My Top Family History Discoveries

For this week’s blog post I want to share some of my latest online genealogy discoveries.  They’re all free, searchable websites, and hopefully at least one of them will be of interest and/or use to you in your research.  Do bear in mind, though, that while they’re new to me, they may not be new to you!

So here, in no order of preference at all, they are:

Liverpool as a Trading Port  This site has collected the names of residents of the city from 1704-1860, plus ships sailing from the port between 1759 and 1809.  

Scottish Court of Session Digital Archive  Hosted by the University of Virginia Law Library, this covers the late 1750s to late 1830s. People mentioned in these documents include Scottish women, Virginia merchants, aristocratic Highland proprietors, famous authors, enslaved labourers, soldiers, American Loyalists, and many more individuals who sought justice before the Scottish Court of Session.  Many Scots were merchants and slave owners in Britain and the American colonies. 

Berlin Central Library Collections  These include telephone directories which I used recently to help with relative tracing.  The website is accessible in English (although the records are of course in German).

New Jersey Death Index  Get access to a searchable database of 1,275,833 deaths in the Garden State between 2001 and 2017, and more than half a million digitized death index images for 1901-1903, 1920-1929 and 1949-2000.  

This last one isn’t exactly new to me, but I had forgotten it was available online, and was recently reminded about it by a more on-the-ball frugal friend.  The Scottish poor law records are excellent resources for tracing people who moved about both in and out of the country.  It’s always worth putting in a few of your difficult-to-find ancestors to see what pops.

Index to Paisley Poor Law records 1839-1942  The site gives more information about what to expect from the records and how to access those you find in the index.

Free Office software - no strings attached

This is the first in an occasional series of posts about computer software which you can download and use at absolutely no cost to yourself.  I’ll kick off with one of my own personal favourites, Apache OpenOffice.

Family historians use office software, such as spreadsheets for organising ancestral information, or creating lists or research logs to work with.  Word processing packages are infinitely useful for any form of written work, ranging from basic letters to full-scale biographies.  And if you are sharing your know-how with your fellow genealogists, a presentation package can help get your message across to a group.  You may be familiar with Microsoft's Office programs like Excel, Word, and PowerPoint.

OpenOffice is a suite of programs much like Microsoft Office.  However, unlike its Microsoft counterpart, OpenOffice is an open source product, which means it has been made freely available for anyone to use as they wish.  There will never be any cost involved in downloading or using any element of the package.  It contains word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, database, and drawing software, plus a maths function creator (you probably didn’t know you needed one!).  It also runs on computers using all the main operating systems, including Macs.

I used it for several years before acquiring Microsoft Office 365 as a student, and may yet go back to it again.  The look and function of OpenOffice is quite similar to Microsoft, although there are differences, for example in the way you go about formatting word processing documents.  But it’s pretty straightforward and like any technology you're new to, it takes a little time to adapt to.  There are occasional glitches, which is true of any software package!  

If all this technical stuff is making you switch off, just take it from me: try OpenOffice before you shell out megabucks for a big-brand product that you might only use half of.  You can check out more information about the package here.

Another very similar open source product, which I haven’t used, is LibreOffice.  What’s the difference between this one and OpenOffice?  Read this journalist’s take on it.

Wishing you happy free downloading 😃

Mad, bad, or dangerous to know?

Edinburgh Castle

I’m always up for a free day out, especially when it involves a trip to the festival capital Edinburgh.  Today my friend Pauline and I had the chance to go there to learn more about an aspect of Scottish social history we were both interested in.

Dome Room, New Register House

The venue was a place we were both very familiar with but which no longer serves as a research office, as it did when we were fledgling family historians.  Today, New Register House’s Dome room (my natural habitat for many years) serves as a meeting and conference centre, and the topic of today’s event* was “Prisoners or Patients? Criminal Insanity in Victorian Scotland”.  Fun, eh?  That’s how we genealogists roll.  First up was a visit to the small exhibition, in next-door General Register House, which introduced us to the sad stories of some “criminal lunatics” and how their lives unfolded.

The curator of this exhibition, Dr Rab Houston of St Andrews University, then addressed the subject in more detail in his presentation in the Dome (his area of expertise is the history of psychiatry; see his podcast page here). I was surprised to learn that before the 19th century, imprisonment itself wasn’t used as a penalty; rather, it was just a short-term holding arrangement before trial or punishment - usually fines or transportation (or worse). 

Dr Houston explained who would have been likely to be committed to the Criminal Lunatic Department of the oldest prison in Scotland, at Perth, and how they would have been dealt with.  He talked about some of the cases from the exhibition and it was sobering to compare how those individuals would have been treated nowadays.  What was considered madness then would be seen as mental illness in our times, and while some of the causes aren't common now, there were some conditions described which were all too familiar.

