Tuesday 14 May 2024

Family Tree magazine's Irish Ancestors Study Afternoon with Chris Paton

On Saturday June 29th 2024 I will be giving three talks for a Family Tree magazine hosted Irish Ancestors Study Afternoon. The following will be the programme, which kicks off at 1pm (UK time) - each talk will be about an hour, with Q&A and short breaks in between:

1) Records of Daily Life in Ireland

There are many basic resources available to help us establish the genealogy of our families, but in this session, family historian Chris Paton looks at many additional record sets exist that document their role and status in society, as well as their fate. These include electoral records (including freeholders lists and absent voters lists), the administration of the poor law and the role of the poorhouse in Ireland, and education records.

Chris will also look at judicial records and the records of law enforcement, and explore a case study of a 19th century murder which unblocked a genealogical brick wall within his own ancestry, pushing the family narrative back to the mid 18th century.

2) Researching Irish Occupations

In this session genealogist Chris Paton explores the occupational world of our Irish ancestors, including agricultural Ireland, the factories and shipyards established through industrialisation, the professional classes such as church ministries, physicians and nurses, communications workers, the merchant shipping services, and the military, both British and Irish.

Chris will also look at how Irish people travelled to Britain and beyond for economic opportunities, whether through seasonal work or through longer term economic necessity.

3) A Decade of Remembrance: Researching Ireland 1912-1923

In this talk Chris looks at the landmark events that led to the Partition of Ireland in 1921 and its consequences. It includes the Suffragette struggle in Ireland, the Ulster Covenant of 1912, the formation of the Irish Volunteers and the Ulster Volunteers, the Dublin Lock-out of 1913, the First World War, the Easter Rising, the War of Independence, Partition, and the subsequent Irish Civil War.

As well as addressing the historical events Chris will show how to research ancestors caught up in the period, whether on the British or Irish side, and from across the island and beyond.

To sign up, please visit https://www.family-tree.co.uk/how-to-guides/webinars/irish-ancestors-study-afternoon-29-june/ - ticket for all three talks are £35, or £25 for Family Tree subscribers or Family Tree Plus members.

I hope you can join me!

Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

Friday 10 May 2024

New Pharos course - Researching Irish Land Records

I'm delighted to announce that a second Irish themed course that I have written will be taught via Pharos Tutors (www.pharostutors.com) from October 21st - here are the details!

Researching Irish Land Records

The issue of land ownership was a potent question in Ireland for centuries. In the 17th century vast swathes of land was settled by Protestant British colonists during the Plantations of Ulster, drawn mostly from Scotland, whilst the subsequent Cromwellian conquest led to mass confiscation of land across Ireland, to be conveyed to English soldiers and 'adventurers'. The Penal Laws had soon dispossessed the native Irish Catholic population of many rights, including land ownership and inheritance rights. At the same time, the first national land valuation survey in the world was carried out, and an elaborate system of land administration imposed. In the 19th century, Ireland's incorporation into the United Kingdom was followed by great tragedy with the Famine, but in its aftermath a new opportunity arose following the Land War to radically alter rental provisions and then to redistribute land away from an absentee landlord class.

Following on from the Progressing Your Irish Research Online course*, this course will look at the various types of records that can help with land research in Ireland from the period of the 17th century to the present day. It will examine the various forms of land tenure that existed, the records of ownership and rental, the valuation and conveyance of property, maps, and many other resources. Importantly it will show how to find the most useful land records, and how to use them for your family history research.

* Although not compulsory, it is recommended that students will have first completed the Progressing Your Irish Research Online course.

Lesson Headings:

  • The Basics of Irish Land Research
  • Colonialism and Conquest
  • Managing the Land
  • Valuation and Conveyance
  • The Land War and Redistribution

Relevant countries: Ireland

What to expect:

Each lesson includes lesson notes, activities and forum exercises for students to complete during the week and a one-hour live tutorial (text chat or Zoom) with the tutor and the rest of the class. Times for the tutorials are set at the beginning of each course by the tutor. 

Tutor: Chris Paton   
Length: 5 weeks   
Start date: Mon 21 Oct 2024
Cost: £58

To register, please visit https://www.pharostutors.com/researching-irish-land-records

Comment: This will be the fifth course that I teach through Pharos, and the third that I have written, and I am looking forward to getting stuck in! Athouygh not compulsory, it is recommended that students will have first done my Progressing Your Irish Research Online course prior to this new course - it starts up again on August 19th, and you can find more on this at https://www.pharostutors.com/progressing-your-irish-research-online.

Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

FindmyPast adds more Scottish occupational records

FindmyPast (www.findmypast.co.uk) has added records to its Scotland, Occupations & Professions. No specific information has been given on what has been added, with the site's blog simply stating that "There are 38,123 brand-new Scottish occupational records for you to discover. These unique new additions span back as far as the 17th century". 

However, the complete collection now holds the following:

  • Aberdeen mariners, 1600-1700
  • Aberdeen mariners, 1700-1800, part 1
  • Aberdeen mariners, 1700-1800, part 2
  • Aberdeen Merchant & Trade Burgesses, 1600-1620
  • Aberdeen Merchant & Trade Burgesses, 1621-1639
  • Aberdeen Merchant & Trade Burgesses, 1640-1659
  • Aberdeen Merchant & Trade Burgesses, 1660-1679
  • Aberdeen Obituaries, 1800-1822
  • Aberdeen Obituaries, 1823-1839
  • Aberdeen Obituaries, 1840-1854
  • Aberdeen Testaments, 1715-1734
  • Aberdeen University Alumni, 1840-1849
  • Aberdeen University Alumni, 1850-1860
  • Angus Mariners, 1700-1800, part 1
  • Angus Mariners, 1700-1800, part 2
  • Banff Sasines etc, 1701-1720
  • Clyde Mariners, 1600-1700
  • Clyde Mariners, 1700-1800, part 1
  • Clyde Mariners, 1700-1800, part 2
  • Dundee Whalers, 1750-1850
  • Elgin Burgess Roll
  • Fife Burgess Rolls, 1700-1800, part 1
  • Fife Burgess Rolls, 1700-1800, part 2
  • Fife Mariners, 1700-1800
  • Kirkcaldy Mariners, 1600-1700
  • Lothians Mariners, 1600-1700, part 2
  • Lothians Mariners, 1700-1800, part 1
  • Old Aberdeen Merchant & Trade Burgesses, 1605-1885
  • Paisley Poll Tax, 1695, part 1
  • Paisley Poll Tax, 1695, part 2
  • Scots in Africa, part 1
  • Scots in Australasia, 1788-1900, part 1
  • Scots in Australasia, 1788-1900, part 2
  • Scottish Catholics, 1701-1705
  • Scottish Goldsmiths, 1600-1800
  • Scottish Schoolmasters, 1600-1700
  • Scottish Seafarers of the Eighteenth Century
  • Scottish Seafarers of the Seventeenth Century
  • Scottish Soldiers in Continental Europe, part 1
  • Scottish Soldiers, 1600-1800, part 1
  • Scottish Whalers before 1800
  • St Andrews & East Neuk Mariners, 1600-1700
  • St Andrews Burgess Rolls, 1700-1750
  • St Andrews Burgess Rolls, 1751-1775
  • Clock & Watchmakers Of The Scottish Highlands & Islands
  • List of Students of Veterinary Colleges, Recognised by Government, who have passed examinations, & obtained the certificate of the Highland & Agricultural Society, 1874, Edinburgh With supplements
  • Photographers of Central Scotland
  • Photographers of Edinburgh and the Lothians
  • Photographers of Lanarkshire
  • Photographers of North Eastern Scotland
  • Photographers of Northern Scotland
  • Photographers of Western Scotland
  • The Edinburgh Police Register 1815-1859, P. Ruthven-Murray, Edinburgh, 1991
  • 17th Century Ships Of Scotland
  • A Directory Of Seafarers Of The East Neuk Of Fife, 1600-1800
  • A history of the Society of Writers to Her Majesty's Signet, 1890
  • A list of All Merchants Matriculat in the Company of Merchants of Edinburgh 25 June 1687 - The Scottish Antiquary (1897)
  • Aberdeen Shipping 1748-1751
  • Dundee Shipping 1760-1769
  • Dundee Skippers & Their Ships 1830-1850
  • Fellows of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh 1581-1873
  • Fife Shopkeepers & Traders
  • Montrose Shipping Before 1776
  • Scottish Seafarers of the Seventeenth Century
  • The Shipping Of Anstruther 1742-1771
  • The Shipping Of Dundee And Montrose, 1720-1750, Ships, Shipmasters And Voyages 

(Source: https://www.findmypast.co.uk/blog/new/staffordshire-schools-scotland-occupations

Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

Passport applications 1845-1916 held at Edinburgh City Archives

Vivienne Dunstan has written an interesting blog post on passports issued between 1845 and 1916 which are held by Edinburgh City Archives (www.edinburgh.gov.uk/managing-information/edinburgh-city-archives-1/3), and which have been digitised and made available on Ancestry (www.ancestry.co.uk). Applications were sent to the Edinburgh Lord Provost from all over Lowland Scotland, including Glasgow, Angus and the Scottish Borders. 

