fourth cousins etc and cousins 'removed'?

Question:

What exactly are second/third/fourth cousins etc and cousins 'removed'?

I'm really into family history and have gone quite a long way back but have never quite got my head round these terms. Sensible answers please - no guesses!

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: There is a four-color tree chart at
http://www.tedpack.org/cousins.html...
if you count black and white as two colors.

Looking at the answers, I can see you are not alone in being confused. I had to draw it out to get it straight; I'm a visual person.

Children of siblings are first cousins.
Children of first cousins are second cousins.
Children of second cousins are third cousins and so on.

In all cases they may be closer; the children of your fourth cousin Harry will be siblings to each other, first cousins to Harry's sibling's children but fifth cousins to your children.

Removed comes in when you compare cousins up or down the generational levels.

Your first cousins' children are your first cousins once removed.
Your father and mother's first cousins are your first cousins once removed too.

Your first cousins' grandchildren are your first cousins, twice removed.

Your grandparents' cousins are yours, twice removed.

All these removed work for any degree of cousinhood. For instance, your grandparents' cousins can be 1C2R, 2C2R, 3C2R or 14C2R for that matter. (You have a gazillion 14th cousins.) They are all yours cousins too, twice removed.

In practice no one cares much beyond 2nd cousin or twice removed, unless there is something special. I worked with a fellow who was Daniel Boone's first cousin seven times removed, which means his 5th great grandmother was DB's 1C.