Nearly 6 million British family notices are now free to explore online! Find your ancestors from England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales in more new and updated records, too: newspaper articles, British almanacs and directories, clandestine marriages, Liverpool Catholic and Warwickshire Church of England records, military collections (especially WWI) and Scotland death notices.
6 million free British Family Notices now searchable
The British Newspaper Archive is home to millions of exclusively-digitized newspaper pages from the British Library, covering England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales. Great news for those of you who don’t already subscribe: a free collection of British family notices that appear in papers on The British Newspaper Archive is now searchable at FamilySearch.org.
The index contains nearly 6 million records and may include family names, relationships, dates, and places of vital events and the publication. Better yet, you’ll find links to images in those newspapers, like this example:
More British Isles newspaper coverage
Family notices are only one of the many spots in a newspaper in which your relatives may appear! Feature news article coverage, crime reports, legal notices, advertisements, even sporting events. In recent weeks, The British Newspaper Archive has added over 270,000 digitized newspaper pages its site—and these updates also appear in the newspaper collections at sister site Findmypast.com. Updates to existing titles span England, Scotland and Ireland and include the following (links go to the Findmypast collections):
British directories and almanacs. Findmypast.com has added over 329,000 records to its British Directories and Almanacs collection. According to the site, “the new additions include English & Welsh publications spanning the years 1766 to 1919. Inside you will find the names, addresses and occupations of prominent people, tradesmen, people who held office, business owners and local civil servants.”
Browse these pages to learn more about an ancestor’s life. For example, says the site, “They provide topographical accounts of towns, social statistics and comprehensive guides of towns or cities, as well as full listings of gentry, business owners, tradespeople, civil servants, church leaders, school teachers and much more. Furthermore, you can explore the history of your home by searching the publications by address, where you may discover previous proprietors.”
England clandestine marriages. Now on Findmypast are more than 881,000 indexed images of clandestine marriage records covering the years 1667 to 1775. “Records will reveal a combination of the couple’s names, marital conditions, occupations and residences,” says the collection description. The term “clandestine” refers to marriages performed outside the Anglican church, which were still recognized by law but categorized as common-law. According to the site, “There are a number of reasons why individuals would have participated in these ceremonies. The couple may have wanted to be married in secret and away from their home. There may have been a reason that the marriage needed to be performed quickly. A clandestine marriage also cost far less than a traditional wedding. However, not all reasons were innocent, and the courtrooms heard many cases of people coerced or forced into a marriage or cases of bigamy. At this time, the age required for marriage was 14 for men and 12 for women.”
Liverpool Catholics.Genealogy Giant Ancestry.com has updated several collections of Catholic parish records for Liverpool, England, provided in association with Liverpool City Council. Explore these collections by first by going to Ancestry.com here and then in the menu, select Search > Card Catalog > and search for the name of the collections:
Liverpool, England, Catholic Baptisms, 1741-1916. Over 1.5 million records! According to the collection description, “most baptisms took place shortly after children were born. Baptism register entries in these records may include name, birth date, baptism date, father’s name, mother’s name, godparents, minister [and] parish.”
Liverpool, England, Catholic Confirmations, 1813-1922. Over 100,000 records; may include the name, age, confirmation date, parent’s name and parish.
Liverpool, England, Catholic Marriages, 1754-1932. Over 300,000 records in this collection. Entries may include marriage date, bride’s name and age, groom’s name and age, parents’ names and parish.
Liverpool, England, Catholic Burials, 1813-1985. Over 720,000 records; may include the deceased’s name, age, burial date, residence, and gravesite.
Warwickshire Church of England parish registers. FamilySearch.org has updated its database of England, Warwickshire, Parish Registers, 1535-1984. With nearly 3 million records spanning about 450 years, this collection of Church of England parish registers contain records of christening, marriage and burial entries.
