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 Friday, May 02, 2008
FamilySearch and British Partners to Digitize UK Records
Posted by Diane
A partnership among FamilySearch, British family history subscription/pay-per-view database site FindMyPast, and The National Archives of Britain will give genealogists access to millions of names of British soldiers and seamen from the 18th to the 20th century. The records include: The records may include each ex-serviceman's name, age, birthplace and service history, physical appearance, conduct sheet, previous occupation, and in some cases, the reason for discharge. After 1883, details of marriages and children may also appear.
- Merchant Seamen records from 1835 to 1844 and 1918 to 1941, which will provide the name and the date and place of birth. Many 20th-century records include photographs of the sailors and details of their voyages. Nearly a third of UK families have ancestors who were merchant seaman, according to FamilySearch's announcement.
For this three-year project, FamilySearch staffers will digitize the records at the UK National Archives, and FindMyPast will create indexes and transcriptions. When they're through, the indexes and images will be searchable at FindMyPast and FamilySearch. I can hear you wondering, “Will they be free?” FamilySearch’s announcement didn’t say one way or the other, but in previously announced partnerships, records are to be free on FamilySearch and partner organizations have the option to provide fee-based access.
FamilySearch | Genealogy Industry | Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy
5/2/2008 5:07:14 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00) 
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Monday, March 17, 2008
Got Irish Roots?
Posted by Diane
Happy St. Patrick's Day! A few numbers to help you appreciate the occasion: - 30.5 million US residents who claim Irish ancestry
- 4 million population of The Republic of Ireland
- 22.5 percent Massachusetts residents with Irish ancestry
- 4.8 million immigrants from Ireland admitted for US residence since 1820
- 100 pounds of green dye added to the Chicago River St. Patrick’s Day, 1962 (the year that verdant tradition began)
- 3 million spectators at New York City’s annual St. Patrick’s Day parade
- 52,000 number of Irish immigrants who arrived in New York City in 1847
- 372,000 total population of New York City in 1847
- 107 years Boston has held an annual St. Patrick’s Day parade (Beantown witnessed the country’s first recorded St. Paddy’s Day celebration in 1737)
- 9 places in the United States named Dublin
We’re all Irish on St. Patrick’s Day, but if you’re Irish every other day of the year, too, the March 2008 Family Tree Magazine Irish research guide—and our online Irish Toolkit—will help you trace those roots back to the Emerald Isle.
Family Tree Magazine articles | International Genealogy | Social History
3/17/2008 10:56:07 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Monday, March 10, 2008
Ancestry.com Posts 500 German City Directories
Posted by Grace
Pay database Ancestry.com last week put online 500 German city directories, from Aachen to Zwickau.
Often overlooked as a genealogy resource, city directories can fill in
the blanks between censuses and help trace wandering ancestors. Ancestry's new collection includes business and professional directories, as well. From the main German Genealogy Records page, you can browse by state (mistakenly labeled as Counties in the drop-down menu) and by time period. Or try searching for a name in the fields on the left side of the page. The records include about 27 million names, according to the 24-7 Family History Circle blog, with most records from the late 1800s to mid-1900s. World Deluxe Membership is required to access the digitized directories. Click here to search them.
International Genealogy | Public Records
3/10/2008 3:46:16 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Wednesday, March 05, 2008
Maps of historic London
Posted by Grace
If your family hails from London (or you just like cartography), you'll love this site: the British Library's virtual exhibition of historical maps of the city. The 40 historic plats are organized on a Google map, making it easy to determine what areas they represent. The maps and images are also divided by time period, and you can access a zoomable version to see them up close. I especially like the map from 1653 with the lengthy title "A guide for Cuntrey men In the famous Cittey of LONDON by the helpe of wich plot they shall be able to know how farr it is to any Street." For more resources for researching your English roots, you can always refer to our Ethnic Toolkit. The University of Texas also has a large collection of historic British maps in its Perry-Castañeda Map Collection.
