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Beginners => Family History Beginners Board => Topic started by: Eric Hatfield on Wednesday 11 July 18 05:35 BST (UK)
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I have been doing family history for about 10 years, but most of my research has been for ancestors in Scotland or here in Australia where I live. I have mostly used Ancestry and FindMyPast plus Family Search. In Australia, I can also visit local records offices when I have needed to, but that isn't so easy for UK records!
Scotland has been good too, because Scotland's People only charges about $A2.50 for online records, and so I can afford to be a little speculative and buy a few certificates that prove to be dead ends.
But now I am researching ancestors in England (specifically Herefordshire, adjacent counties and Birmingham city), and I have to rely on online records. After 1841, the census information gives a very good indication of births, occupations, places and dates, which allows BMD records to be interpreted. But before 1841, there is no census information, and the BMD information available from Ancestry and FindMyPast typically is very sparse. Birth records often don't state parents, marriage records often don't state spouses, etc. At something like $A30 for certificates (if I have done my maths correctly), I can't afford to buy anything "on spec". And so I often have a number of possible births, parents, spouses, etc, to choose from.
But I am new to English records, so perhaps I am missing something obvious. What do more experienced people here do to overcome the limited information available from FindMyPast and Ancestry? I'd appreciate any tips.
Thanks.
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There is currently a pilot giving cheaper access to UK certificates - cost is £6, as opposed to the paper record they post to you which costs £9.25.
https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/PDF_most_customers_want_to_know.asp
I have never ordered a PDF certificate so can't vouch for the service.
Added: The current exchange rate tells me that £9.25 = AUD$16.55, and £6 = $10.73.
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For bmd records from September 1837 many people use Freebmd:
https://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/search.pl
Depending on the area you might get lucky on Freereg for parish records before Sept 1837:
https://www.freereg.org.uk/search_queries/new
And there is Familysearch of course. Check their Historical Record Collections in case your areas of interest are covered:
http://www.rootschat.com/links/01mc9/
Sometimes I just google the place name and "parish records" and this often helps find where these records are held.
For Warwickshire this used to have some useful information (though I have not used it for years so don't know if that is still the case):
http://www.hunimex.com/warwick/
If you get stuck you can always post specific queries on the relevant forum and someone will be able to point you in the right direction.
I'm sure you will get more suggestions from others. :)
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Civil Registration, and therefore Birth, Marriage and Death Certificates only began on 1st July 1837.
Before that time you are reliant on Parish Registers - Christening, Marriage and Burial records.
But, that is dependent on knowing which church to look at! :-\
And which religious denomination.
Many Parish Registers are available online - but certainly not all.
I use GenUKI.org.uk to try to ascertain where such records may be found.
Also many counties have OPC websites (Online Parish Clerks) which are very useful.
Cornwall-OPC-Database and Lan-opc.org.uk (Lancashire) are two that I have used.
Otherwise it's worth checking the relevant County Archives.
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There is currently a pilot giving cheaper access to UK certificates - cost is £6, as opposed to the paper record they post to you which costs £9.25.
https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/PDF_most_customers_want_to_know.asp
I have never ordered a PDF certificate so can't vouch for the service.
Added: The current exchange rate tells me that £9.25 = AUD$16.55, and £6 = $10.73.
I've used the service - it took about a fortnight to have the PDF available for download, with no hitches. Note that this is only for births and deaths. Marriages have to be ordered the old fashioned way.
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There is currently a pilot giving cheaper access to UK certificates - cost is £6, as opposed to the paper record they post to you which costs £9.25.
https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/PDF_most_customers_want_to_know.asp
I have never ordered a PDF certificate so can't vouch for the service.
Added: The current exchange rate tells me that £9.25 = AUD$16.55, and £6 = $10.73.
I've used the service - it took about a fortnight to have the PDF available for download, with no hitches. Note that this is only for births and deaths. Marriages have to be ordered the old fashioned way.
They are getting better now as it is only taking about 5 days now for PDFs
Cheers
Guy
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There is currently a pilot giving cheaper access to UK certificates - cost is £6, as opposed to the paper record they post to you which costs £9.25.
https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/PDF_most_customers_want_to_know.asp
I have never ordered a PDF certificate so can't vouch for the service.