World War I collections. Now online at Findmypast.com, you can search these new or updated databases relating to the Great War:
Irish Officers Died in the Great War, 1914-1919. “Search over 1,000 records to learn more about the Irish officers who died in the First World War. Discover where and when an officer died, as well as the cause of death. You may also uncover details of an officer’s family and pre-war life.”
Honourable Women of the Great War, 1914-1918. “Discover your female ancestor who served during the First World War. Learn about the wartime activities your ancestor was involved in as well as her pre-war life. You may also find a photograph of your ancestor.”
Airmen Died in The Great War, 1914-1919. “Discover your relative’s name, birth and death years, cause of death, rank, and more. These records come from the Naval & Military Press. The service branches designated in this collection are as follows: Australian Flying Corps, Miscellaneous Airmen Casualties, Pre-War Casualties, Royal Air Force, Royal Flying Corps, Royal Naval Air Service, United States Air Service Casualties Attached to the Royal Fighting Corps/Royal Air Force, US Navy Casualties, and Women’s Royal Air Force.”
More British military collections. These two collections have been updated at Findmypast:
British Subjects Who Died In The Service Of The Indian Empire. ”This collection contains over 1,100 records and each result includes both a transcript and an image of the original document. Records will reveal a combination of the individual’s name, birth and death years, rank, regiment, and service history.”
Britain, Campaign, Gallantry & Long Service Medals & Awards.“Over 58,000 additional records have been added to the collection. The new additions cover recipients of the Military Cross, Distinguished Flying Medal, Distinguished Conduct Medal, Distinguished Service Order and Commando Gallantry awards.”
Scotland deaths. Findmypast’s Scotland, Lanarkshire Death & Burial Index 1642-1855 includes more than 64,000 death and burial records from 31 burial grounds. “Each result includes a transcript taken from an original document that will reveal a combination of your ancestor’s birth year, death and burial dates, age at death, burial place, and mortcloth price.” (The mortcloth was the cloth spread over the coffin.)
What does “British” actually mean?
To start exploring your British Isles roots, it would help to know what the term “British” actually means. Click here to read the answer and tips for getting started in your British Isles family history research.
Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links (at no additional cost to you). Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!
Now online! German civil registration records for Bad Doberman, Berchtesgaden and Minden, as well as WWII UK prisoners of war records, updates to the 1939 Register, parish records for Cheshire, Cumberland and Derbyshire; British newspapers and Queensland, Australia inquests.
Featured: German civil registration records
Genealogy Giant Ancestry.com has published several new collections of German civil registration records. According to the site, “Beginning on January 1, 1876, birth, marriage and death records in the former German Empire were created by local registry offices. The collected records are arranged chronologically and usually bound together in the form of yearbooks. These are collectively referred to as ‘civil registers.’ Occasionally, alphabetical directories of names were also created. While churches continued to keep traditional records, the State also mandated that the personal or marital status of the entire population be recorded.” Information in each varies.
Explore these German civil registration records by first by going to Ancestry.com here and then in the menu, select Search > Card Catalog > and search for the name of the collection we list below:
For Bad Doberman:
Bad Doberan, Germany, Military Registers, 1868-1914
Bad Doberan, Germany, Residence Registers, 1884-1918
For Berchtesgaden:
Berchtesgaden, Germany, Births, Marriages, and Deaths, 1876-1950
For Minden:
Minden, Germany, Citizen Lists and Residence Registers, 1845-1902
Minden, Germany, Births, 1874-1905
Minden, Germany, Marriages, 1874-1935
Minden, Germany, Deaths, 1874-1966 and
Minden, Germany, Military Records, 1783-1856.
UK, Allied Prisoners of War, 1939-1945. “This collection contains information about the soldiers captured, where they were held and often, what happened to them,” states the collection description. “Whilst details vary between sets of records, you may find the following information (where available): name, camp name, nationality, place and date of birth, place and date of death, father’s name, mother’s name, gender, date and place of capture, service (e.g. Army, Air, Navy, Civilian), service rank [and] service number.”
