2018 will see millions of new records added to TheGenealogist, increasing our coverage of a wide variety of useful record sets for genealogists.
We have already started releasing New Parish Records with original images and are continuing to expand our already large coverage of Baptism, Marriage and Burial records.
Millions of new additions for further counties will also be released in our Parish Record Transcripts and Bishops' Transcripts collections.
We are launching the second stage of the Lloyd George Domesday project, giving even more detail on where our ancestors lived. Released county by county, these records will accompany the highly detailed annotated historic maps. Searchable by name, address and area, results will link to the high resolution maps pinpointing the property.
TheGenealogist's ongoing project with The National Archives will see the release of yet more detailed Colour County and Tithe Maps with tags to show you where your ancestors lived.
In the coming months we are also expanding our Criminal, Migration and Newspaper collections as well as the International Headstone and War Memorial Projects as more photographs and transcriptions are added by our volunteers.
Keep an eye on this page for further announcements!
Click here to read our round up of 2017
New Poll Books Added
TheGenealogist has just released 116,218 records into its ever growing Poll Book Database. This useful resource for family historians can be used to find ancestors' residences from the period before the census collection. The newly released Poll Books range from 1705 to the 1830s, joining records covering periods between census years.
The database allows researchers to:
The records cover 18 different registers of people who were entitled to vote in between 1705 and the 1830s and cover constituencies situated in Abingdon, Bristol, Hampshire, Somerset, Suffolk, Maidstone, Norfolk, Northamptonshire, Worcestershire and York.
These records have been transcribed by volunteers on the UKindexer.co.uk website, which brings benefits to the volunteers as well as the wider family history community. They join the millions of electoral resources on TheGenealogist, which include Electoral registers, Voters lists and Absentee Voters.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.
Discover how John Constable's family voted in Nick Thorne's article about the release.
New Change of Names Database
This searchable database is great for family historians wanting to find ancestors who officially changed their forename or surname in Britain. The Change of Names Database covers information gathered from a number of sources including Private Acts of Parliament; Royal Licences published in the London and Dublin Gazettes; notices of changes of name published in The Times after 1861 with a few notices from other newspapers; registers of the Lord Lyon [King of Arms] where Scottish changes of name were commonly recorded; records in the office of the Ulster King at Arms and also some private information.
These fully searchable records allow researchers to:
Read Nick Thorne's article exploring this record set.
[Image shows Lord Byron who is featured in these records]
New Colour Tithe Maps
TheGenealogist has now added Colour Tithe Maps for the North Riding and the East Riding of Yorkshire. Complimenting the already released schedule books and greyscale maps, these colour maps add an attractive visual aid to find where your ancestor lived in the mid 1800s.
The fully searchable tithe records released online allow researchers to:
1921 Census Substitute Expands to More Counties
With the 1921 census still some years away from public release, TheGenealogist has added to its 1921 census substitute. This resource covers a large number of county directories which have been transcribed to produce a searchable resource. This appears under Census Records as the 1921 Census Substitute on TheGenealogist and they encompass a period currently not served by a published census. With this release, the total records are boosted to 1.75 million heads of household.
The fully transcribed, searchable records released today will allow researchers to:
If you have ancestors from the 1920s then this new release from TheGenealogist adds a fantastic name rich resource for you to use. Why not read our article on how the census substitute reveals the Suffragists Tea Room?
These 1921 directories cover Nottingham, Glasgow, Leicestershire & Rutland, Derby, Shropshire, Kent and add to those already released for Aberdeen, Bath, Berkshire, Bradford and Surrounding Districts, Bristol and Suburbs, Brixton and Clapham, Buckinghamshire, Cambridgeshire, Channel Islands, Cheshire, Cumberland, Dorset, Durham, Hessle, Hull, Lincolnshire, London, London County Suburbs, Middlesbrough, Norfolk, Northumberland, Oxfordshire, Somerset, Suffolk, Westmorland, Wiltshire, Worcestershire and Yorkshire.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.