Added: The current exchange rate tells me that £9.25 = AUD$16.55, and £6 = $10.73.
I've used the service - it took about a fortnight to have the PDF available for download, with no hitches. Note that this is only for births and deaths. Marriages have to be ordered the old fashioned way.
They are getting better now as it is only taking about 5 days now for PDFs
Cheers
Guy
I'd second that.
It only took a very few days to get the pdf. Good service I thought, and not too expensive at 6 pounds.
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Hi Eric
Yes starting to research in England is a shock to the system after you have researched in Scotland as they tend to have lots of information content.
Civil registration as others have said didn't begin until 1837, so prior to that you will get no 'birth, marriage or death', so yu will be looking at parish records, baptism, marriage, burial. The first census that is 'useful' for research is the 1841 however that doesn't give lots of detail such as you don't know the relationship of people in the household, it is 'estimated' age up/down 5yrs ( depending on the enumerator) doesn't tell you where the people were born, just 'in county or not', the 1851 puts all that right.
You have been given freebmd( after civil reg) and freereg ( transcriptions of parish), both very useful and Genuki which is a great site which enables you to get to know the area you are researching in, what records are available and where to look for them, boundary changes, map of area, what is nearby and links to many useful sites.
Always worth checking out the local council website like this https://www.herefordshire.gov.uk/info/200164/herefordshire_archive_and_records_centre/94/family_history_research/1 and https://www.birmingham.gov.uk/info/50164/family_history_research/1573/family_history_research_useful_websites/6 and also local FHS like this http://www.bmsgh.org/index.html, several of these FHS hold copies of parish records, so it may be worth paying to join to have access
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Another type of website worth consulting are the "online parish clerk" sites. They tend to have transcripts of parish records. I have used the Cornish site, tracking my wife's ancestors:
http://www.cornwall-opc-database.org/home/
And another, similar site, for my ancestors, in Yorkshire
http://tong.calverley.info/index.html
For County Durham, there is a pay site:
https://www.durhamrecordsonline.com/index.php?q=1&cookiecheck=1
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In the past I have obtained copies (both photocopies and digital copies) of PRs from FHSs including Birmingham at a minimal cost when supplying exact dates and places of births and marriages.
I have even been sent complimentary copies from a couple of FHSs. (I think when they found out I am in Australia they felt sorry for me). :) ;)
This was several years ago and things may have changed over the years, but it may still be worth enquiring. Rootschatters who live locally to ROs may also be willing to help you with look-ups.
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Some guidance on these websites:
Tracing your English and Welsh Ancestors
www.ancestor-search.info/home.htm
BYU Discovering English Ancestors (BYU = Brigham Young University)
National Archives website for particular fields of research.
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Thank you everyone for all that helpful advice. It seems there is a real difficulty, but all that information will surely help. Thanks.
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Sometimes being presented with lots of options can be a bit overwhelming. It can be hard to know where to start, so ask for specific help if you need it. :)
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Thank you. I will. I have gained a lot of help from this forum over the years, including finding an aunt I had never been in contact with, and through her identifying my grandfather, who until then had been a mystery.
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I have been doing family history for about 10 years, but most of my research has been for ancestors in Scotland or here in Australia where I live. I have mostly used Ancestry and FindMyPast plus Family Search. In Australia, I can also visit local records offices when I have needed to, but that isn't so easy for UK records!
Scotland has been good too, because Scotland's People only charges about $A2.50 for online records, and so I can afford to be a little speculative and buy a few certificates that prove to be dead ends.
But now I am researching ancestors in England (specifically Herefordshire, adjacent counties and Birmingham city), and I have to rely on online records. After 1841, the census information gives a very good indication of births, occupations, places and dates, which allows BMD records to be interpreted. But before 1841, there is no census information, and the BMD information available from Ancestry and FindMyPast typically is very sparse. Birth records often don't state parents, marriage records often don't state spouses, etc. At something like $A30 for certificates (if I have done my maths correctly), I can't afford to buy anything "on spec". And so I often have a number of possible births, parents, spouses, etc, to choose from.