New Genealogy Records at Findmypast
1939 Register Update. For England and Wales: “Over 37,000 ‘closed records’ have been opened up and are now available to search. Search today and find out what your ancestors were doing on the eve of WWII. Discover exactly what they did for a living, maps of where they lived, and even who their neighbors were.”
Cheshire Registers & Records. Explore registers and records from the English county of Cheshire. This collection currently comprises five titles including parish registers, local histories, and funeral certificates.
Cumberland Registers & Records. This collection currently comprises one title: Monumental Inscriptions in the Graveyards of Brigham & Bridekirk, 1666-1876. This title was published in 1878. The preface notes that ‘the whole of these inscriptions were copied with great care, and the same care has been extended to the printing of them.”
Derbyshire Registers & Records. This collection currently comprises one title: The Brave Men of Eyam, 1665-1666. The preface of this title states that the statistics regarding deaths, dates, and some leading incidents are historical, although ‘the object of the book is to tell, in a popular form, the tale of a “mighty woe.”
British newspaper additions! Now at Findmypast is the Oxfordshire Weekly News, covering the years 1869-1895 and 1898-1926. You’ll also find the following added coverage for these papers: Irish Independent (1995-1997, 2000), Belfast Telegraph (1915-1916, 1918-1919) and Liverpool Echo (1987-1988).
Australia, Queensland, Inquests 1859-1897. Discover your ancestor in this index compiled from the inquest files created by the Justice Department for the period 1859 to 1897. Each result will provide you with a transcript including a combination of your ancestor’s name, alias, and inquest year, any additional notes, their file number, reference and item ID.
German family history research help for you
The Genealogy Gems website is packed with German family history research tips and tricks, from this beginner post (where we tackle the question of what “German” even means!) to this helpful explanation of German census records. Click here to explore all our German-related articles. Or: click on the free video right here to learn about finding your German ancestor’s village of origin!
Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links (at no additional cost to you). Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!
Extra, extra! Thousands of pages of US and UK newspapers are newly online for your genealogy research. Also new this week are birth, marriage, death, and parish records for England and the United States, a large historic Irish photo collection and a unique family history research aid for Iceland.
Feature Photo: Newspapers
UK Newspapers, Parish Records and More
England: Parish records and newspapers
Ancestry.com got a big update recently to their English records! The following collections have been added for Derbyshire, England:
Originals of these documents come from Derbyshire Church of England Parish Registers, and dozens of parishes are included. You can narrow your results by parish by selecting from the drop-down menu in the Browse this Collection box (shown here) on the right side of the page.
Also brand new this week are several newspapers for England, hosted by the British Newspaper Archive:
You can search the British Newspaper Archive for free, and they’ve recently created a brand new package: Save 31% with their 3 Month package for just £25.90! You’ll get access to over 22 million newspaper pages across Britain and Ireland, with more added every day.
Scotland: Parish records & newspapers
A new collection of Scottish parish records is now available at Ancestry.com: Extracted Parish Records, 1571-1997. The records in this collection include baptisms/christenings, burials, marriages, tombstone inscriptions, obituaries, tax lists, wills, and other miscellaneous types of records. For copies of the originals, “the microfilm number of pertinent corroborating records can often be found on the LDS Church’s FamilySearch site (www.familysearch.org) in the Family History Library Catalog.”
Also new for Scotland, the Paisley & Renfrewshire Gazette newspaper is available at the British Newspaper Archive. Years span 1875-1908 (except 1877) and it was published by Newsquest in Paisley, Renfrewshire, Scotland. 1,722 issues comprised of 14,000 pages are now available to view online.
Historic Irish photos & newspapers
More than 10,000 historic pictures from have been added to a folklore website, duchas.ie. A recent article announcing the launch stated that “the Collection contains photographs taken by professional photographers and by collectors working with the National Folklore Commission, amongst others, and are classified under 14 different topics including: festivals; holy wells; settlement; folklore collection; and games and pastimes.” A large number of the photographs date from the early 20th century.
