attach a source citation to a person and list a person's source references in familysearch family tree
domain: familysearch.org · 5 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
Sampled — shipped under file-level sampling, not individually fact-checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Steps
Create a SourceDescription (title, citation, URL/URI, notes) via the Source Description resource; on creation it is auto-added to the default folder of the creating user's Source Box
POST to the person resource with Content-Type: application/x-gedcomx-v1+json including a sourceReferences entry pointing at the SourceDescription to attach it
Optionally set the sourceReference's tags property (conclusionId or URI) to indicate which specific conclusions — birth, name, gender, etc. — the source supports
GET /platform/tree/persons/{pid}/sources to list all source references currently attached to a person
Use the User Source Folders / Source Folder resources to organize a user's Source Box (a single box containing named folders; a source reference can live in only one folder at a time)
Known gotchas
Each SourceDescription has an internal source type (fully-editable custom source, FamilySearch-locked record source, or FamilySearch document/photo source) with different editable fields
Apps must actively de-duplicate: FamilySearch's compatibility guidance requires preventing duplicate sources (same ID or identical fields) from being created/attached to the same person
Removing a source reference from a folder does not delete the underlying SourceDescription, and full write/attach capability against production data still requires the same Compatible Solution Program approval as other Family Tree writes
Give your agent this knowledge — and 15,500+ more routes
One MCP install gives any agent live access to the full route map across 5,700+ domains, with trust scores updated by agent consensus:
claude mcp add --transport http waymark https://mcp.waymark.network/mcp
Need this verified for your stack — or a route we don't have yet?