To read Vivienne's blog post visit https://vivsacademicblog.wordpress.com/2024/05/09/19th-century-scottish-passport-records/. The collection on Ancestry is entitled "Edinburgh, Scotland, Lord Provost Passports, 1845-1916" (www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/62350/), with over 17000 entries.

Note that passports were not compulsory for overseas travel until 1914. FindmyPast (www.findmypast.co.uk) also host a useful collection entitled 'Index To Register Of Passport Applications 1851-1903', documenting additional Scots who may have applied in that peirod. The source for these is the National Archives in England, in series FO 611.

(With thanks to Vivienne)

Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

Wednesday 8 May 2024

Twenty per cent discount offer from Pharos Tutors for May courses

From Pharos Teaching and Tutoring Ltd (www.pharostutors.com):

Thinking about taking a family history course? We have a fantastic offer for you with our flash sale on our May courses that still have places. We're offering you a whopping 20% off, that’s our BIGGEST EVER DISCOUNT.

There are three courses for you to choose from:

  • Researching Ancestors in Continental Europe (started this week but taking bookings through to the end of today)
  • Elusive Ancestors: Migration within the British Isles
  • Researching Scottish Ancestral Crisis

Use code MAY20 at checkout to get your discount!

Comment: My next Researching Scottish Ancestral Crisis course kicks off very shortly on May 20th, and will last for five weeks. If interested to find more, visit https://www.pharostutors.com/researching-scottish-ancestral-crisis - and if signing up, don't forget to apply the discount code, MAY20!

Chris 

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

Scottish Handwriting site integrated into ScotlandsPeople

The Scottish Handwriting website at www.scottishhandwriting.com is sadly no more - its contents have just been integrated into the ScotlandsPeople website at https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/scottish-handwriting.

The learning tools on the new version appear to be the same as those previously available on the Scottish Handwriting platform. These can be used to learn how to read old forms of Scottish Handwriting, most notoriously the form known as Secretary Hand, which I often tell folk was invented by the Klingons!

ScotlandsPeople has a news announcement about the integration of the site at https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/article/news-article-scottish-handwriting-resource

I've not yet found quite how to locate the link directly on the site yet from the home page, but it can be found via the Researching Older Handwriting (Palaeography) guide on the Topics A-Z list at https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/guides/research-guides/topics-alphabetical - the guide is at https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/guides/research-guides/reading-older-handwriting.

A free guide on how to read documents from 1500-1700 is also available from the National Records of Scotland at https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/files/research/publications/NRS-Scottish_handwriting_self-help_kit-Web_ready_version.pdf.

** For those wishing to use the original Scottish Handwriting site, it has been cached at the Internet Archive on many occasions - this link appears to lead to a fully functioning version of the site, with most pages crawled and saved - https://web.archive.org/web/20210617072923/https://scottishhandwriting.com/.

Chris 

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

Edinburgh event for researching nurses and midwives in your family tree

Edinburgh Napier University, in partnership with the National Library of Scotland and Royal College of Nursing, is running the following free event in central Edinburgh (with free lunch) on Wednesday 5th June for members of the public who are interested in finding out about nurses or midwives in their family but are not sure how to do so.


Do you have a nurse or midwife in your family history?

  • Want to find out more about them?
  • Not sure where to start?

Edinburgh Napier University, the Royal College of Nursing, and the National Library of Scotland are offering a 1-day event for people who want to find out about nurses or midwives connected to their family but who are not sure where to start.

You may be looking for a nurse or midwife of any era who worked in any setting (e.g., hospital, community, industry, prisons, military). They may have worked in the NHS or privately, or have spent time working outside the UK. All are welcome!

What will the day involve?

There will be short presentations and introductions to family history research from librarians, researchers, and archivists, and opportunities to learn about online searching. There will also be the chance to ask questions and get guidance on how to find out more about the nurse or midwife in your family.

No previous experience or knowledge is needed.

If you have a photo or other small memento of the person or people in your family you are interested in finding out more about, and would be happy to show it, please bring this on the day.

