Genealogy Chat

Oh Joy,if you never took in the delights of Somerset House you missed a real treat,,,it was like a shussssher's gallery and any minute you expected Heap to come looming from somewhere it was so formal.

:-D

I was taken back in time watching Minder and wished I could still go to the Family Records Centre in London - Arthur was tracing his family tree in St Catherine's House :-)

It was brilliant and the excitement on Arthur's face really took me back to when we used to go to the Family Records Centre. When his nephew Ray found the registration for Arthur's parents, Arthur was SO excited! - that's my Mum and Dad! he said. And then the expressions on the face of both of them when they saw the gravestone for Grace Daley! a real picture! Oh how I can empathise with them. That programme was real tracing family :-)

It really took me back to the days of lifting the heavy books off the shelves, searching quarter by quarter, year by year, having an aching shoulder and back later, but oh it was so worth it with the finds! :-) And the staff were so helpful, too.

The big books are stored out of sight somewhere in Christchurch (Dorset).

I use to love going to FRC as i was born up the road from it.

You use to always get chatting to someone. Most of the staff went to TNA in Kew. Not many of them stayed there tho, but few are and we always get talking about the FRC. The good old days :-D

The online GRO records are the ones from the BIG books so you can still look at them

Spent many hours at the LRO Islington lugging the big books on and off the shelves and sometimes finding someone had taken your place at the wooden ledges and using your pencil and notepad that you had left there poised to record GRO refs so you could order a cert at the counters. Whenever we went with out Family History Soc . a day out from Kent, It always had loads of researchers doing their lookups .

I used to enjoy the trip out.

Somerset House held the index ledgers that eventually went to Family Records @ St Catherines, at Aldwych ,from there they were transerfed to Family Records in Myddleton St,,,,,,those only ever gave a maiden surname of mother.

You can still view the whole page/s per surname from each quarter on Ancestry.

most archives have micro fiche of the indexed ledgers,,by surname and quarter,

When Myddleton St shut all materail was shipped to Kew and was avaliable there but with the advent of the same online records these ledgers have been stored as archived material.

Having just watched the flm "Organges and Sunshine" it reminded me of this thread. In the film the lead character sits and goes through the books that I was trying to locate - not much help in getting access to them now but it was good to see 'proof' of what I remembered!

Sadly, the Family Records Centre closed in March 2008. I still miss it very much. We used to really enjoy the journey, train and then bus, searching the film, village by village; then lifting down the heavy books, searching, making a note, in pencil, of course :-), of which quarter and which year had been checked, putting the big book back, getting back ache, then finding an entry and completing the form to order the certificate, and then on occasions reaching the ordering desk only to find had forgotten the volume number and going back again, rushing to get there before closing time!

Yes, the books were put in storage, if I remember correctly, somewhere in Christchurch.

I posted that it was closing - http://www.genesreunited.co.za/boards.asp?wci=thread&tk=1008099

I probably am mis remembering what was in the books, particularly as I was looking mainly at the marriages and only briefly looked my self and sister up in the birth books.

I remember many shelves with books titled by quarter and aphabetically there were several for each quarter and I had to find the one with the J's and H's in for my names for the marriage. You took them off the shelves and read them on a unit beside the shelves. I think the B, M, & D books were coloured differently like red for births, green for marriages and black for deaths.

I was convinced up until this thread that the mothers name was in the birth book that I could look for the surname and check to see the mothers full namd, but I stand corrected, it would have been useful tho! , lol

From what I understand the records were removed from public access because the GRO were re-indexing them and making a new online access system to search the records and buy certificates. This was project DOVE which failed some time ago.

Project DOVE has been replaced by the D&I Project which isn't even kicking off until 2011.

http://www.ips.gov.uk/cps/rde/xchg/ips_live/hs.xsl/1090.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Register_Office_for_England_and_Wales

Mark.

Karen - I think you're misremembering. Post 1911q2, all one gets is the Mum's Maiden Surname. I just checked the index I looked up - I remember it well as although there were only 10 births with my surname that quarter, there was another me - but born in another rego district. I was born out in the tules - less than 1000 births in my district that year. The other me was born in another district & had his mum's MS=Onion, not an easy name to forget - I've often wondered if it was really O'Nion - another name I've not heard of. Anyways, back in the 1940s, there'd been registration for 100+ y, so 400+ quarters, so 10000+ volumes of registers for each of B,M & D. The room just wasn't big enough Aside from the pedestal work table thingies, all else in the room was a guy at a wicket where you handed in your request (+money).

Not that it's really on-topic, but things are rather different in Scotland.
Also, some local rego offices also have their own local indices on-line. I've not seen one that gives the mum's full name, but some (e.g., Preston) do give the mum's MS back to 1837.

The books don't give mothers first name. They are exactly the same as the online indexes.

Hi Gwyn

thanks for the offer but I don't think I have enough info really to search. The reason I was looking for the books is that they enabled me to go through each quarter and look under a surname and the mothers name was there. On reflection I think these were the registers because they were filed by quarter and volume. i.e. the books relating to the GRO reference in the idexes. I can't seem to find an online version that will give the mothers first name.

I'm looking for a birth that is most likely under my grans maiden name. I'll pm you with more explanation and if you have any ideas I'd be grateful!

Karen

I don't know of full names.
I usually see if I can find a marriage match once I know the 2 surnames and use that as a guide.

Do you want some help searching?
I could help now if you like.
Send a pm if you wish...
.
Gwyn

More advice please -

As far as I remember the books gave the full name of the mother, are there any online records that do that?

Thanks.

Sorry for being away. I appreciate your all your help.

The only images I've seen of BMD indexes have been lists of surnames with place of birth and then the reference number and I'd assumed that was the case for all of them.

I think my blonde moments have arrived because I've not found the equivalent of the books in the birth online indexes, however I now realise that I've not been looking at such recent births before now so I'll go and have a look now that you have all pointed me in the right direction. If I can do it all online so much the better up until now I thought trawling the actual books was going to be the only way.

Kew has had Microfiche of BMD for years, but I think now they are available online they have removed them from general access although you could probably still ask to view them. Not a lot of point though as all the indexes can be viewed online.

I think Janice did mean on Ancestry. The images on there are of the books that you used at Somerset House.

After Sept 1911 they will have the mother's maiden surname for births and spouse's name for marriages.

Hi Karen,
Yes, but that is what you get in the big books. If you click on view image you get the whole page from the book so you can view all the entries not just the one you typed into the search.
Janice

Janice

Do you mean on FreeBMD? the only images i've found on Ancestry are the indexes with the names and GRO numbers.

Karen

Thanks Shirley. I have Ancestry but it seems to be sporadic as to whether the mums maiden name is on the record or not. I'll have a look at BMD, thanks.

Its an old family mystery. My great aunt told us that my gran had 'gone off pregnant and come back not pregnant' - when we asked her she wouldn't say whether she had the baby or not (having said it she then clammed up and said it was all in the past and didn't matter!) but as this would have been 1930's I'm thinking she probably had the baby or is that naive?. So I don't know whether this happened before or after my mum was born or before or after grans marriage.

I'm hoping to find a birth with matching surnames of baby and mum in an area that makes sense to me and hey presto mystery solved - as if:)

And you made me smile - you are quite right re someone taking your place with the ledgers - or having to wait while someone painstakingly went through the one you needed!