Were some of your ancestors mad, bad, or just simply dangerous to know?  Honestly, if they were any of the above, you're much more likely to find them in court documents, newspaper reports, and prison records, so don't knock it.  And reading about their struggles will probably give you a greater appreciation for them.

* New Register House regularly hosts talks and exhibitions on a variety of subjects, and they’re free to attend.  I’ve already booked for one of the future talks!

Discount code for RootsTech London

Discount alert! As one of the presenters at RootsTech London, I've been allocated a special discount code for you (yes, you) to use to

save 20% on a 3-day pass
or
save 10% on a 1-day pass

The show takes place on 24-26 October in the ExCeL Centre in London’s 
Docklands, so if you haven’t already bought your ticket, bag a bargain by clicking on this link

https://rootstech2019london.smarteventscloud.com/portal/registration/SPKRPAL

or use the code SPKRPAL at the checkout.

And feel free to share this code with anyone you know who’d be interested.

What’s on offer at RootsTech? More than 150 different presentations; attend as many of them as you can fit in to your time there.  Check out the presentation schedule - every one of these sessions is included in the price of your pass. 

And if your research in Scotland has hit a brick wall, come along to my Saturday morning presentation where I'll be talking about how to overcome some of the barriers commonly encountered in Scottish genealogical research.

Some of genealogy's best-kept secrets

National Library of Ireland

Now that the summer holidays are here, I have friends travelling around Britain who will doubtless be spending at least some of their time ancestor-hunting.  This has reminded me that although I’ve blogged before about using your local public library, there are four well-kept secrets around the UK and Ireland that can help you grow your family tree, also for free: our national libraries.

Here’s a short introduction to each of these great institutions.  They have countless resources which a visit to their websites can fully explain, so here are just a few stand-outs from their collections, as well as some tips that apply to all of the national libraries.  Anybody can join; you don't have to live locally.

The first of these, and probably the most well-known, is the British Library in central London.  As well as providing visitors with reference materials, they have one of the largest collections of oral histories in the world.  It’s not a well-used source of genealogical information, but before literacy was quite as widespread as it is now, families passed on details of their ancestry by word of mouth.  Recorded memories of past times and communities preserve ways of life that our ancestors would have known.

The BL is also home to the India Office collection – this includes both official records such as births, and personal papers of individuals and families with a connection to India.  This collection is a must to investigate if someone in your family worked for the East India Company, or was in military service in the subcontinent.

The National Library of Scotland in Edinburgh, although its genealogical focus is on Scottish families, has an excellent online presence in their UK Map Images which anyone researching British places will find invaluable.  NLS e-resources, including newspaper collections, are freely available to Scottish residents.  And their guide to Scottish family history is well worth a look, too.  Their onsite collections include the papers of many Scottish landowning families, so if your ancestors worked for them or crofted on their lands, you may find them mentioned in correspondence or rentals.  Coincidentally, the NLS also has a collection relating to Scots with links to India. 

Located in Aberystwyth, the National Library of Wales describes itself as ‘the main repository for family history research in Wales’.  Like other libraries, some of its holdings, such as census returns, are widely available elsewhere, but the unique archives, manuscripts, newspapers, nonconformist church records, and tithe maps are not.  The archives at NLW hold many estate and family papers which will provide insight not only into the lives of the landed gentry, but to their tenants and employees as well.

The National Library of Ireland in Dublin offers fantastic on-site support for family historians.  Its free Genealogy Advisory Service provides an opportunity for you to sit down with a specialist who will give you tailored pointers on where and how to continue your research.  Useful for both beginning and experienced genealogists, this is best done at the start of your visit so that you can take advantage of the resources the library holds, including Catholic parish registers, estate papers, and maps.  No appointment is necessary for this service and its hours are posted on the NLI website.

Registration at each of the national libraries is essential and you will be issued with a reader’s pass.  Check the requirements for the library you plan to use and see if you also need to register online in advance of your visit.  Information sessions and talks are part of the work these libraries do to promote their services, and it may be useful to time your visit so that you can take advantage of one of these.  Another bonus is free in-house access to subscription websites such as FindMyPast, the British Newspaper Archive, or Ancestry.

As with any record office, you should search the library’s online catalogue before your trip to determine what they have that will help your research. Search for place and family names to discover what the library holds about the subjects you are interested in.  This is particularly crucial if the material you want to look at is stored off-site and needs to be ordered well in advance of your visit – or even just to save you a long wait while your order is retrieved from the depths of the repository.  You may want to contact library staff with any questions you have about your planned research. 

