Genealogy Chat

you could also try irish records has links to other sites

Janet North London Borders I reckon that my great grandad/great grandma got married in 1859/1860 in Cork Ireland. There 1st child was born in 1860 in Cork would I be able to find their marriage if I went over to Ireland to have a look at the records office in Cork. Great Grandad was in the 80thFoot(Royal Irish Fusiliers) in India in 1857-1859(Indian Mutiny). Have already tried Family History in India Thats how I found he had been in Ireland but cannot find his family in the Griffith's Valuations. Do you know of any sites that I would be able to find any further info on my family please. Thanks Sue

Sue Have you tried the Overseas Regimental Indexes which are now on line through 1837? These are the same indexes that are in tthe Family Record Centre in London in big books If he was in the army getting married and having a first child he should be in those indexes. That is where I found mine getting married in Ireland and having his first child there in 1865 and 1866. If it was Cork it is probably around the Fermoy area(The Curragh was a big barracks) Your soldier may well have served during the Crimea War as well as the Indian Mutiny? Failing that write or E mail the Dublin office to obtain the certificates that way. Address: GRO Civil Registration of BDM Joyce House 8-11 Lombard Street East Dublin 2 Tel: (01) 6711000 To find E mail Google"GRO Dublin" For the above you will need to know the date of marriage and date of birth. If you are going to Ireland and wish to visit the Cork GRO then I would suggest you E Mail them as I was shocked to hear recently that there is a 2 year waiting list to access the Cork Archives but maybe this was just hearsay! If your soldier is Irish then he should be on Griffiths as this was a head count of all Irish people living in Ireland taken about 1850ish. Any other nationality and he will not appear on Griffiths. Every Irish head of household should be on Griffiths. If he married an Irish girl her family will be on there somwhere, but the key for you is to find his marriage first which will give her father's name. For what its worth we were in Cork in the summer and we used the County Library rather than the main GRO in the Centre and we found that quite adequate for what we wanted and not at all crowded or even having to book. They had the fiche records of Cork Births so that may be a way around the main city GRO if that is the way you want to go.Their web site is: www.familia.org/services/eire/cork.html Collect as much info first before you go. This is the best website I have for Cork: http://homepage.eircom.net/~ridgway Hope this is of some help. Janet

Janet Thanks for ALL the information you have given me. You are so knowledgeable about Irish History,you must be like a walking encyclopedia. Glad to know that I can go to the County Library if the Cork GRO is going to have a waiting list of 2 yrs. I found my great grandad on the 1881 census for Derbyshire on that it said the place of birth was Halifax York which is only about 1/2hrs drive from where I live. But on the 1871 census for Derbyshire it said that he was born in Ireland but as you say he wouldn't be on the Griffiths Valuation if he wasn't born in Ireland. I am going to find the Parish Records in Halifax Yorkshire first then go to Ireland next year. Thanks once age for all your help.. Sue

I studied Irish History 1800-1922 at university. There was lots of wrongdoing and betrayl on both sides and if the Irish want to carry those huge grudges through life then that's their choice. However, genealogy isn't a politically or religiously motivated hobby. The LDS have Irish parish records, the Ulster Historical Foundation claims to be putting some online, and there must be others. There is even a certificate exchange site for Ireland. Yet there have been GR members who have written to Irish churches requesting information and been told politely to shove their genealogical interest. The 1901 and 1911 censuses have been released; if someone was able to make that decision, then should getting it transcribed really be such a wild idea?

Twinkle Please remember that all church/state records of BMD and Census in any country was never instigated with Genealogists and Family Historians in mind. They were started as a way of nations finding out how many people were being born, were getting married, having children and dying so that the nations could cope with their populations. If churches seem churlish when you write for info do please remember that they are busy people and running a genealogy centre is not seen as part of their duties. Even the IGI started by the Mormon Church was not done for genealogical or family history reasons but purely as a matter of gaining as many souls as possible for their own church and this is still the same today, but those of us who use it fully realise that we all have our own free will to choose whether or not our souls are being saved for the Mormons or not. The fact that we all happen to use these records is purely incidental. I have to say that when I have visited any church in Ireland and asked to see records I have never been refused. But we do tend to do it through B&B's which offer a genealogy service ie they tend to pave the way for us by introducing us to the local PP etc. I also agree with Theresa when she says that some of the info from the Heritage Centres is often unreliable, as I had to work through some errors given to me by the Brian Boru Centre in Tipperary and discovered a lot more info when I was able to search the church registers myself. That is a very kind offer Theresa, thankyou. Janet

Just like to add a bit from our own experience in researching Irish Genealogy. Pam's grandfather Alphonsus Berkeley was born in Dublin, 1891. Fortunately we knew his date of birth with some certainty and it was possible to ordrer his birth certificate by post. This was extremely useful as it obviously provided an address and details of his parents. Earlier this year we had a short holiday in Ireland and spent a couple of days doing genealogy research in Dublin. We had given quite a bit of thought to what we should spend our time on and genned up on where the various records were held and how we might best spend our limited time. There are three main sources of information. The easiest to access by far are the BMD records at the General Register Office. For just Euro 15 for a whole day you have unlimited access to the entire records. In the space of a single morning we found the marriage of our g grandfather Berkeley and several of grandad's siblings in the births, plus quite a few 'possible' relatives, for future reference. At a cost of Euro 1.90 you can have a photocopy of the entry in the register, not so pretty as a full certificate, granted, but provides the same information and much much cheaper than the £7 we have to pay, plus you get it there and then without having to wait. The National Archives have copies of the 1901 and 1911 Censuses. These are on microfilm and are of reasonable to good quality. You do need to have an address to start with thouh as there are no indexes at present. The records are similar to our on UK census returns but with the added advantage that the family names are summarised at the start of each folio which helps. Finally, The National Library has microfilm containing parish registers. We found these record much more difficult to research, mainly as the quality is very mixed, whith many being almost impossible to read. You need to find a good working microfilm reader in a dark part of the room. We managed to find a couple of births, bur ran out of time before we could look at the marriage records for gg grandfather, which is our next target. Regards, Peter and Pam

Peter Do you know that when you are in the Dublin GRO now and you pay your 15euro for the day, you can only get FIVE PHOTOCOPIES in one day, so if you need more (which nearly everyone does) you have to come back another day. They refuse to use checkpoints for these photocopies so there were a few people like me with five useless photocopies, and the prospect of having to go back and do the whole thing over again, was very unapealing to me, and I am sure others as well. Pat x

Nudged-lots of interesting info. on here for anyone with Irish ancestors-
thank you!! Margot :-D :-D

Just a few updates on information on here.
Firstly it is the Bishops of parts of Cork, Kerry and Tipperary that refuse to allow anyone, including Irish people themselves to get infoemation about their rellies. Their excuse is that the records are Church property????.
The address of G.R.O. now is The Irish Mall, Abbey Street, Dublin.
Prices for non certified copies of B/M/Ds is 4euros each, Full day research is 20euros. 5 years consecitive books cost 2euros to search through.Mothers maiden name is included from 1902.
If you think that Relitave was in British Army/Navy/Air force and they or wife died overseas or had children born overseas they are registered in the back of the book. Late registerions are also recorded in the back of the books.
The 5 copies a day includes everyone including Irish, but they will post Free any extra copies that you find, but it will take about 10 days.
One tip, if you have anyone visiting with you, get them to hand up 5 copies as well writing their names on bottom of request, that way you will get 10 copies instead of 5.
Betty.