Genealogy Chat

From 4 April 2005, the 1871, 1881 and 1891 census records online will have free onsite access at The National Archives in Kew or at the Family Records Centre in Islington Just seen this on National Archive site Linda

I think that it means that you will be able to use Ancestry Plus for free if you go to the National Archives in Kew or to the Family Records Centre in Islington. Fine if you live in London, not much use out here in the colonies!!

Linda, Many thanks for pointing this out - and sorry to those in the 'colonies'! Regs Jane

I expect there are other ways for those who know, but having got into the Ancestry site via the National Archives website, I've been able to do advanced searches. Making educated guesses, I have found people in the indexes, down to the village they are in. Okay, these are not the images themselves and I will have to physically visit a library or RO to view the film, but I will resist to the utmost any action which puts money into Ancestry's coffers.

Should really spread it out to other libraries around the country, and around the world. But then again, the internet hasn't been there for that long (over a year or something) for free, so I think it will be a long long time before Ancestry Plus is free in the libraries, like it is in the States.

It will probably be available before the 1911 census at any rate! nell

There's a catch... Find your ancestors on the 18*1 census... Search by name plus use other fields to refine your search Searching the index is free ***Pay a small fee for downloading the images of the actual census entry Ancestry.co.uk hosts the 18*1 Census database for England and Wales under an enhanced arrangement. (This even applies to 1881!)

Ah bloomin' heck!! Nothing is ever for free, is it? Well you wouldn't need to do that at the FRC for example, you've got the page number, in theory, go and find it yourself and only spend 25p for the image!