The British Newspaper Archive has added a new newspaper title from Antrim, Northern Ireland: Carrickfergus Advertiser 1884-1895, 1897-1910. Nearly 1,400 issues and over 5,000 pages are included in this new digitized collection.
Iceland: New language resource
If you have ancestors from Iceland, this unique resource is for you! A new website has made Icelandic spelling, declension, and etymology dictionaries now free online. From Iceland Magazine: “In an effort to protect the Icelandic language in a time of smartphones and computers, The Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies at the University of Iceland has opened a website which offers free access to the institute’s large catalogue of dictionaries, including etymology- and spelling dictionaries and the institute’s declension database for the Icelandic language.” Here’s a tip: The site is in Icelandic, but use Google Translate to navigate in English! Plus check out our favorite resources for pronunciation help.
United States: Vital records & more
California.County Birth, Marriage, and Death Records, 1849-1980 are new online at Ancestry.com. This collection contains records from various counties throughout California, and you can use the drop-down table to search by the county, record type, and year range of your ancestor’s life events.
Connecticut. New records are available online at Findmypast for Connecticut baptisms, church records, and burials from the 1600s-1800s. These records cover various towns and have been transcribed from public domain records.
Georgia. New from the Georgia Archives: Colonial Conveyances. This collection contains 11 volumes of property transactions between private citizens in the Colony of Georgia from 1750-1804. Each book contains a grantor index at the end of the volume.
Maryland.The University of Maryland Student Newspapers Database has recently launched. From the press release: “[This collection] provides keyword and date access to issues of The Diamondback and its seven predecessor newspapers from 1910 to October 1971. Users can search names and topics across all the issues, as well as focusing in on a particular day, month, or year of publication or publication title.”
Want more help with newspapers, Google Translate, and more? Genealogy Gems Premium Members can watch full-length video classes by Lisa Louise Cooke on those topics and more! Sign up today
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links (at no additional cost to you). Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!
Trace your British Isles genealogy! This week we report on new genealogy records online for England, Scotland, and Ireland. Read about WWI weekly casualty lists, free census records at FreeCen, English and Scottish burials, Scottish poorhouse–and a free British Newspaper Archive webinar on learning about migration and travel in old newspapers.
British Isles Genealogy: Free and Fee Records Now Online
NEW! Free UK census records website
The same team of volunteers who bring us FreeBMD and FreeREG have now launched FreeCEN, a free website offering free-to-search 19th-century UK censuses. “Transcribed entirely by volunteers, we have more than 32 million individuals available on our website that anyone can search without having to create an account,” states a press release. “FreeCEN2 also brings with it a host of improvements for existing and future volunteers, such as a members sign-in area and brand new messaging system.” NOTE: This site may not be comprehensive for every kind of record you’re looking for. But it’s free, and definitely worth exploring, whether you want to search its collections or volunteer to help add to them.
England burial records: Staffordshire, Lincolnshire
Findmypast.com subscribers can now access over 127,000 entries in its Staffordshire Monumental Inscriptions, providing information on burials in “168 churchyards, burial grounds, and cemeteries throughout the county. This record sets can help you discover an ancestor’s birth date, death date, and residence, as well as the name of other family members such as parents, spouse, or children.”
About 90,000 new records have been added to Findmypast’s Lincolnshire Burials 1754-1812, which now totals over 1.5 million records covering over 300 locations across the county. For each person, you might find age at death, birth year, burial date, and location.
Scotland, West Lothian
Findmypast.com has published new records relating to West Lothian, located in the south of Scotland. According to the site, the area was “known as Linlithgowshire until 1921. The county was home to the Scottish monarchs of the 15th and 16th centuries.”
Linlithgowshire Poorhouse records, with details on more than 15,000 people admitted between 1859 and 1912. “The collection contains a variety of different record types including admissions, deaths, discharges, and sick rolls that will reveal your ancestor’s admission date, behavior during their stay, previous residence, and more.”