International Genealogy | Libraries and Archives
3/5/2008 4:25:24 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
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Tuesday, March 04, 2008
NARA Posts Free Passenger Indexes Online
Posted by Diane
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has added passenger lists of Russian, German and Italian immigrants to its free Access to Archival Databases (AAD) service. (Irish passenger lists already were available here.) Each collection consists mostly of immigrants who identified their nationality as Russian, German or Italian and arrived at the ports of New York, Boston, Baltimore, New Orleans or Philadelphia during the 19th century. The database for each nationality also contains some names of immigrants from other places. For example, 90 percent of people in the German records said they were from Germany or a “German” area—the other 10 percent came from elsewhere. The data are from passenger list indexes created by the Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies. Keep in mind they’re not complete listings of all Russian, German, Italian or Irish immigrants. For each collection, you'll see a Manifest Header Data File and a Passenger Data File. The search isn't the most intuitive we've ever seen, so get started with these tips: 1. From AAD, click Passenger Lists under Genealogy/Personal History. Then, click the Search button to the right of a Passenger Data File to look for an ancestor. (NARA calls the search terms you enter “values.”)
2. In your results, click View Record on the left to see first and last name, age, sex, occupation, last residence, destination and other information.
3. Use the ship manifest identification number to determine the port of arrival. Click View the FAQs and scroll to the chart showing ports and the range of manifest numbers assigned to each port’s records.
If you think you've found an ancestor, you can search the database for his or her passenger manifest identification number. That lets you see all passenger records from that ship—handy for finding traveling companions.
In the Manifest Header Data File, you can search for all ships with a particular manifest identification number, ship name, departure port or arrival date. For example, say you know your German ancestor arrived March 16, 1846. Click the Search button next to the German Manifest Header Data file and enter 03/16/1846 in the Arrival field. You'll get all the ships included in this database that arrived that day. Then you can go back to the Passenger Data File and search for the passengers on each ship. I highly, highly recommend reading the FAQ document—each database has its own, linked at the top of the search screen. It’ll help you search the databases and understand your ancestor’s record. Some places of origin or other data are difficult to interpret. You’ll want to see your ancestor’s orginal passenger list, which you can do on microfilm at major genealogy libraries, NARA facilities and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Family History Library. You can view records online through the subscription Web site Ancestry.com.
Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy | Libraries and Archives
3/4/2008 10:21:37 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
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Monday, February 25, 2008
How to Find Research Guides on FamilySearch
Posted by Diane
If you have ancestors from Finland, you’ll want to download the free Finnish genealogy research guide FamilySearch has just added to its Web site. FamilySearch’s excellent online research outlines are among our go-to resources when editing Family Tree Magazine articles about tracing ancestors in this or that place, and we often recommend the guides in our articles. They cover how to do research, historical background, genealogy terms to know, writing request letters, and much more. But the guides are linked in different places on FamilySearch, so sometimes it's hard to find the right one. Here’s our quick guide to finding FamilySearch guides: - Start by clicking the Search tab at the top of the page. Then look in the blue bar under “Search”:
- Now, for an alphabetical index to the FHL’s research outlines, letter-writing guides, word lists, beginners’ guides, census worksheets and more, click Research Helps. This index is sorted by place, but you can use the links on the left to sort it by title, subject or document type.
Click a document title to access the guide’s content online. Or, click PDF to download a PDF with the information, or click the item number (in the right-hand column) to order a copy mailed to you. Not all the guides have all three options.
- To get steps for finding the FHL’s microfilmed birth, marriage and death information by place and year, click Research Guidance, then click on a place.
On the next page, choose a tab for historical background, advice for
beginners, and research strategies for various records. This
information is drawn from the above-mentioned research guides.
- For in-depth, full-color PDF guides to a selection of ancestries, look on the home page under "Get Started With Family History" and click the word guides. From here, you also can follow links to separate directories of the word lists, letter-writing guides, forms and more.
Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy | Research Tips
2/25/2008 5:47:46 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
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Wednesday, February 20, 2008
The World's Longest Family Tree?
Posted by Diane
Chinese philosopher Confucius (who tradition holds was born 551 BC) has 2 million recorded descendants in 83 generations, says one of that number, Kong Dewei, in China Daily. Dewei is a member of the Confucius Genealogy Compilation Committee, which will publish the fifth edition of the family register next year. For the first time, it includes women and those living outside of China. Each person paid 5 yuan (about 70 cents) to register; the committee has stopped soliciting names. People without pedigrees proving descent could take a DNA test to compare with Confucius’ genetic signature, which scientists in China discovered in 2006. It may sound as though Confucius, whose proper name was Kong Zi, was particularly prolific, but all I could find ( in the Handbook of Today’s Religions) is that he had a son and a daughter—I guess that's what 2,500 years can do for your family tree. The descendants have held noble titles and governmental posts throughout history. The main lineage fled from their ancestral home in Qufu during the Chinese Civil War, but now the Temple of Confucius and the Confucius Mansion (the residence of the philosopher’s descendants) are tourist attractions. Now, if only I can figure out how to set up a genealogy compilation committee for my family ...
