Births, Marriage and Death Records: a guide for family historians

I promised/threatened some shameless self-promotion, and here it is. Our book, Birth, Marriage and Death Records is now on sale.

You can buy it in the shop here at The National Archives or order it online, using the link on the right.

That is all.

Busy September

Apart from the extra traffic that reappears on the roads with the start of a new school term, I like September. The weather is usually better than August (but it's nice to see the autumn and winter collections in the shops too, just in case). It's also the time when new family history classes start up, and when many societies re-start their talks programmes after a summer break.

I also have a book coming out at the end of the month (in my last blog post I did warn you of the shameless self-promotion to come). In fact is is a joint project with my good friend and former colleague, Dave Annal of Lifelines Research. His name comes before mine for a number of reasons; Annal comes before Collins in the alphabet; he is an established author; and he did more than his fair share of the work! It is called 'Birth, marriage and Death Records, a guide for family historians' to be published on 30 September. If you are really keen you can follow the link and pre-order it from the Pen & Sword Books site for the bargain price of £10.39.

Oddly enough, no-one has written a book on this subject before. There are plenty of books on individual topics, such as civil registration or baptism records, and chapters on births, marriages and deaths in general family history books. But while there are numerous books on the census, or wills and probate, no-one has ever put together a whole book exclusively on birth, marriage and death records. We only wish we could have made it twice the length, there is so much wonderful material out there.

But before the book comes out I have two important speaking engagements, both at the Society of Genealogists. The first is a half-day course on Tracing Scottish Ancestors at The National Archives on Saturday 22 September. This is based on a talk that I first delivered three years ago, but which has now been updated and extended. There's a lot of material, so I am looking forward to having a double-length session this time. There is a podcast of the original version that I gave onsite at The National Archives in 2009.

Somerset House, birthplace of civil registration in England and Wales, in the 1830s

On the following Saturday, 29 September, I am back at the Society to deliver the opening sessions at their day conference celebrating 175 Years of Civil Registration. Hats off to the Society of Genealogists for being (as far as I am aware) the only organisation to mark this very significant anniversary. It seems to have passed entirely unnoticed as far as the General Register Office is concerned; they made a big deal of the 150th anniversary in 1987 and even commissioned a book, the excellent 'People Count' by Muriel Nissel. Perhaps they are saving themselves for the bicentenary in 2037.

You can book for both the Scottish Ancestry and 175 Years of Civil Registration on the Society's Events Calendar page. Maybe I'll see you there?

Welcome new editions of old(ish) books

I'm not in the habit of plugging books (apart from my own, which comes out next month - you'll see some shameless self-promotion then!). But there are some books where a new edition is worth shouting about, and this is one of them. There is a lot of interest in Caribbean family history, but there is relatively little in print, compared to other areas of research. It's quite some time since the last edition of Guy Grannum's Tracing your Caribbean Ancestors appeared, and it has been out of print for a while too, so the new edition is particularly welcome. If you are interested in the subject, Guy's website Caribbean Roots is also worth a look.  

This book is a National Archives Guide, from Bloomsbury Publishing, I knew that publication was imminent, so I was pleased to see a few days ago that it had arrived in The National Archives bookshop - I could hardly miss it, it's Publication of the Month. This means that you can buy it at a bargain price, £11.99 instead of £16.99, if you follow the link above. Like a number of other new publications it is also available as a e-book, which you can buy direct from Bloomsbury.

I also noticed a new edition of another established title that first appeared 25 years ago, Bound for Australia by David Hawkings. Most of the records he mentions are held in The National Archives, and David Hawkings is extremely good at finding relevant ones. Since the first edition appeared in 1987 he has discovered a victualling list for the First Fleet among Treasury records, which he reproduces in full in Chapter 1 (TNA ref T 46/22). This edition has 8 more chapters than the original 1987 work, with 22 appendices, a bibliography and separate indexes of personal names, place names and ships.

Although the title and the cover illustration suggest that this is a book about convicts, the subtitle 'A guide to the records of transported convicts and early settlers' shows that its scope is wider than that. One of the items that caught my eye on flicking through the book was an extract from 'A List of Free Passengers on board the Convict Ship Merchantman at Swan River on the 15th February 1863' (TNA Ref: MT 32/5). Among the Wives and Families of Pensioner Guard , the conduct on board of Mrs McCourt is described:

'A violent and most unmanageable woman. She was reported to me by her husband for keeping company with single men on board and refusing to come to bed at 10pm.'

Oh dear. So it wasn't just convicts who caused trouble.

Bound for Australia is published by The History Press and is also available from The National Archives bookshop, and although it isn't Publication of Month, it too is on sale at a bargain price if you buy it online.