If you cannot attend for the whole day, please do still join us!

Notebooks, pens and lunch will be provided free of charge.


The event is open to all and free. The online registration link is: https://www.tickettailor.com/events/edinburghnapieruniversitycentreformentalhealthpracticepolicyandlawresearch/1222685

(With thanks to Ken Nisbet via the Scottish Genealogy Network) 

Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

Friday 3 May 2024

MyHeritage releases New York City birth, marriage and death records

MyHeritage (www.myheritage.com) has released 37.4 million birth, marriage and death records from New York City, USA, both indexed and digitised, which will be of immense help to those with emigrant ancestors, particularly from Ireland. The collections not only index the primary individuals, but also the parents of individuals where listed. 

The datasets have the following titles:

  • New York City Births, 1866–1909
  • New York City Marriages, 1866–1949
  • New York City Deaths, 1866–1948

The company has released a blog post with further information on the records, available at https://blog.myheritage.com/2024/05/myheritage-releases-new-york-city-birth-marriage-and-death-record-collections/

(With thanks to Daniel Horowitz)

Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

FindmyPast adds India Office records and 18th century Limerick freeholders records

FindmyPast (www.findmypast.co.uk) has added birth, marriage and death records for British India from the year 1872.

In addition, it has added a database that it calls "Ireland, Limerick City & County Electoral Registers 1760-1776", which actually carries records of named freeholders with a vote qualification from the years 1761, 1768 and 1776, as sourced from the National Library of Ireland. The records are in transcription form.

For more on this week's release visit https://www.findmypast.co.uk/blog/new/british-india-new-zealand-bmds.


 Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.

Aberdeenshire memorial inscriptions records removed from Ancestry

Well, it's happened again. At the end of March I announced that Ancestry had been forced to remove a database of Isle of Man civil registration indexes which it had crawled from another user's wesbite and added to their platform without any given consent, a move which was labelled as "apparent data theft" by the data creator (see http://scottishgenes.blogspot.com/2024/03/ancestry-pulls-isle-of-man-civil.html). 

Now Ancestry has removed its Aberdeen and North-East Scotland, Index to Memorial Inscription Booklets, 1500-2021 database (see http://scottishgenes.blogspot.com/2024/03/ancestry-adds-aberdeenshire-memorial.html), appropriated from content created by the Aberdeen and North-East Scotland Family History Society, again without any given consent.

It seems that Ancestry is adding these collections to its site as part of an initiative called Ancestry Web Records. On its guide at https://support.ancestry.com/s/article/Finding-Records-Online-with-Ancestry-Web-Records it notes the following:

Libraries, governments, genealogical societies, universities, and genealogists have made a wealth of information available online. Ancestry® web records makes it easy to find records from many of these places. We summarize information from free web records and provide links to the original sites.
 
Guiding principles of web records

  • Access to web records is free. No one needs to subscribe or register with Ancestry to view these records.
  • Web records are attributed to the content publishers.
  • They're easily available. Prominent links make it easy to access the source website.

The site also adds the following for content creators:

We follow web standards for restricting crawling (robots.txt files). If a website has a robots.txt file that prohibits crawling the genealogical records, we don't search those records. If records from your website are included and you'd like them removed, please send a request to websearch@an​cestry​​.com.

In essence, Ancestry is sweeping the web for data that it can add to its site. It's not charging for such data, and it is linking back to the original content creators, but one has to ask whether this is being done for charitable reasons, or for other purposes. There can be many positive reasons for hosting such material - and indeed, in the past, Ancestry has created third party indexes to records available on other platforms, with their agreement, which you can often see with Web: written as a prefix to the collection title. But to just arbitrarily take content that others have created without seeking permission first does seem to me to be something that may potentially break trust with many people and organisations, and potentially earn itself a few Darwin Awards along the way. 

Records from the Isle of Man and Aberdeenshire collected on such a basis have already been removed over the last month as soon as the collection creators have learned about their appropriation. What else has been appropriated in the same way? Maybe Ancestry should think again about such a practice?

Chris

Order Tracing Your Belfast Ancestors in the UK at https://bit.ly/BelfastAncestors. Also available - Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Sharing Your Family History Online, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed), and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records - to purchase, please visit https://bit.ly/ChrisPatonPSbooks. For purchase in tthe USA visit https://www.penandswordbooks.com. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, on Threads at @scottishgenesblog and via Mastodon at https://mastodon.scot/@ScottishGENES.