SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

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SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

This section should not to be taken as in-depth be-all-and-end all Advice. The Genealogy Spectrum can be very complex, and appear daunting to those who have no experience, and so this Section suggests a few simple Starter Points. More in-depth research can be undertaken once the researcher gains more experience in all aspects of genealogy. On this thread will be some dates, contact numbrs, E-mail address's and price ammounts, this are to the best of our knowledge true at the time of starting this thread. Dates, contact numbers, Email address's and price ammounts may change as time goes on.

Ok now thats been said lets start, I hope you like a good read....

SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Civil registration started in 1837, and became compulsory during the 1870s. Birth Marriage and Death records post-1837 are held by the ONS (Office of National Statistics), in Southport, and certificates can be ordered from there. Many official records are also held at the Public Record Office in Kew.

Before 1837, parish registers are about the only way to track ancestors – assuming the registers survived to be put on microfilm. BMD Certificates can also be bought from the Registrars, in some cases for less than the ONS charges.

Parish records are available on microfilm at the London Metropolitan Archives, Northampton Road, EC1. I would imagine that if they don’t hold a county parish register then the County Records Office would. CRO and LMA researchers will “find” for you but its not cheap – the LMA researchers charge £35 an hour last time I asked.

The Family Record Centre (FRC) at Myddleton Street, EC1, has microfilm of all census records but in the case of non indexed records you do need to know the address. The microfilm is viewable for free. All England & Wales BMD’s are stored there, older ones in hand-written ledgers, although some have been retyped. Microfiche copies of BMD’s are held at most county record offices. Cross-referencing in GRO indexes eg, Mother’s Maiden Name on births only began in Sep Q 1911. Name of Spouse in Marriage entry began in 1912.

Censuses began in 1841. S & N Genealogy have permission to sell censuses on CD ROM – costs from £49.95 to £59.95 depending on which area. These come with limited indexing if you pay the extra – but for example in 1861 London Census, only 4000 names were indexed against one million living in London, so its not worth buying.

Buying CD ROM boxed sets from S & N can be useful; it’s a lot of money but when set against fares and travel time it can pay for itself by the time you haven’t gone into London a dozen times and have done your researching in the comfort of your home.

The Mormons have a website, “familysearch.org.”, which is free. This has International Genealogy Index (IGI) and All Resources to enable researchers to track ancestors via christening records. They also have a chart on their website which anyone can copy for free. The Mormons also transcribed the 1881 census, which is free to view.

To find the names of all the children in a family in a Parent Search, go to All Resources, and type in the father’s name and mother’s first name. I found the least information you enter in the boxes the better your chance of a result. There is a more in-depth article on the IGI in Section 9 of this Guide.

The 1901 census can be found on the National Archives site. It will let you do a free Person Name Search, but if you want to view the entire census page to see who else lived there you have to pay. You can pay by credit card “as you go” or buy a voucher, but vouchers only last for 6 months. The site also allows the researcher to do Free Name Searches for 1841 1851 1861 1871 and 1891, but here too to view the image you have to pay.

The free BMD online is government approved but it is put together by volunteers and is incomplete, however new records are being added every month. This will soon be enhanced by FreeCEN and FreeREG.

The free BMD is useful (if the record is there) for finding the name of the spouse before 1911.

There are lots of websites claiming to have information, and PC packages to buy, but all information comes from ONS Civil Registration and Census records and Parish records anyway so its cheaper to go to the “root source” and / or to use the Mormon site or Free BMD.

There is also a National Burials Index.
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

When you’ve found a birth marriage or death entry in the ONS records and you want to get a copy of the certificate, the charge is £8.50 by phone if you have the volume, page number, year, quarter, and district, or £11 if you have no information beyond name / year. They also do “additional” certificate and year searches, for a small fee. To order by phone : 0845 603 7788. To order online costs just £7 but there is a higher risk of being sent the wrong certificate.

Buying certificates is the only way to get at the information contained therein. If you can give a checking point and the ONS find your criteria doesn’t match the certificate details, they don’t send the certificate, and charge £4.50 for the search, but this avoids paying £8.50 or £11 for a wrong certificate, which can happen with common names.

Info from certificates can help determine birth year, eg in the case of a marriage, or give a mother’s maiden name, or give an address which you can use in a census search to see who else was in the family that you never knew about.

Children who were born and died between censuses are harder to locate, but this is where the Mormon IGI can be useful (if they’ve picked up on the christening, that is).

From marriage certificates of the 1840’s, the names of the respective fathers (which will be shown even if the fathers are deceased) will take you back to the late 1700’s, early 1800’s eg Joe Smith married in 1840, aged 25; his father was Fred Smith, for Fred to be Joe’s father he must be about 45–50 thus would have been born about 1790 – 1795.