International Genealogy
2/20/2008 10:47:32 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
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Thursday, January 31, 2008
World Vital Records Launches International Collection
Posted by Diane
Starting Monday, Feb. 4, FamilyLink's World Vital Records subscription database site will be outfitted with a new, gargantuan World Collection of international records. Built through partnerships with more than 20 record-holding organizations, the World Collection has more than 1.5 billion records from about 35 countries, including England, Canada, Australia, France, Ireland, Scotland, Hungary and Portugal. It’ll double World Vital Records’ offerings. Some of the new collection's major components: - UK census records (1851 to 1901) from FindMyPast.com, to be posted county-by-county through out the year, including record images
- newspapers from Australia, the Bahamas, Chile, Ecuador, England, Ireland, Canada and Mexico
Other partners include Archive CD Books businesses in Canada and Australia, Irish reference publisher Eneclann, the Godfrey Memorial Library in Connecticut, UK records site British Origins and Australian book distributor Gould Genealogy. The World Collection, which includes the US Collection records already on World Vital Records, costs $149.95 per year, but you can sign up for $99.95 until Feb.4. [ Note: We've just learned of a new World Collection discount—$119.95 if you sign up by Feb. 11.] The US Collection by itself costs $49.95 per year, or you can get two years for $79.95 if you sign up by Feb. 4. We're going to give the World Collection a whirl and report back. If you try it, click Comment and let us know what you think.
Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy
1/31/2008 5:02:03 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
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Wednesday, December 05, 2007
1901 and 1911 Irish Censuses Going Online
Posted by Diane
We’ve just seen the first fruits of a project from the National Archives of Ireland and Library and Archives Canada to digitize, index and post online the 1901 and 1911 Irish censuses. You now can search or browse Dublin’s 1911 census records free at www.census.nationalarchives.ie; the rest of the 1911 and then 1901 records will follow. Search on a name or place, then and click on a match to see a page with the household's residents and links to PDF images of the dwelling’s census return forms (they were a bit slow to load). What an exciting development, and not only because contributing editor Sharon DeBartolo Carmack tipped us off just in time to slip the good news into our March 2008 Irish research guide before the issue went to press. The project is creating the only master index to Irish census records—currently, you have to look up the district electoral division (DED) for your ancestor's townland (similar to a neighborhood) and residence, then find the Family History Library census microfilm covering the right DED. On your relative’s Household Return (Form A) for 1901, you’ll find his or her name, age, sex, relationship to the head of household, religion, occupation, marital status, county or country of birth, and ability to read, write and speak Irish. All of that’s also in the 1911 census, plus, for married women, the numbers of years of marriage, children born alive and children still living. You can get a good picture of your family’s economic status, too: On the House and Building Return (Form B), census takers recorded details about dwellings, such as number of windows, type of roof, number of rooms a family occupies, and overall condition. Though Ireland took censuses every 10 years starting in 1821, the infamous 1922 Four Courts fire took a toll, as did government officials who destroyed old returns once they gathered statistical information. The 1921 count was skipped due to the Irish Civil War, leaving 1901 and 1911 as the only censuses available.
Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy | Research Tips
12/5/2007 10:48:52 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
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Thursday, November 08, 2007
Research London Children's Hospital Records
Posted by Diane
I learned about this cool resource for British ancestors from the ResearchBuzz newsletter about online search engines and databases: A new Web site provides historical admission record transcriptions from Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children in London. The free Small and Special database contains information on more than 85,000 patient admissions from the hospital’s opening in February 1852, through 1914. You can do a simple search on a name and birth year (exact or choose a range) on the home page. Or, click Search on the left of the page to search on other parameters such as patient’s address, admission date and disease. Results show the patient’s name, age and address; illness, outcome (such as “died” or “relieved”), admission and discharge dates, and case notes (if any). You have to register with the site to see details such as case notes. Under the left-hand Gallery link, you can browse photographs. Click Library to see articles about the hospital, staff, and patients such as little Minnie Ashman, who suffered from empyema. 
Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy
11/8/2007 9:27:33 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)
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Monday, September 24, 2007
Proceedings of London's Old Bailey Courthouse Online
Posted by Diane
I came across a cool resource while researching our Now What blog question about convicts sentenced to indentured servitude abroad. The Proceedings of the Old Bailey, London 1674 to 1834 is a searchable version of the accounts of more than 100,000 criminal trials held at London's central criminal court.  Elizabeth Cox is one of the “non-elite” (as the site calls them) whose trials are detailed here. On Oct. 8, 1684, she was found guilty of petty larceny for stealing a silk gown from George Winterton’s shop. Her sentence? Whipping. The same day, a “notorious thief” named Anne Parker, who’d been convicted three times of stealing silver from households where she was employed as servant, received respite from her death sentence due to pregnancy. You can browse by date or search the trials on a name, date, keyword, crime, place and a variety of other terms. Click a match for a transcription of the trial account, links to other trials the same day, plus a digitized image of the account as it appeared in the original volumes of Old Bailey proceedings. The site also offers fascinating background information on the courthouse, laws of the day, the gender factor in criminal proceedings, and London communities. Even better, a digitization project is underway for trials from 1834 to 1913.
court records | Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy | Social History
9/24/2007 8:51:19 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Friday, September 07, 2007
Ancestry.se and More Swedish Genealogy Resources
Posted by Diane
Ancestry.com has launched a Swedish Web site, www.Ancestry.se. Accessible with a $299.40-per-year ($29.95 per month) World Deluxe membership, the site contains Swedish emigration records with 1.4 million names, and vital records from 81 Lutheran parishes in Sweden’s Varmland County. The same records are also available through Ancestry.com’s US records collection ($155.40 per year). Note they’re not linked to digitized original records. The original emigration data comes from a CD called Emigranten Populär. Data were culled from various records including passport lists, passenger lists and correspondence. For more on what you can learn from the records, see Ancestry.com’s “about” page for that database. You can buy a version of the database on a two-CD set called Emigranten for $190 from Göteborgs-Emigranten in Göteborg. Other Swedish record sources you can check out: - Emigrantslistor, passenger-list information from 1851 to 1940 the police department kept for Stockholm. The Family History Library has this on microfilm, as well as emigrations through other Swedish ports.
- Emibas, a CD of 1.1 million emigrants listed in between 1845 and 1930. It’s available from Ancestors Swedish.
- Genline has digitized virtually all Swedish church records and made them searchable in its database. Access costs around $370 for a year; you also can buy shorter subscriptions and take advantage of special offers.
- SVAR, a division of Sweden's national archives, offers a smaller collection of digitized church records, as well as some censuses and vital records (click the English icon on the Web site). It costs about $146 per year, with shorter subscriptions and other packages available.
For more help, use our Swedish online ethnic toolkit and see the October 2006 Family Tree Magazine (sold out from our back issues store, but ask for it at your library).
Family Tree Magazine articles | Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy
9/7/2007 5:03:05 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Friday, August 31, 2007
The State of Genealogy in Germany
Posted by Grace
We don't need to tell you that genealogy's a big deal. But for the sake of backing up the argument, here are some numbers. A poll released by The Generations Network in 2005 said 29 percent have created a family tree—that's more than 80 million people. Ancestry.com alone has 760,000 subscribers.
Now, about one in six Americans reported having German ancestry in the 2000 US Census—more than 43 million people.
Considering how many US genealogists might be rooting around in the archives of Baden-Wurttemberg and Brandenburg, it seems surprising that only about 30,000 Germans are tracing their family roots, according to German news channel N-TV.
But the lack of fervor in Deutschland has deep-seated roots.
Genealogy was at its most popular in Germany during the Third Reich—it was a way of proving Aryan heritage. Because much of the general population associated the hobby with national socialism, nearly all genealogical organizations were disbanded in 1945, and the hobby still leaves a bad taste in the mouths of many Germans.
With the advent of Internet-driven research (and perhaps with the influence of countries like the United States and United Kingdom, where genealogy is big business), it seems like Ahnenforschung is making a comeback. TV stations are producing genealogy-focused programs like "Die Spur der Ahnen" ("The Trace of the Ancestors") and "Vorfahren Gesucht: Abenteuer Ahnenforschung" ("Ancestors Sought: Genealogy Adventure"). For those fluent in Deutsch, a German-language blog affiliated with Ancestry.de gives an interesting take on family history.
So now I’m curious—what's the state of genealogy in other countries? Leave a comment!
Genealogy Web Sites | International Genealogy
8/31/2007 2:49:10 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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