picture of my great, great grandfather.
UPDATE: October 12, 2025
A reader emailed to say that they used MyHeritage's Photo Dater feature on the above photograph. The result was (reportedly with 82% accuracy) that the photo dates to 1879 give or take a few years. I don't use AI to date my photos here on the blog, because I think it leads to a dulling of observational skills, but I include this info for your interest. If MyHeritage is correct, Søren Gregersen would be 56 years old in this photograph. Does the fellow in the photo look that old? What are your thoughts?
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