But I am new to English records, so perhaps I am missing something obvious. What do more experienced people here do to overcome the limited information available from FindMyPast and Ancestry? I'd appreciate any tips.
Thanks.
You are hitting a road block which has always been there but is becoming a larger obstacle than in the past due to “new researchers” not developing research methods, including manual browsing of records, but relying on the database search engines.
Having said that you sound as if you have developed some skills by visiting your local records offices in Australia and manually searching their records.
Research prior to 1837 is really a continuation of the same methods that should have been used for records post 1837.
By that I mean using as many records as possible to build a picture of your target family rather than just the commonly available BMD & Census records.
There are many types of records that overlap the 1837 sticking point.
For instance post 1837 the researcher will be used to searching Parish Registers for Births, Baptisms Marriages, Deaths and Burials. Births & Burials I hear the murmur: Yes, many parish registers record (as legally required) births & burials, but it can be hit or miss, but researchers should develop the skill of searching these records for post 1837 research as it will help them when it comes to pre 1837 research.
In a similar way there are other records that bridge the two periods, Wills & Probate records, Poor Law records, Occupational records I.E. Apprenticeship & freemen records, trade, guild/livery records. Court Records (these are not just criminal records but cover a wide range of interaction between the individual and state) on many different levels.
Manorial records, Land Records, Military Records, Newspapers, Visitations, Inquisitions Post Mortem etc., etc.
There are hundreds of types of records that give information to the family historian, it is up to us the researchers to find, evaluate and corroborate the information using other records relevant to the family.
As researchers rely more and more on online records these research skills are not being developed as they used to be in the past.
Cheers
Guy
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Hi Guy, thanks for that useful information. The trouble is, I don't really have any choice about doing my UK research online. I may never visit UK again and if I do I will probably be visiting places I've longed to see, not researching in churches and records offices. (If I had more time, I would love to do that, but ....)
So it is online records that I need. Once I found a person who was in charge of a set of church records (I think maybe at a village in Devon) and he kindly sent me a copy of the page of the records I was interested in, but I can't expect that all the time.
But putting everyone's ideas together, and being aptient, I hope I can make progress. Thanks.
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Hi
I have used pdf certificates for £6 from GRO they are fine. It takes about 7 days then you just download them. Really easy.
Wendy
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Hi,
I also live in Australia and found going back pre 1837 was very difficult. I found as much as I could online and then was stuck.
I did subscribe to a historical group in Sussex and had a notice put in one of their magazines. A stroke of luck and I did receive a reply from a relative (fifth or sixth cousin) who was also into family history and had lots of photographs that she passed on to me. The information that she had was from the late 1700's but then she started going back further visiting many places that it was impossible for me to get to. I purchased birth, death and marriage certificates when ever I could to support and verify information relating to ancestors who were born/married/died after 1837. In the end the family was traced back to being in Sussex in 1589 through a Deposition Book and with certainty a marriage found of an ancestor in 1676 in Eartham through Bishop Transcript records. She was not able to determine with a degree of certainty the birth year and parents of this ancestor so research ended at this point.
Everything that was found was passed on, along with photocopies of original documents. Without this connection it would have been extremely difficult to have found out so much about my ancestors and I will always be grateful to this relative for passing on so willingly what she discovered.
Like you Eric, I will most probably never visit the UK and if I did the few days I would devote to family history research would not uncover much. I would be more interested in visiting the places my ancestors lived rather than researching in churches and records offices.
Regards Kaybron
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Dear Eric
Please be aware that it's not all that easy or cheap for people in the UK either, if they have ancestors from all over the four nations! UK must look very little to people in Australia but not many here can afford to go travelling all over the country to the various record offices and repositories. We're in the same boat to a large extent!
Good luck with your research,
Melbell
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Hi Guy, thanks for that useful information. The trouble is, I don't really have any choice about doing my UK research online. I may never visit UK again and if I do I will probably be visiting places I've longed to see, not researching in churches and records offices. (If I had more time, I would love to do that, but ....)
