Bishopric of the Forces collection on FindmyPast

I signed up to a FindmyPast (www.findmypast.co.uk) subscription a couple of days ago in order to access the Scottish Roman Catholic parish records. Although the records are also presented on ScotlandsPeople (www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk), FindmyPast has a considerably larger collection (even though I have no idea what the full coverage actually is) - including records from a particular Renfrewshire parish I have an interest in, dating up to the 1960s, for which I could previously only access pre-1900 records on ScotlandsPeople.

I commented on my positive experience with the records on my Scottish GENES Facebook page, but mentioned that I thought it a pity that the records do not contain material from the Bishopric of the Forces collection, as is the case on ScotlandsPeople. The Bishopric is based in Aldershot, England, but does not just contain records for all Roman Catholic Scots worldwide, but entries from all Roman Catholics in the British armed forces who have had events recorded during their service.

In fact, it transpires that the records ARE on FindmyPast - they are not included in the Scottish records, because quite rightly, they are not just Scottish records. Instead, they form a completely separate offering, British Armed Forces, Roman Catholic Registers (https://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-world-Records/british-armed-forces-roman-catholic-registers).

The following is FindmyPast's blurb about the collection:

The British Armed Forces, Roman Catholic Registers have been digitised from The Scottish Catholic Archives. They contain sacramental registers of baptisms, confirmations, marriages, and burials between 1836 and 1975. The registers feature the names of military personnel and their families stationed both at home and abroad. You will find registers from the military towns Aldershot and Shorncliffe, as well as bases in Cairo, Cyprus, Malta, and more.

The registers were created by the Bishopric of the Forces, the religious officials of the Roman Catholic Church responsible for the pastoral care of Roman Catholics in the military. Roman Catholic registers were often recorded in Latin. Latin was the official language of the Church until the second half of the 20th century. Below is a list of common Latin words found in the records to help you decipher the detailed images.

So the bottom line, I think, is that when it comes to Scottish Roman Catholic records research, FindmyPast has properly surpassed ScotlandsPeople's offerings - something you may wish to take on board if you have a lot of Scottish Catholic research to pursue!

(With thanks to Myko Clelland from FindmyPast)

Chris

You can pre-order my new book, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Scottish2 (out April). Also available, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed) at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Irish1 and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Scotland1. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, and on Twitter @genesblog.