Genealogy Chat

Have a peek at the Society of Genealogists' website; they have loads of records, including parish records, from all over the country. You clearly have a lot of ground to cover so perhaps a trip there (it's in London, along with the FRC!) might save you some time and money.

Dear Heike, I see that one of your areas is Sussex. A good link is www.sussex-opc.org/ These sites are volunteers who transcribe Births, Marriges Deaths and much more from records held locally. At present about seven counties are covered. I have been using the one for Dorset. Requires a fair amount of time as they are not searchable and you just have to trawl through the records. Good luck Jane

Wow, thanks for the many useful tips, they were all very helpful and I will print them out and plan my pre-research so that I can get the best out of the actual research in England. Thanks and best wishes, Heike

Heike, There are lots of old cemetaries in England, I have been lucky with headstones, a lot of my family were stone masons, so they had headstones, but remember the further back you go there won't be headstones they may have been damaged or just moved to the side, also in the olden days they just did not have the money for stones. If you go to record offices in the area you are researching then I think you need to book a fiche reader, also some record offices need two photo's of you and proof of who you are.You can only take in a note pad and a few pieces of paper in most of them, also remember your glasses and maybe magnify glass as some of it is hard to read. To go back further than 1837, it is the record office you need, maybe some parishes have kept books but I think you will be charged to look at them. I wish you all the best for your summer vacation. If you need any census look ups just ask on here there are loads of nice people that will help you to take you back and to find out where they were all from. Regards Sue..........

Uxbridge and Ruislip are both now part of the London Borough of Hillingdon. Their deposited parish records are at the London Metropolitan Archive, 40 Northampton Road, London EC1. This is just round the corner from the Family Records Centre in Myddleton Street which holds censuses and Birth, Marriage and Death indexes for the whole of England and Wales. They both have websites with maps to show how to get there and information about their holdings. There are links to the websites on GR's homepage. High Wycombe is in Buckinghamshire . You can see parish records pre 1900 on microfilm at High Wycombe Library http://www.buckscc.gov.uk/libraries/lima_lib_hwr_registers.htm Good hunting Judith

Might be a good idea to find what parish records you can from the IGI (familysearch(.co).uk) site so that you can then check those and look for more when you go to the county offices. I think there is a centre in London which has the records from all areas so you could start there. Uxbridge is a separate town. I think you could find out about researching records there with a google search....Uxbridge+family history... but I,' sure I'm telling you what you know already... Have a great trip anyway. Joan

Hi Heike, There is a lot you can do before you get here. There are some excellent genealogy books that you can buy from amazon or other online book shops. Parish records are held in county record offices. They all have websites so google them before you come to see what they have. If there are specific items you want - plans of graveyards for example- order them before you get here. Be specific about what you want and find out where it will be before you arrive, that will save you loads of time. Gwynne

Dear all, I'm currently planning my summer vacation to dear England and of course I'd like to combine that with doing some family research there. In order to plan this most efficiently, I was wondering if any of you could give me some advice about how to best start this. Generally my questions would be: 1. Where do I find pre-1837 records? Would that be in parishes? If so, is it best to contact them and make an appointment? What kind of access to I have to the records there? Are there other places for pre-1837 records? 2. Are there still old cemetaries where I can find old gravestones of ancestors? I'm talking of the Ruislip/Uxbridge/High Wycombe areas. If so, is are there any records of how the graves are laid out? 3. Am I correct in assuming that Uxbridge is a part of London? Or is it an own town? 4. Do you have any general tips and advice about what I could do with regard to research when I'm in the above-mentioned area? Background info: what I got so far is all census information about my family I could get my hands on. I also have some certificates and plan to order more. So basically what I'd like to do in England would be to research information that is not available over the net. Additional question: Are there any shops in England (areas: Kent, Sussex, Hampshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Cotswolds, Gloucestershire) or Wales that have good genealogical books/charts/family books etc? Sorry for the long question and thanks in advance for your help. Regards, Heike