So it is online records that I need. Once I found a person who was in charge of a set of church records (I think maybe at a village in Devon) and he kindly sent me a copy of the page of the records I was interested in, but I can't expect that all the time.
But putting everyone's ideas together, and being aptient, I hope I can make progress. Thanks.
But you do have a choice Eric, as you and Kaybron have mentioned there are other options, the options I used back in the 1950s when I started and family historians for decades have used before the invention of the internet.
When I started there was not internet, only a very few Family History Societies (FHS) and very few transcriptions of records. By the mid 1970s there was a surge in FHS and they in turn took up the transcription challenge, leading to a higher availability of transcripts, most FHS will also help overseas members with their research and their records transcripts are a good start.
Many FHS members will visit local archives for other members as well.
In addition most of the familysearch microfilmed records are now digitised a few are even available on the internet. All their digitised records are available at their Family History Centers (FHC) in countries worldwide, this means if the parish is not only it will if it was microfilmed be available in a FHC “near” you.
I would also note that individuals, groups, councils etc. host transcripts and even digital records on their own websites, so even your internet use is not limited to the 4 main players many call to mind.
Cheers
Guy
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I concur with Kaybron's and Guy's recommendation that you join a FHS in a county where your ancestors lived. Some have an online forum or FB page. The one I joined has 2 research centres with libraries. I also got a lot of help from volunteers at a heritage centre in a town where a branch of my family had lived for hundreds of years and owned a business.
Catalogues of some county archives are online. Some items in county archives are also included in Natonal Archives online catalogue.
The town or village in which your ancestors lived may have a website, FB page, community association, historical or heritage group.
Don't forget libraries! :) Some allow remote membership. I've used my library card to view library catalogue and to access British Newspaper Archive from home. Some larger libraries have local studies sections.
Have you looked at Resources on the county boards on this forum? People add new items to these.
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Thanks again for all the ideas and assistance, especially yours Maiden Stone. I will certainly be trying some of them out.
(Also happy for any more ideas.)
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Before 1837 you are dependent on parish registers ("PRs") as your principal source. A standard, pre-printed format was introduced in 1813. Prior to that, what was recorded was often pretty much at the whim of the minister. Essentially, the further back in time you go, the less information you get.
A good way to get the hang of searching PRs is to start with the births, marriages and deaths you already know about from the 1840s and 50s and see if you can trace the corresponding baptisms, marriages and burials in the PRs. A couple of words of caution: in the early days of internet genealogy, the databases didn't tend to give you the PRs from after 1837, because the assumption was you would use the BMD records ... this is being addressed now, but I do not think the work is complete yet. Secondly, just because somebody was born, doesn't mean they were baptised either as an infant, or at all. So don't be dismayed if you cannot find a baptism to match a birth.
There are some things that come to your aid when you start working with the PRs. One is that you are into the age before mass transportation (the London & Birmingham Railway, Britain's first long-distance railway route, was opened in 1838). For the most part, people did not tend to travel long distances. And the rigorous enforcement of the Poor Laws meant that poorer people did not tend to leave their home parishes except on marriage, and when they did they seldom moved more than one parish.
The exception to this is the migration to the cities. There was a significant migration to the cities in the early 19th century. If you have labouring class ancestors in Birmingham they are likely to have been part of this. So movement through several parishes into the city is quite possible. But even so, people did not choose to go to Birmingham as such ... they went to the nearest city. So if you have a potential candidate for the baptism of somebody who ended up working in Birmingham in, say, Ryton-on-Dunsmore, then be hesitant to assume that this is necessarily your ancestor because to get to Birmingham he would have had to pass through Coventry. If he was looking for work, why did he not find a job in Coventry instead of pushing on to Birmingham? (That's not to say that he didn't - perhaps there were no suitable jobs in Coventry - but we are playing the odds here, and the odds favour that person going to Coventry rather than Birmingham).
An understanding of the geography of the places you are dealing with is going to be important in the next stage of your research. So for a while you may find that you have to stop looking for ancestors, and start looking for places instead. This is no bad thing. I have seen plenty of risible genealogy posted online by people who clearly never bothered to learn about the geography of the places where they claimed their ancestors lived, and hence had cobbled together totally implausible life stories which relied upon evidence of totally different people who just happened to share the same name. A little bit of map work can save you from this sort of error.
