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I have a GRO copy of a death certificate relating to Mary Thompson, who died 31 Jan 1939 at 36 Edward Street, Thornaby on Tees. She was 60 years old and the wife of William Thomas Thompson, a ship yard labourer. The death was registered by her son, T A Thompson, who was living at the Bedford Street address.
If anybody wishes to have this certificate please send me a PM to briefly explain your interest and give me your address.
All the best
Gobbo

Hi

I am trying to trace the career of John Kelman (1798-1830). He was born in Fraserburgh and trained as a surgeon, presumably in Scotland, before going to India where he was employed as a military surgeon and was involved in the 1st Anglo-Burmese war - his correspondence mentions the Kingdom of Ava and campaigning on the Irrawady. He was invalided out of this service and returned to Fraserburgh, where he died. A private family document says that his death came after "services as a surgeon on the H.E.T.C.S." The authoress is now dead so I cannot ask her what was the H.E.T.C. and Google has not been helpful. Please does anybody here know what the H.E.T.C. stands for?

All the best

Gobbo

You can access copies of the Diocese of Durham Bishop's transcripts for free on Familysearch:

https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/show#uri=http://hr-search-api:8080/searchapi/search/collection/1309819

The transcripts are copies of the Parish birth, marriage and burial entries that the Parish priest was  supposed to send to the Bishop about once a year. The records cover the diocese of Durham which includes Cumberland, Co. Durham, Northumberland and parts of the North Riding. The Transcripts run from the 18th century to the 19th century but there are gaps in the records and some have been misplaced. Nevertheless this is a wonderful resource for anybody researching families in Co. Durham or Northumberland and who cannot get to the Records Office to view the Parish Registers.

The url above should take you to the introductory page for the records. There is an interesting description that can be accessed by clicking "Learn more" at the bottom of the QUICK FACTS box on the right of the page.  To search the records you need to click "Browse through 108,812 images". This will take you to a list of the areas covered - click on an area and you will get a table of the parishes covered in that area - click on a parish to get one or more date ranges and finally click on a date range to start browsing the transcript images.

The parishes are grouped in counties which include North Durham. This area was a detatched part of County Durham and the records included on the FamilySearch site refer to the parishes of Ancroft and Cornhill, which now form part of Northumberland. Do note this North Durham does not overlap the current administrative area and constituency of North Durham.

Misplaced records that I have noticed are listed below:

Dalton le Dale in Durham is indexed as Calton le Dale.

The parishes of Durham City are listed only by date and no name as follows

Durham>Durham
1   1740-1836      Durham St Nicholas
2   1762-1841      Durham St Mary-le-Bow
3   1765-1919      Durham St Margaret includes Nevilles Cross St John
4   1773-1869      Durham St Oswald
5   1837-1838      Durham St Mary the Less
6   1813-1848      Durham Cathedral
7   1850-1919      Chapelry of St Margaret
8   1863-1893      Durham St Cuthbert
9   1878-1878      Durham St Cuthbert (burials)

There are a few index entries labelled "other".  These are short runs of parish records that have become separated from the main body of the parish records. The table below lists the content of the "others".

Year range                Parish                  No of images   First          Last

Durham>Other
1832-1835      Chapelry of Hetton le Hole   105      15 Nov 1832   22 Dec 1835

North Durham>Other
1764-1867      Ancroft                            89      29 Oct 1904   17 Nov 1812

Other>Other
1762-1864      St Helen's Aukland, Durham   1      21 Nov 1817   10 Feb 1818
1762-1876      Alwinton, Northumberland     5      13 Dec 1839   1840
1765-1849      Edmondbyers, Durham           37      13 Apr 1831   1841
1769-1851      Easington Durham                35      1 May 1774   29 Mar 1784


There is a long run of records for Wallsend, Northumberland in the Durham>Sunderland>1769 to 1842 series.  Wallsend starts at image number 119 with baptisms (from 1 Jan 1813) and ends at image 695 (burials 1833).  Image 697 is Sunderland burials 1770: this Sunderland series ends with a page of burials in 1820 on image 1412. As far as I can tell the early Sunderland images, 1 -118, are duplicated from 696 to 813.

JosiahS
Just a note on Dalton-le-Dale - the records are now pretty much complete to 1812 on FreeREG

FreeREG is very useful but it is only an index and does not show all the information available on the transcripts.

WolfieSmith
The Internet Archive has some free downloadable Parish Register transcriptions for Ryton, Castle Eden and Conscliffe in Co Durham.
Also Eglingham, Edlingham, Berwick upon Tweed, Alnham, Corbridge, Elsdon, Ingram and Lesbury in Northumberland.
Covers some dates not covered by the Bishops Transcripts.
Also about 50 sets of Parish Register transcriptions for Yorkshire for anybody looking further south.
New records are regularly added so worth checking back.

http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=parish%20registers%20durham

Hi

I have been researching the activities of 8th Bn DLI in mid-April 1915 (2nd Battle of Ypres). Most of the accounts I have seen and the British War diaries seem to be using Greenwich Mean Time. Am I correct in thinking this and if so what was the time used by our Belgian and French allies. (If they were using a continental time it perhaps explains why it was so difficult to coordinate counter attacks.)

All the best

Gobbo