For a One Name Study - e.g. Paternal Line

Start with Father, his parents’ full names will be given on his birth certificate

Search for Grandparents marriage entry, as you need to know Grandfather’s age to look for his birth entry in GRO index

Search for Grandfather’s birth certificate, which will give his parents’ names - your Gt Grandparents

The marriage certificate for your Gt Grandparents will give their ages (unless they lied). Age at marriage indicates Year of Birth.

Repeat search of GRO for birth entry of Gt Grandfather, his marriage - and repeat process for Gt Gt Grandfather etc etc .

When your searches have taken you back to 1901 or thereabouts, start looking in census returns, checking the addresses you’ve got from Birth and Marriage certificates. This should provide info on the rest of the family e.g. siblings down the generations. You may well have lots of distant cousins you never knew existed.
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

CIVIL REGISTRATION OF BIRTHS, MARRIAGES AND DEATHS was first proposed by Oliver Cromwell in the 1650s. But because the church was such a powerful entity, it took on the role of recording christenings and marriages in Parish Registers. Over the centuries, the increase in the number of non-conformist churches, and the persistence of Common Law marriages and unbaptised children, was increasingly perceived as a problem for the wealthy who needed to define inheritance and ownership. This led to a House of Commons Committee recommending the introduction of a national system of registration and the introduction of a civil marriage. On July 1st, 1837, the new Registration Service began with 2,193 Registrars of Births and Deaths and 619 Superintendent Registrars. This compares with current levels of 1,026 Registrars of Births and Deaths and 380 Superintendent Registrars. The Act permitted non-conformists to marry in their own churches, chapels and meeting-houses, if licensed, but only in the presence of a civil registrar.

The new law was not well-received. First the Church of England did not like it because it eroded her place as the recorder of such events. Many nonconformist sects saw it as a plot to list and track their members, libertarians regarded the law as an infringement of the Englishman's rights to privacy and freedom. The labouring classes could neither read nor write and did not understand the need for some kind of government paper. Finally there were those who saw registration as a precursor of more taxation.

Queen Victoria introduced the legislation to the people of England and Wales and promised that the government would be good. And to sweeten the deal, while everyone was supposed to register births, it was not compulsory. The government used the existing structure of Poor Law Unions to define registration districts.

Originally, the registrars had to travel around and visit the people who had an event and make a note of the details. A new Act of 1874 removed this and it was up to the people to visit the local registrar office to record the event.
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

The Lincolnshire Archives has a publication: 'Poor Law Union Records', from which we quote:

'By the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration act of 1836 (6&7 Will 4 c86) the Guardians were directed to provide a register office and to appoint Registrars of Births and Deaths. The Clerk to the Guardians was given a right of appointment to the office of Superintendent Registrar, and the power of appointment of Registrars of Marriages. Arrangements for carrying out periodic censuses devolved upon the Superintendent Registrar and the Registrars.

The functions of Boards of Guardians under this Act were transferred to County and County Borough Councils under the Local Government Act of 1929 (19 & 20 Geo. 5, c. 17)'.
It was not until 1898 that non-conformist ministers and priests were able to apply for a licence to conduct marriages by themselves (i.e. to act as registrars).
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

THE REGISTRY OFFICE

Each Registry Office creates certificates and once a quarter these are sent to the Registrar General's Office where they are indexed by type and name. Indexes exist for each quarter of a year for each type of event - for example: Marriages, quarter ending March, 1880. To ask someone to look for an event over a two year period requires them to consult eight separate index volumes.

A local Registrar's Office (RO) holds their marriage records indexed by church, not surname, unless it was a civil ceremony, and those are recorded by date. If you don't know the church name, the parish name should suffice. Normally, births and deaths are recorded in approximate date order at the Registry Office. It isn't until the records are sent to the General Registrar's Office (GRO) once each quarter, that an index by surnames is created. It is these quarterly indexes mentioned above that are available at various libraries and archives. The GRO Index number is a volume and page number, and is not unique for each event. For example, for marriages there may be three marriages recorded per page. Until the early 1850s up to eight people (four couples) can share the same page number in each quarter. After that up to four people share the same number. For the first few years of indexing, the volume number was a Roman numeral.

Unfortunately, the volume and page number provided in the national GRO index means nothing to the local RO. But having it proves that the entry exists in a certain time frame. The address of local ROs in Lincolnshire are provided via links below. Fees for certificates ordered from the GRO are more expensive than the RO fees, but if you are uncertain about the details, the GRO may be a better place to search. If you know the date, church, etc., then the local RO is often faster and less expensive. Only the marriage certificates are ordered by church.
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

There are events post 1837 on the IGI, but being post 1837 doesn't mean that you cannot search the parish registers at the local county record office. Parish register entries can be found up to modern times so you dont have to rely on the GRO Index.

Very handy for marriages and great for grouping families together when you don't want to go to the expense of certs for them all.