Exhibitions and displays are also part of national libraries; great for when your brain and eyes need a break from research for a bit.  And of course there are cafés and restaurants and the inevitable gift shops to enjoy.  But don’t be too tempted by the expensive wares on sale in the British Library shop!

How to Save Money at RootsTech London

If you’ve already bought your ticket for RootsTech and made your travel arrangements, it’s time you saved some money instead of spending it.  First things first: if you need help with some elusive Scottish ancestors, come to my class at 9 a.m. on the Saturday of RootsTech, Room 7 15.  It won’t cost you anything extra (like all of the classes)! 

As a former London resident and a regular visitor to the capital, I’ve picked up some tips over the years and continue to get regular advice from London friends about what’s hot and what’s not.

Much of your savings can be done by planning ahead before you leave home.  Season tickets, maps, route planning, and tour slots can all be organised in advance.  Leaving everything until you arrive in London may take up a lot of your valuable time as well as proving more costly!  So prioritise your itinerary – must-see, nice to visit, not-so-important – and make the best possible use of your time while you’re there.

Using public transport

Save money and time by planning your city travel using the official Transport for London website.  Maps, ticket information, timetables and journey planning software are all free and easy to use.  You can buy a top-up travel pass called

an Oyster card which works on a contactless system and can be charged online, at a ticket machine, or in convenience stores.   Pay for your travel by tapping it at the beginning and end of each journey on the bus, tube, or riverbus.  Contactless debit or credit cards can also be used instead of the Oyster, but if you’re using a non-UK bank, there may be a surcharge for each transaction, so be careful not to overdo it.  Whichever method you use, check the directions carefully on the TfL website.

A tip from a native Londoner: if you have a UK Disabled Persons Railcard, speak to a member of underground staff to arrange discounts on all Oyster journeys on the tube. It takes less than a minute to set up!

A nifty time-saver is the Walking Tube Map, which lets you see the street distances between underground stations.  It's often quicker to walk than it is to trek down into the depths of the tube system, take the train one or two stops, then make your way through the crowds back to the surface.  And sometimes the nearest tube stop to your destination isn't the best one to alight at - for instance, Covent Garden can be really busy and only has lifts up from the platforms, so exiting the station can take a while.  The alternative stop is Leicester Square, only a short walk away.  Keep your eyes open for similar tips as well as service announcements, posted on tube station noticeboards.

✨Star Attraction: Enjoy a cable car trip (or several) across the Thames via the Emirates Air Line, not far from the ExCeL Centre. Your Oyster card will pay for this!

Wifi

Free wireless internet is available in a lot of chain retail outlets such as fast food restaurants and supermarkets.  You may need to complete a quick one-time registration but normally the network will remember you next time you sign in.  Many hotels also offer basic wifi as a complimentary service, but some charge for it as an optional extra.  Others require you to upgrade to a more expensive tariff if you wish to stream video or music content.

✨Star Attraction: Avoid bank-breaking data roaming charges for downloading your London maps – just pick up a free one at your hotel, a tourist information office, or a travel centre for the tube map.  Old school!

Free Visitor Attractions

Many of the major historic attractions charge entry fees, including churches.  It’s hard to avoid but can become very expensive.  Some of the free venues are

Imperial War Museum

Lambeth, SE1.  Open 10am-6pm daily.

Natural History Museum

South Kensington, SW7.  Open daily 10am-5.50pm

National Gallery

Trafalgar Square, WC2.  Open daily 10am-6pm, late on Fridays till 9pm.

Gutenberg Bible, c. 1455

✨Star Attraction: Treasures of the British Library 
The permanent Treasures exhibition is full of original priceless documents such as Shakespeare manuscripts and Magna Carta, as well as personal papers of the Beatles and Winston Churchill.  There is a handy free locker system where you can leave backpacks, shopping etc. but your bags will be searched on entering the building.

Euston, NW1.  Open daily, see website for hours.

Saving Money on Tourist Attractions

There are two organisations which have responsibility for many historic sites in England: The National Trust, and English Heritage.  (Note: They do not manage the many other stately homes and castles which are privately maintained and run)

The National Trust gives the option to either pay on admission, or purchase a membership (which also permits free entry to most National Trust for Scotland properties, if you’re planning on going that far).

English Heritage offers, as well as individual entry fees and season tickets, a choice of passes for visitors from outside the UK, which you can buy in advance or on a visit to a property.

The best solution is to investigate these organisations’ websites from the comfort of home, and decide if you have a preference for the properties managed by either one of them, then work out if buying a season ticket will save you money. 

