BACKGROUND NOTE

CHESS VALLEY U3A FAMILY HISTORY GROUP MEETING

1 FEBRUARY 2011

Presentation by Rachel Robinson – ‘FamilySearch Website’

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons), otherwise known as the LDSChurch, has a special interest in encouraging family history studies, not only because of a great emphasis that is placed on the importance of family life but because it is obligatory for its members to trace their ancestors in order to give them salvation by proxy.

The Church has been gathering and preserving genealogical records from around the world for over 100 years. This material is primarily made available to the general public through the facilities of the LDS Family History Centre network, County Record Offices and through their website

The International Genealogical Index

Probably the most well known of the ‘datasets’ developed by LDSChurch is the International Genealogical Index (IGI). This remains the most extensive collection of British parish register transcripts with over 70 million entries listed. It also includes transcripts of records from a vast array of countries throughout the world

Looking specifically at the British Isles the IGI predominantly covers baptisms from the sixteenth century to 1885. It also contains marriage records but by no means as many, and very few burials. Coverage is not complete and some parishes are excluded altogether. Publications such as the ‘Phillimore Atlas and Index to Parish Registers’ provide an indication as to whether the parish that you are researching is in fact covered. However, you need to bear in mind that the IGI is being continuously updated so the information in Phillimore may be out of date.

Access to the IGI is either via microfiche viewed at Family History Centre or County Record Offices, or from the comfort of your own home via the LDS website at

When searching the IGI always bear in mind that you are working from someone’s transcriptions, and that errors can occur. You should always use the IGI purely as a short cut to locate a record and then go back to the original parish register to check for accuracy, as well as scan for related entries.

As mentioned above, Family Search is the LDSwebsite and is crucial for anyone conducting research into parish registers. It incorporates several key datasets:

  • Ancestral File
  • Pedigree Resource File
  • The International Genealogical Index (IGI) (see above)
  • British 1881 Census

.Ancestral Files and Pedigree Resource Filescontain voluntary submissions by other users and members of the LDS, and are based on privately researched non-verified material. You will need to exercise caution before incorporating any of the information into your family tree. Where possible try to contact the submitter (details of which are included) and ask where their sources were drawn from, and then go back to those sources and check them. Further advice on the way material is submitted, and on the datasets themselves, can be found on the Family Search website. Just a further reminder - it is free to use.

The FamilySearch website is currently being updated and the purpose of Rachel Robinson’s talk was to provide members with an insight into the changes being made and to aid navigation through the updated site.

Research through the Microfilm Collection

As mentioned, many of the records produced by the Church can be accessed online through the comfort of your home. However, there are those that have yet to be digitised. In addition to parish records these also include wills, immigration records, censuses, nonconformist records, military records and many more. These can be viewed on microfilm by visiting a Family History Centre (details of the network of Centres can be found on the FamilySearch website).

TheFamily History Library Catalogue of these microfilms can be accessed via the Family Search website. Having identified the film(s) that you wish to research you will need to order the material through the Family History Centre of your choice, which is where the material will be viewed. It may be worth noting that the Temple in Central London is the only Centre that retains microfilms on site, otherwise they have to be requested from the LDS Headquarters in Salt Lake City. If you are able to travel to Central London and they are holding the material that you are requesting then there is no fee, in all other cases you pay a £7.50 administrative charge.

Conclusion

Just to repeat the point made within the Introduction – the LDSChurchprovides the largest genealogical related library of research material in the world including, within the IGI, over 70 million entries transcribed from British parish registers. So it makes sense to include a visit to the FamilySearch website as part of your research into your ancestors.

Like any other new approach it won’t be without its problems, most of which revolve around your lack of knowledge of the site. But persevere, it does get easier and bear in mind thatit could hold the solution to that sticking point in your research.

Successful hunting.

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