Burials, 1860-1975. Over 87,000 transcripts of burial records spanning 115 years. “Each transcript that will reveal the date of your ancestor’s burial, the location of their grave, their occupation, residence, death date, and in some cases the names of additional family members.”
WWI Weekly Casualty List at The British Newspaper Archive
The historically significant Weekly Casualty List (1917-1918, published by the War Office & Air Ministry) lists names of soldiers who were killed, wounded, or declared missing during the First World War. The War Office and Air Ministry updated and published the lists weekly and our current holdings cover the latter years of the conflict. Over 2,400 digitized pages are published in this collection.
More new collections at the British Newspaper Archive
East Sussex: For Brighton Gazette, additions include 1871-1910, for total coverage for this scenic seaside town now spanning 1825-1910.
Hertfordshire: New issues have been added for Herts & Cambs Reporter & Royston Crow, covering the town of Royston. Available years now include 1878-1882, 1884-1888, 1890-1898, and 1900-1910.
Lancashire: The Nelson Leader coverage now spans 1920-1957; it was published in Nelson.
Norfolk: Another new collection is Eastern Daily Press from Norwich. It’s already got nearly 40,000 pages of coverage for 1870-1876, 1878-1890, 1896, 1899, and 1901-1909.
Tynemouth, Tyne, and Wear: Now you can read Shields Daily News from 1870-1957, with the recent addition of pages for 1938-1957.
Warwickshire: New on the site is Alcester Chronicle, with over 17,000 digitized pages covering 1869-1888 and 1890-1910.
West Yorkshire: The years 1880-1888 have been added for The Knaresborough Post, for total coverage now spanning 1878-1912 (with a few little gaps).
Ireland, Tyrone: The Limerick Chronicle (1832-1868) gives historical news from the western seaboard of Ireland and their holdings cover both the pre- and post-Famine periods. The Mid-Ulster Mail was published in County Tyrone, with current coverage offering insight into the period before the Great War.
Scotland, Angus, and Kincardineshire: The Brechin Herald and Angus and Mearns News (1890-1892). This paper covers both of the historic eastern counties of Angus and Kincardineshire.
Free webinar from The British Newspaper Archive: News coverage of immigration and travel
“The topic of emigration is well covered by the newspapers. For instance, you can easily find advertisements that might have enticed your ancestor to leave Britain or Ireland to seek a new life in Australia or America. In the 1840s, The Limerick Chronicle carried advertisements for ‘fast ships’ and information booklets designed to assist immigrants travelling to the United States.” -The British Newspaper Archive
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links. Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!
Old cookbooks are among new recent online records collections. So are British newspapers, British Columbia estate files, New Zealand WWII appointments, UK Parliamentary returns, UK military indexes, US newspapers (Arkansas, Kansas, and New York) and church records for Sydney, Australia; Norfolk, England; and Stockholm, Sweden.
Featured New Records Online: Old Cookbooks and Home Remedies
The US National Library of Medicine has “recently embarked on a project to digitize and make available” its collection of historical recipes and cookbooks, according to its blog. Old recipes (also called “receipts”) may give you a glimpse into what daily life was like for your ancestors. Among these are “recipes and advice for food preparation and preservation, animal husbandry, preparing useful household concoctions, and allopathic medicines and treatments for maintaining personal health.” Find these at the National Library of Medicine Digital Collections.
Love these? Click here to find more old recipes and classic cookbooks on the Genealogy Gems website.
Australia – New South Wales – Church records
Nearly 125 years of baptism, marriage, and burial registers for the city and parish of Saint Peter’s in the greater metropolitan area of Sydney, Australia (1839-1963) are now available on Ancestry.com. Baptismal registers may include the child’s name, birth and baptismal dates, parents’ names, abode and profession of parent(s) and officiant’s name. Marriage records may list for bride and groom the names, occupations, residences, ages and marital status, along with the date and place of the wedding, names of those giving consent (if required) and the officiant. Burial registers may mention the name of the deceased; death and burial dates; abode; age; “quality” or profession, and officiant.