You can visit royal properties in London under the auspices of Historic Royal Palaces.  This only includes certain properties within London (and not, for instance, Buckingham Palace or Windsor Castle – they charge separately), but it may work out cheaper for you to buy an annual membership if you’re planning to visit at least three Historic Royal Palaces.

✨Star Attraction:  Admiring these buildings and photographing them outside

is absolutely free, as is watching the Changing of the Guard outside Buckingham Palace (get times and where-to-watch-it tips here).

Walking Tours

There are a number of different websites that provide details of free walking tours, either self-guided or with a volunteer guide.  Check some out at Free Tours By Foot or Transport for London’s Walking initiative.

✨Star Attraction: Consider finding a podcast to download that will help you explore independently.  The City of London (the square mile at the heart of the metropolis) contains some of the oldest and most fascinating sights, including Roman remains*.  Follow free visitor trails with a map or an app.

* Some in my favourite place, the Guildhall Art Gallery, another wonderful free attraction.

Theatre

The TKTS booth in Leicester Square offers last-minute and discount tickets (not all their sales are discounted, though) for theatre productions, including selected West End musicals.  You can’t get these special offers online or by phone, or at the theatre on the night; you must buy your tickets at this booth.  A bit like Russian roulette, you have to take your chances that tickets for the show you want to see will be available.  But be flexible and you're more likely to bag a bargain!  Deals of the day will be posted online and you can check these out before heading off to Leicester Square.

✨Star Attraction: At busy times, you may have to wait a little while to get your cut-price tickets, but you’ve not visited London until you’ve spent time in a queue.  It’s part of the experience and costs absolutely nothing at all.  And incidentally, it's pronounced "Lester" Square.

London for Nothing

Plenty of websites describe the multitude of things you can do and see in London at no cost.  I’ve linked to some of these sites here but they’re by no means the only ones.  Always check if the information they contain is up to date by doing some online research or asking at a tourist information centre (see below).  And Google may be your friend, but always avoid the first few search results, which may be adverts and not necessarily the most helpful.

London For Free 

Secret London: 175 Fantastic Free Things To Do 

TripSavvy: Top Free Things to Do in London 

Official Tourist Information Centres

These are found around the capital – call in to one when you’re out and about and get guidebooks, advice, leaflets, and more. 

Lastly, and most importantly, have fun, and I’ll see you at RootsTech!

Bite-size family history!

What about those days when you just don’t have time for anything, let alone your family tree?  Or you can’t face the thought of starting again after a while of neglecting it.  Perhaps you’ve tried but just aren’t able to get into the “zone”?

Try one of these quick-fix ideas – they don’t need to take more than an hour –that is, unless you want them to…and, of course, they don't have to cost you a penny.

And don’t blame me if you end up surrounded by genealogy at 2 a.m., in your pyjamas.

☙  Has it been a while since you last picked up your family history? Make a note of all the important events that have happened in your family in the intervening time.  New babies, weddings, funerals – these can all be added to your records.

☙  Find and read a library book or magazine article that will teach you something new about genealogy methods, or about your ancestors’ lives and times.

☙  Bite the bullet and get someone to show you how to use that family tree software you got to organise your information.

☙  Write or email a family member asking for their recollections and thoughts about your common ancestors.

☙  Do any of your relatives have a box or case containing family papers or memorabilia?  If you don’t already have access to it, find out if they're willing to share its contents and let you make copies.

☙  Start recording your life history, either in a conventional diary/journal, or in electronic format – maybe a video diary?

☙  Make a list of questions you would like to ask your relatives about the family, and be sure to take the list (and a notebook) to the next family get-together.

☙  Learn something about the area your forebears came from and do something special to celebrate your heritage.  For instance, if they were from Ireland, try and identify some Irish traditions you can use in your own home.

☙  Been putting off labelling/scanning your photos?  Pick four and work on them, and plan another time when you can do another four.  Then keep going!

☙  If you’ve registered with a genealogy website but never used it, now is the time.  Log in and see if they have a learning centre or help section with how-to videos and beginners’ tips that you can get inspiration from.

☙  Is there an emblem associated with your family?  Start with that, and design a family banner or flag for a special occasion, or just to display at home.

☙  Use your “hour” in a heritage centre or family history library.  As well as actually doing research, you could find out what resources they have, ask staff for ideas, and pick up handouts for future reference.

☙  Break out your old family history notes and charts, and have a review of what’s been done and what needs to be done to progress things.

☙  Visit a house, church, shop, graveyard, war memorial or other place in your area that has special significance for your family.  Don’t forget to take a camera to record what you see, and share your photos.