Certificate costs:
registrar offices are about £7, I understand (Although I am told by another Genes member that Hertfordshire charges £10 so Reg office prices may vary)

All prices are for standard delivery (at time of print)

http://www.gro.gov.uk/gro
Full certificate with GRO reference number..........................................£7.00
Full certificate without GRO reference number....................................£11.50

If ordering by telephone - 0845 603 7788
Full certificate with GRO reference number..........................................£8.50
Full certificate without GRO reference number....................................£11.50
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

CENSUS RETURNS

There has been a census every ten years since 1801, excluding 1941. However, only those that date from 1841 are of real value to the family historian. The administration of the early census returns 1801-1831 was the responsibility of the Overseers of the Poor and the clergy.

Most of these early returns were unfortunately destroyed, although in some isolated instances they have been preserved. The census returns for 1841 were the first to be kept and, as far as the general public is concerned, the information is released by the Public Record Office after a hundred years. For example, the public were given access to the 1891 census returns on 1 January 1992.

The census was taken on the following dates:

10 Mar 1801 No longer exists, with a few exceptions
27 May 1811 No longer exists, with a few exceptions
28 May 1821 No longer exists, with a few exceptions
30 May 1831 No longer exists, with a few exceptions
7 June 1841 Few local indexes exist - see GENUKI county pages (or 6/6/1841 ?)
30 March 1851 Many local indexes exist - see GENUKI county pages
7 April 1861 Few local indexes exist - see GENUKI county pages
2 April 1871 Few local indexes exist - see GENUKI county pages
3 April 1881 National index available online
5 April 1891 Few local indexes exist - see GENUKI county pages
31 March 1901 National index available online

2 April 1911 100 year closure - will be opened 1st January 2012
19 June 1921 100 year closure
26 April 1931 Destroyed during WW2
29 September 1939 WW2 National Registration - 100 year closure

8 April 1951 100 year closure
23 April 1961 100 year closure
25 April 1971 100 year closure
5 April 1981 100 year closure
21 April 1991 100 year closure
29 April 2001 100 year closure
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

Census returns are held at:

England and Wales
"Family Records Centre"
1 Myddelton Street
Islington
LONDON EC1R 1UW

District Libraries and County Record Offices normally have copies of the returns for their own area.

The LDS have copies of the census microfilms. These usually need to be ordered unless you are visiting a branch of the LDS in the same area as the returns in which you are interested.

It is advisable before making a trip to a library or record office, to check the exact whereabouts of specific census returns in order to avoid a wasted visit. Also some libraries may have a limited number of viewers and a booking may be necessary.
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

AN I.G.I. TUTORIAL

(Contributed by a fellow researcher) - How to search the IGI (for beginners) :

If you are new to researching and/or to the IGI, please bear the following in mind.

IGI: International Genealogical Index
found on:
http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/ ... search.asp

It is a database of mostly baptisms and marriage records put together by the Latter Day Saints church. It covers parishes all over the country, but it's really important to remember that some places are VERY well covered by the Index whilst other places do not appear.

There are broadly two sorts of records on the IGI. These are EXTRACTED records and SUBMITTED records. One or other of these words will appear on the record you are looking at, usually at the bottom.

EXTRACTED records are taken from a particular Parish Register, or other official source. They are as likely to be subject to errors of transcriptions, mistakes, typos etc as any other transcribed record anywhere. Check the ORIGINAL Parish Register for confirmation and often for additional information - Vicars marginal notes are rarely transcribed and can often be very revealing. To access the part of the IGI which shows ONLY transcribed records, go in through the Hugh Wallis IGI Batch Numbers site - google it.

SUBMITTED records are a free for all - anyone can submit anything to the IGI for inclusion. Nobody checks it. These records range from absolutely accurate (very rare, in my experience) right down to sheer fantasy, and in a few cases, malice. If looking at submitted records ask yourself - does it give dates and places? If it doesn't, it’s worthless, forget it and do your research some other way. If it does give dates and places, then check EACH and every fact as you go along. You only need to accept one fact which is incorrect, for your whole tree to be rubbish.
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Re: SIMPLE GUIDE FOR RESEARCHERS WHO NEVER DID IT BEFORE

Post by White Knight »

Using the afore-mentioned as a guide, the same search format can be applied to Marriages.

These tips may work for you :

If your search gives a batch number you can also try searching with the number one above or one below that number - sometimes +/-2 or three, also.
You can also try the same batch number with the letter altered -for example, if you have C000000 then try M000000 for Marriages.

If you have a whole page of names, dates, places - if you use Control F you can type a name, date or place etc in the search box and quickly go through the page/s rather than having to trawl through every single name. Works in lots of other places as well.

With Batch Numbers :

C = Christenings
M = Marriages
P = Parent Search but comes up with baptisms if you are looking for the children of Parents, rather than for one individual baptism record.

*********************

The 1881 census is free online in the LDS site familysearch.org.

********************

familysearch have a new Pilot section, showing original digitised parish records. These arent indexed however which means a frame by frame search. However, its invaluable for any researchers studying Durham or Northumberland.
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