New Metropolitan Police Habitual Criminals Registers
MAJOR NEW RELEASE:
We have added to our Criminal Records collection with the release of the MEPO 6 Metropolitan Police: Criminal Record Office: Habitual Criminals & Habitual Drunkards.
These are high quality transcripts with original colour images of the registers, as well as registers created by the Police to supervise released criminals - including spies! Entries can contain a description of the individual, dates of conviction or discharge from prison and even the places they frequent!
One of the most interesting features of these records are the photographic portraits taken from the Registers of Habitual Drunkards. These registers feature two photographs, face on and in profile, per individual. Some records may also give distinguishing features, the name of the prison, length of sentence and previous convictions.
Over A Million Individuals Added To Our Warwickshire Parish Record Collection
MAJOR NEW RELEASE:
TheGenealogist has added over 1,270,000 individuals to its Parish Record collection in an ongoing project with the Warwickshire County Record Office. These newly transcribed records are linked to high-quality images of the original parish register pages and bring our total for Warwickshire to over two million.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist and join the millions of Parish Records already on the site.
You can find out more about these records and a famous actress found within them in Nick Thorne's Article "Warwickshire Parish Records reveal the marriage of an 18th century ‘tragedienne’"
New War Memorial records
Over 64,000 additional War Memorial records have just been added, which include a complete roll of honour for both WW1 and WW2 for Shetland, with men's units and the Shetland village in which they resided. There are other war memorials in this release that cover the country including the Abercarn Tinplaters Memorial Institute in Wales. There are plaques and monuments in Bedford, Bolton, Lancashire, London, Merseyside, Greater Manchester, Warwickshire and even further afield in Canada, Western Australia and the USA. One of the Canadian memorials is a fascinating, but sadly very worn, WW2 memorial from Calgary in Canada that names 227 aircrew from Australia and New Zealand who died while training in Calgary, revealing just how dangerous WW2 aviation was.
From the USA TheGenealogist has uploaded some WW1 and WW2 war memorials from New York, including a fine one in Battery Park. This is a roll of those men and women who lost their lives in the Atlantic coastal waters in WW2 and had no known grave as a result of U-boat action. The war memorial gives researchers the ranks, units and the US state from which they were from, and the shockingly large number of Americans included is a salutary lesson when in Britain we are often only aware of our own countrymen/women who died at sea from enemy action against the convoys.
Lastly there are a number of Boer War memorials - for example the tribute within Blackpool Town Hall that commemorates the 74 Blackpool men who volunteered to join various units for service in South Africa.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.
New Headstone records
We have added over 13,000 new Headstone records covering 53 new cemeteries.
The International Headstone collection is an ongoing project where every stone photographed or transcribed earns volunteers credits, which they can spend on subscriptions at TheGenealogist.co.uk or products from GenealogySupplies.com. If you would like to join, you can find out more about the scheme in this week's article.
The headstone for the Earl of Avon, Anthony Eden, is included in this release. This politician served three periods as British Foreign Secretary and then succeeded Winston Churchill as Prime Minister from 1955 to 1957. He is laid to rest at Alvediston in Wiltshire.
Why not make the most of this sunny weather and go out and photograph your local cemetery, it's easy (all you need is a digital camera) and you could earn a free subscription! Find out more at UKIndexer.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.
Celebrating the centenary of the R.A.F. with TheGenealogist's records
To celebrate the centenary of the RAF we are launching thousands of records from Air Force Lists, copies of the Flight Magazine, plus an important collection of historic reference books.
To find out more about these records, you can read Nick Thorne's Article, Celebrating the centenary of the R.A.F. with TheGenealogist's records.
New Meritorious Service Medal Records
We have released the records of 29,000 individuals who were decorated with the Meritorious Service Medal (MSM). The roll of names for those who were awarded this British honour in the First World War can now be searched on our website. Researchers can look for holders of this medal up to 1920 from within our ever growing military records collection.
These new records released today will allow researchers to:
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.
