Genealogy Chat

Hello everyone I was wondering if anyone can suggest how to search beyond the 1850s? I have found my family back to then but now don't know what other resources I could use to carry on. Also, does anyone have any idea how to find specific place names (house names) that appear on the census? Any help would be gratefully appreciated. Thank you rebecca batty

Rebecca, Civil registration started September 1837, so you should be able to get a bit further back. Before that it is parish records. As to specific place names, I have been having problems with that, as with some addresses, the houses no longer exist.

Rebecca - do you still have births,marriages and deaths to find before the 1850's? If so, the Free BMD search on Rootsweb.com has fairly good coverage and the records held are increasing all the time. (I'm assuming that you want to search via the net, otherwise it would be a trip to the Family Records Centre in Islington.) Another useful website is familysearch.org for parish register entries, though not such good coverage on this one. Do you know whether the 1841/1851 census has been indexed for the area that you're interested in? A post on the Records Office message board should give you the answer. If not, you could search for the local Family History Society or council records office websites and inquire there. Good luck! Sarah

Before civil registration, family historians are reliant on baptisms, marriages and burials registers. The LDS site www.familysearch.org has some of these records online (mainly baptisms & marriages), which will help to point you in the right direction. Most C of E registers that survive are with the relevant local record office. The record office will also have documents such as settlement orders, quarter sessions etc. You can visit a2a (access to archives) website which allows you to search and see if your relatives, or their home village/town is mentioned in documents and then which archive has them. nell

At the beginning of each census booklet there is a description of the area it covers. This might be "the entire village of X" or "all of the south side of the High Street" or more helpfully "the area bounded to the east by A St, the south by B St, the west by C St and the north by D St, including E St, F St....." There is a very good series of reproduction Ordnance Survey maps available: put Godfrey Maps into Google. These maps are so large scale that you can identify individual houses. They don't cover rural areas, but for areas which changed considerably over the years there can be as many as three editions. A good many London roads changed names in the 1870s. The following website lists lost London Streets http[://]members[.]aol[.]com[/]WHall95037[/]london[.]html Some local studies libraries have very good photographic collections of their areas. Brenda

Thank you everyone. I will crack on!! Cheers Rebecca

Brenda Thanks for useful links. You may have solved imminent birthday prez problem for impecunious (mapaholic) son celebrating mapaholic dad's birthday!. thanks Christine