The Cassini Historical Map series are reprints of the first three series of Ordnance Survey maps, re-scaled and re-projected to match the modern OS 1:50 000 sheet numbers. The dates that each sheet conforms to will differ according to the map, because OS mapping in those days was a rolling process. For example, OS Sheet 177 is East London. In the Cassini Historical Map series, there is:
Old Series sheet 177 (1805 - 1822)
Revised Series sheet 177 (1897 - 1902) and
Popular Edition sheet 177 (1920 - 1922)
The Old Series is likely to be the map most useful to you if you are looking at pre-1837. This will show you the "lie of the land" at the end of the period you are researching, and enable you to see which places are where, and how they are connected by roads and canals. This will enable you to test the plausibility of the assumption that the man who was baptised in parish X was also the man of the same name who was married in parish Y and who had children baptised in parish Z.
Finally, once you are researching pre-BMD, the importance of WILLS comes to the fore. Even people of quite limited means made wills, and they give you the names of acknowledged children (and often as well grandchildren, and some siblings who might be appointed executors and so forth). This often enables you to verify the family grouping that your ancestor belongs to. So when you are looking at baptisms, don't just say "Ah yes ... my ancestor was John Jordan, and here is a John Jordan son of Philip and Mary being baptised in 1812 ... that looks like him". Make a note of all of the other children of Philip and Mary Jordan baptised in the same parish for 20 years either side of John. Then go and look for a will associated with John Jordan's death. If he appoints "my brother Zachary Jordan" to be his executor, and Philip and Mary did not baptise a son named Zachary, then you're probably looking at the wrong John Jordan baptism. BUT ... you DO now have a more distinctive name to search for. So go and search for some Zachary Jordan baptisms that fit ... and when you find one, check to see if the same parents had a son baptised called John (then check the burials to make sure that he didn't die at the age of 4 months ... ).
Hope this helps, and best luck with your researches!
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Thanks heaps. Lots of good information there. The wills sounds like a particularly good thing to try - I didn't realise so many people left wills.
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Thanks heaps. Lots of good information there. The wills sounds like a particularly good thing to try - I didn't realise so many people left wills.
One I have is of a weaver whose worldly goods were worth £10. Most valuable items he owned were his apparel.
Wills of men in 18th & early 19thC usually stated their occupation or rank.
Married names of daughters would be given and their husbands may have been mentioned.
Two wills I read had provision for illegitimate grandchildren. Another mentioned a widowed daughter-in-law. A spinster left legacies to a favourite nephew and niece. Nephew was a clergyman. His life was well-documented. Researching him turned up more evidence about his father's family. One man left a small legacy to a woman who was probably his niece, so she became another jigsaw piece in a complicated family.
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I endorse jbml's post re knowledge of geography.
One of my families lived near a canal and a major road between north-west England and Scotland. Their skills, passed down from father to sons through the generations were in demand. Some members of the family went to & fro between towns and villages, others died where they were born. One had children baptised and buried in at least 3 parishes.
Another family lived off the beaten track. One branch farmed, another kept the town inn. Extension of the stagecoach route to the town meant the inn became a stagecoach inn, bringing more custom and therefore more work for sons, daughters and servants. The family remained, making a good living until the elder sons decided to set up on their own accounts, one in the nearest large town, his brother in the nearest city. Siblings and parents moved to join them over a period of time.
Btw one innkeeper's widow married a maltster as her 2nd husband. Her eldest grandson, the one who moved to the bigger town, was in business as a miller for a while. Understanding how various occupations might be connected sometimes helps in FH. Marriage between children of business associates for example.
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I would just like to add a couple of ideas to the excellent advice that has been offered. Newspapers on findmypast can be very helpful, also looking for matching trees on Ancestry. You could also try googling the family name and County such as "Thompson Family history, Ledbury". I have found online Family trees using this method.
GenesReunited is also a good site for connecting with people with the same research interests.
I think you are going to be very busy, if you find info online, don't forget to make a note of the source in case you want to return to it.
Carol