Britain – Dougal’s Index Register
A Findmypast.com collection of Britain’s missing beneficiaries and unclaimed estates (1910) “contains over 500 records from Dougal’s Index Register to Next of Kin, Heirs at Law and Cases of Unclaimed Money Advertisements from 1910. The publication looks specifically at properties or estates registered in chancery court, which have gone unclaimed because a deceased person did not create a will or did not have any known descendants….The lists only provide an individual’s first and last name.”
Britain – Newspapers
Over 48,000 new articles and two brand new titles have been added to Findmypast’s collection of historic British newspapers. This month’s new titles are The Shipping & Mercantile Gazette and The Rutland Echo & Leicestershire Advertiser.
Canada – British Columbia
Findmypast.com subscribers may now browse among over 750,000 records of British Columbia Estate Files (1859-1949). According to the site, these “allow you to delve through probate estate files pertaining to the judicial districts of British Columbia; the County Court and the Supreme Court. Probate estate records are a valuable resource for family history research, providing vital details such as dates, names, and locations to help grow your family tree. Included in this collection is a probate index for the district of Vancouver, sorted alphabetically by last name.” Browsing tip: narrow results by year, document, court, and district.
Canada celebrated its 150th birthday in 2017!Click here to read tips for starting your Canadian research from Lisa Louise Cooke’s conversation with Library and Archives Canada staffer Claire Banton.
England – Norfolk parish records
Fifty-one volumes of Norfolk Archdeacon’s Transcripts (1600-1812) and 123 volumes of Bishop’s Transcripts (1687-1901)are now browseable at Findmypast.com. According to the site, the collections contain records of baptisms, marriages, and burials from across the county.
New Zealand – WWII
Fold3.com hosts a new collection of WWII Appointments, Promotions, Transfers and Resignations, extracted from the New Zealand Gazette. These give information such as name, rank, event date, and regiment for members of the New Zealand Expeditionary Forces (including army, air force, and navy).
Ancestry.com has published a new collection of UK Military Indexes, 1920-1971. According to the site, “These lists comprise the names and service numbers of those who were discharged from the armed forces after 1920 and born before 1901. Details given for over 300,000 individuals found within this collection may include (where available): initial and surname, date of birth, their service, service number and Ministry of Defence reference number.”
UK – Parliamentary Returns
The UK Parliamentary Archive has “recently uploaded the Protestation Returns for Berkshire, Cornwall and Cumbria,” according to its blog. “The Protestation Returns are the closest thing we have to a census for England in 1641-1642. They originate in the scuffling between Parliament and Charles I just before Civil War engulfed the country. It was decided that all men over the age of 18 in England and Wales should swear an oath of allegiance to the Protestant religion, Parliament, and the King. Around one-third of the records for England survive.” A companion map allows users to search for these records by location.
US – Arkansas, Kansas, New York – Newspapers
Among new digitized newspaper collections at Newspapers.com are the following titles: The Frankfort Bee (Kansas, 1876-1898), The Southern Standard (Arkadelphia, Arkansas, 1878-1905), Arkansas Times and Advocate (Little Rock, 1837-1838), Cortland Register (Kansas, 1889-1924), The Frankfort Sentinel (Kansas, 1886-1892), The Marshall County Index (Frankfort, Kansas, 1905-1906), Epworth Advocate (Frankfort, Kansas, 1895-1896), Springville Journal (New York, 1867-1985) and The Ness County Pioneer (Sidney, Kansas, 1879-1880).
Are you listening to the free Genealogy Gems Podcast? This year Lisa Louise Cooke celebrates 10 years on the air. The show has more than 2.5 million downloads worldwide. Listen to hear for yourself her winning combination of technology tools, genealogy research strategies, inspiring stories–and tons of tips you can apply right away to your family history!
Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links (at no additional cost to you). Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!