Further Research Links

Home Search Search Print Print Login - User: anonymous Login Add Bookmark

The first section below, covers many of the major research resources that I use in my every-day research. Many of these sites will be familiar to you, some may not be. This list is not designed to be exhaustive, nor is it sorted into any particular order. Some sites require a paid subscription.

FreeBMD. Probably one of the most widely used resources for Birth Marriage and Death information for England and Wales. Covers all records between 1837 and 1915. Records for post 1915 events are currently being indexed and are increasingly becoming more available as the project advances.

FreeCEN. Another free resource, FreeCen provides access to Census records covering the period from 1841 to 1891. Again, an ongoing project, so a lot of records still to be transcribed. Worth a look though!

FreeREG. To end this "trilogy" of free research tools under the FreeGEN banner, FreeREG provides access to a growing number of Parish Register data from 1538 to 1837. This project is very young however, and there are only a few million records completed so far.

Ancestry. Ancestry is probably one of the world's largest resources of genealogical data. Although subscriptions can be expensive, particularly for World Membership, this resource is a "must have" for almost all serious researchers.

Find My Past. Another great subscription based resource. Good for all the usual BMD and census records but also an excellent resource for immigrant passenger lists and military records.

1911 Census. Although a superb resource, this site (operated by Find My Past) can be very expensive. Stick to transcriptions unless you really need the actual census form in your ancestor's original handwriting.

The Genealogist. This subscription based site claims it's strength lies in it's accurate census indexes and transcripts. Also included is access to the complete GRO BMD indexes, Parish Records, Land records, Army, Navy and Trade Directories. A very useful feature is a general forename search and "Smart Search", a service that can find birth dates within death records and Birth records from Family and Maiden names.

Commonwealth War Graves Commission. The purpose of this organisation is to pay tribute to 1.7 Million men and women of the Commonwealth forces who died in the two world wars. The "Debt of Honour Register" is the Commission's database all those who died during the two world wars and the 23,000 cemeteries, memorials and other locations worldwide where they are commemorated. The register can also be searched for details of the 67,000 Commonwealth civilians who died as a result of enemy action in the Second World War.

Ellis Island Foundation. It has been estimated that nearly half of all Americans today can trace their family history to at least one person who passed through the Port of New York at Ellis Island. From 1892 to 1924, more than 22 million immigrants, passengers, and crew members came through Ellis Island and the Port of New York. The ship companies that transported these passengers kept detailed passenger lists, called "ship manifests." Thanks to the generous efforts of volunteers from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, these manifests have been transcribed into a vast electronic archive, which you can easily navigate in search of an individual passenger.

Genes Reunited. Here you can build your own family tree or import a gedcom file and then wait for the Genes Reunited service to match your records to other members records. Once done, you can contact each other and exchange data, or just make friends! Some caution is needed as trees are often inaccurate and there are also some members whose sole purpose is to collect other people's hard work!

GenUKI. The aim of GENUKI is to serve as a "virtual reference library" of genealogical information that is of particular relevance to the UK & Ireland. It is a noncommercial service, provided by an ever-growing group of volunteers in cooperation with the Federation of Family History Societies and a number of its member societies.

Family Search. This service is provided by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It is their belief that families are meant to be central to our lives and that family relationships are intended to continue beyond this life. They therefore believe that all family members — those living, those past, and those future — share an enduring bond that reaches across the generations. FamilySearch is the largest genealogy organisation in the world. Millions of people use FamilySearch records, resources, and services to learn more about their family history. For over 100 years, FamilySearch has been actively gathering, preserving, and sharing genealogical records worldwide. The 'Ancestral File' contains details of 36 million people linked into families. The 'International Genealogical Index' (IGI) contains 600 million names of deceased individuals plus an addendum of 125 million names submitted by patrons or extracted from Birth, Christening or Marriage records. The 'Pedigree Resource File' database contains over 100 million names that are linked into families. Once again, some caution is needed as these files do contain errors.

The National Archives of Australia. Another huge resource for researchers interested in Passenger lists covering migrants to Australia. RecordSearch describes over 6 million records created by 9000 Australian Government agencies, mostly since 1901. Searchable records include documents, photographs, posters, maps, films and sound recordings.

The National Archives (UK). The National Archives is the UK government's official archive, containing 900 years of history with records ranging from parchment and paper scrolls through to digital files and archived websites. The National Archives makes open records available to all, either onsite or online, continuously developing new tools to make history tangible for everyone.

Rootsweb. The primary purpose and function of RootsWeb.com is to connect people so that they can help each other and share genealogical research. Most resources on RootsWeb.com are designed to facilitate such connections. The hundreds of gigabytes of data on RootsWeb.com are a by-product of millions of online genealogists sharing research.

Scotland's People. The official Government source of genealogical data for Scotland. With almost 50 million records to access, ScotlandsPeople is one of the largest online sources of original genealogical information for Scotland.

This next section is for other, personal websites that I have found useful, interesting or a great source of information.

Devon Mitchells and some Cornish too!. The great TNG hosted site contains a wealth of information on Mitchells of Devon, hundreds of photographs, documents and other resources. Run by Ian Mitchell, this site must get a mention here!