Genealogy Chat

I sometimes want to butt in on record office lookup threads to say this, but I have always managed to restrain myself - well, except when I have a thread of my own! See below.

If somebody is going to a record office and offers to do lookups for people, firstly, please be aware that the record office is NOT the same as the register office! MARRIAGES They will not have copies of marriage certificates for marriages that took place at the register office, for example. Also, the parish registers, which will be available, will not be arranged by civil registration district. This means that if you have found a marriage entry in the GRO indexes (and not on the IGI or local BMD site) and you are trying to save £7 by having somebody look it up for you at the record office, they could potentially have to look at 3 months worth of entries for every church in the district (and to do this they would have to find out what parishes were in that district!) and then they might not find it because the marriage took place at the register office! So if you have a request like that, please be aware that you might be asking somebody to spend a long time doing your lookup to save you £7. If the person offering lookups is experienced at this kind of thing they will probably realise and not bother, but if not, they might just try! BIRTHS AND DEATHS The record office will not have copies of birth certificates either, though I believe that some have copies of death certificates (not sure about this, though!). So if you want a copy of a birth certificate you will have to order it from the register office. The record office will have baptisms, but again, if you don't already know when and where the baptism took place you could be asking somebody to search for a long time to save you £7. Plus a baptism will not usually have as much info as a birth certificate - though there is the odd exception. Not everybody was baptised, especially after 1837. (Of course, if you want a baptism pre-1837 then that is fine.) As for deaths, a burial entry in the parish register will not usually tell you as much as the death certificate would. And please remember that in the later part of the 19th century and in the 20th century many burials took place in municipal cemeteries rather than churchyards, and that cremations became increasingly common. Oh, and some record office copies of parish registers do not go very far into the 20th century. Sorry for rant, but I do hate to think of people spending ages on one of these lookups when they could be spending more time on their own research. So please don't think of a record office lookup as a magic way to save you trawling through the GRO indexes quarter by quarter! Kate.

Hi Thanks for the advice for a newbie. Adding to my threads Caz

Think this needs nudging up... Kate.

Kate Could I just add to this... I know off doing the Durham Lookup's that a lot of people just dont give enough information.. For Eg.. Dinah Bloggs Looking for her baptism in Gateshead in 1872 father is Joe Bloggs.. This could cover around 6 - 10 churches.. This in itself is fine but what is also needed and would be very helpful.. is the fact that you could find the family in the 1871 Census.. and find the Eccalastical Parish.. Where the Family were living.. This in turn would narrow the church search down.. A lot of people think that all you have to do it just type in the name and the results come up..like on a computer.. This is not the case.. Trawling Dark Filmed Birth Marriage and Burial entries.. All done on Hand mechanised machines.. rolling the films from one reel to another.. and then re rolling off.. (Just to give some newbies an idea of what is involved in these searches...) But first of all you have to find the relevant Church the family were using.. Also it would be helpful to state if you knew the family were C of E, Methodist, Catholic.. to search the relevant records that way.. If nothing was stated when I was doing the Lookup's ..I would only Check C of E.. Also finding the Birth Death or Marriage in the St Catherine's House Index The number relate to the Gro... They are no good to me researching in Durham.. The Registration District Gateshead is no good either...this covers every little parish around Gateshead itself AS WELL as Gateshead... and last but not least.. I have Joe Bloggs living at Gateshead on the 1901 Census..aged 54 years Could you find his burial for me.. ?? Answer No.... Mo :-) I have been wanting to do that for ages.. Thanks Kate.. Moan Over..