Witnesses to Facts and Events

Witnesses to Facts and Events

You can record that a person had some involvement in another person’s fact or event — for example, as a witness at a marriage, a beneficiary in a will, or the informant on a death certificate.

Adding a witness

Select the relevant fact in the facts table and click the witness button (eye icon). The witnesses dialog lets you select one or more witnesses, set their roles, or remove them from the list.

For example, Charles Darwin wrote his will on 27 September 1881 and probate was granted on 6 June 1882. His eldest son William Erasmus Darwin can be added as a witness to the probate fact with a role such as "executor".

How witnesses appear

Once a witness is added, the event also appears in the witness’s own facts table — marked to show it is a witnessed event rather than their own. This provides a cross-reference without duplicating data.