To find out more about these records, you can read Nick Thorne's Article, Finding ancestors awarded the Meritorious Service Medal.
New 1940s Passenger Lists
We have just released 1.4 million Passenger Records covering the 1940s. This expands our Outbound Passenger Lists to over 25 million and forms part of our larger immigration and emigration collection on TheGenealogist. These newly transcribed BT27 images are from The National Archives, and feature passengers who sailed out of United Kingdom in the years between 1940 and 1949.
The passenger lists released today will allow researchers to:
Researchers who had ancestors that travelled abroad from Britain in the 1940s will find these records a fascinating addition to the vast collection of records on TheGenealogist.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.
New Colour Tithe Maps for Buckinghamshire
We have added Colour Maps for Buckinghamshire to our National Tithe Records collection. With this release, researchers can see the plots owned or occupied by ancestors that lived in this 'home county' at the time of the survey in the 19th century.
These tagged colour maps and their fully searchable tithe schedule records have been digitised in partnership with The National Archives. The collection gives the family history researcher the ability to search by name and keyword (for example parish or county) to look for all levels of society, from large estate owners to occupiers of tiny plots such as a cottage or a cowshed.
You can find out more about this release by reading Nick Thorne's article From Hovels to Manor Houses, Exploring Buckinghamshire Society.
Criminal Records - The hulks
MAJOR NEW RELEASE:
We have added 651,369 records of convicts from The National Archives' HO 8 documents to our Court & Criminal Records collection. With this release researchers can find the details of ancestors that broke the law and were incarcerated in convict hulks and prisons in the 19th century.
These fully searchable records are from The Home Office: Sworn lists of convicts on board the convict hulks and in the convict prisons (HO 8). They give the family history researcher fascinating facts that include the particulars of age, convictions, sentences, health and behaviour of the convict, as well as which court sentenced them and where they were serving their sentence.
Newspapers From the Last Decade of the Nineteenth Century
We have added over 500 editions of The Illustrated London News to our Newspaper and Magazine collection. This latest release contains newspapers that were published in the 1890s and offers a fascinating insight into your ancestors' lives.
The Illustrated London News is one of a number of newspapers and magazines that are fully searchable by name or keywords by Diamond subscribers of TheGenealogist. Not only can this extensive resource add context to your ancestors' lives and times, these newspapers can be used to find out more about people who, for one reason or another, were mentioned in reports from the time.
Nick Thorne's Article "Our Ancestors in the 1890s" takes a look at this fascinating resource.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.
Over 5 Million U.S.A. Records Released
We have added over 5 Million passenger records to our U.S.A. records, featuring people that migrated to the U.S.A. between 1834 and 1900. The mass movement of people from one country to another isn't a new thing. The motivation can be economic, political upheaval or religious persecution.
The data covers:
Most were drawn to the U.S.A. by the attractions of land and religious freedom, after being forced to leave Europe by shortages of land and religious or political oppression.
This release joins the millions of U.S.A. census, death records, trade directories, wills and poll books already available on TheGenealogist
New Warwickshire Parish Records
MAJOR NEW RELEASE:
We have added over 366,000 individuals to our Parish Records for Warwickshire, to increase the coverage of this county in the heart of England.
Released in association with Warwickshire County Record Office, this brings high-quality transcripts as well as images to family historians researching ancestors in this area.
The original Parish Register images are available for a growing list of parishes.
These new records are available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist and join the millions of Parish Records already on the site.
Nick Thorne investigates the last resting place of a murderous lord of the manor, featured in the records. Read the article here.
Visit our featured article section for fascinating stories and the latest news from the world of genealogy.
Boy George
19th July 2018
Lee Mack
12th July 2018
Researching Poll Books discovers how John Constable's family voted
5th July 2018
Olivia Colman
5th July 2018
London Family History Fair
22nd September 2018
10:00 - 16:30
Yorkshire Family History Fair
22nd June 2019
10:00 - 16:30
Visit the press releases section for the official write-up of all our news.
