Accounts written by third parties after the event
• History books
• Stories passed down within families over the years
Locating this evidence to build a family tree, learn more about these relatives and support the stories that are passed down through generations are the core tasks of a genealogist, so it’s time to focus on what material you are going to use to achieve these goals, and where to find it. Roughly speaking, there are two main types of record you’ll encounter during your work – primary sources and secondary sources.
Primary sources come in many shapes and forms, such as contemporary documents that survive from the period, or even oral accounts that are told to you by people who were present at an event. Of most use are officially created sources, such as birth, marriage and death certificates, as their creation and content have been governed and directed by legally binding requirements. These can be more reliable as evidence than personal documents like diaries, which are open to artistic licence and subjective opinion. Official sources are only as reliable as the people filling them in, however, and it is not uncommon for ancestors to ‘forget’ important details, or deliberately provide misleading information. The lesson here is never to take anything at face value.
Secondary sources are accounts written retrospectively by people who were not present, but may have had access to primary material, and as such can be subject to errors. Examples are history books written about a major event, such as the Boer War or life in a workhouse. While secondary sources will play a part in your research, you should always endeavour to locate primary evidence to back up your suspicions and findings. Stories passed down through the generations also fall into the secondary source category, unless the story-teller was actually present at the event.
SUMMARY
The archival pyramid:
National and specialist collections
Municipal or county archives (area administrative records)
Local studies centres (general material)
Your initial investigations within your family will have already generated both primary evidence, in the form of documents, photos and letters found around the house, and secondary material from relatives in the form of anecdotes told to them by their ancestors. The next task is to find additional primary and secondary material to extend your family tree. Once this is done, you can then proceed to a wider search for information that will place your relatives in their historical context. It is time to turn to record offices, libraries and museums.
Where to Look for Evidence: Archives, Record Offices, Libraries and Museums
What is an Archive?
The majority of primary material will be housed in record offices, libraries and museums, scattered across Britain – or, if your ancestors came from overseas, all around the world. Many people loosely refer to these institutions as ‘archives’. Although this isn’t the place for academic debate, in technical terms an archive is actually a collection of documents, manuscripts or other primary evidence, although the term is more often used to describe the building or institution in which the collection is housed. It is in this context that the word ‘archive’ will be used in this book.
For those of you who have never been to an archive before, it can be a daunting experience, but one well worth undertaking. Each archive is unique, will hold a different variety of records, and will have its own way of collecting, storing, cataloguing and indexing its records. Bearing in mind that information about your ancestors could turn up anywhere, the first step of your research strategy should be to work out which archives are going to be of most use to you first. The following notes should help you do this, but don’t forget that you will probably need to visit more than one archive over the course of your research, and will often have to return to the same archive many times.
Local Studies Centres
There is a rough hierarchy to archives, ranging from general material held at local studies centres, via the administrative records of a municipal area or county, to national and specialist collections. It is advisable to start at the bottom of this archival pyramid first, and begin by looking for information at a local studies centre. These are often located in a local library, and hold records relating to the immediate area, which may cover a few towns and villages, or all the places situated within a borough. These records can include newspaper collections, rate books, electoral registers, trade directories, photographic material and private family papers deposited by local gentry, as well as maps and plans of the area. You will also find secondary sources here, such as histories of the local area, and if you are really lucky you may also find national collections – indexes to birth, marriage and death certificates, or census returns – on microfilm or microfiche.
The amount of material held varies greatly from one local studies centre to another. Some hold vast amounts of primary material while others are less well stocked. Therefore it is worthwhile contacting your local studies centre beforehand to enquire exactly what type of records they hold. If your ancestors did not live locally to where you now live, you will need to visit a local studies centre near the place they were from. Geography is very important to pinpoint the archives you need to visit.
‘If your ancestors did not live locally to where you now live, you will need to visit a local studies centre near the place they were from.’
Family History Centres
If you do not have a local studies centre in your area, then you may want to see if the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS) have set up a Family History Centre in the vicinity. The LDS Church is an American organization founded by the Mormons in Utah. It has been collecting genealogical records from around the world for the last century, depositing them at its Family History Library in Salt Lake City. There are many Family History Centres around the British Isles and the rest of the world where duplicate copies of many of their central records are held, ranging from parish registers to ancestral files deposited by other researchers. You can find your local Family History Centre from the www.familysearch.org website by entering a country of interest in the Find a Family History Centre Near Your Home search box and then scrolling through the alphabetical list of places for that country.
County Archives
In the hierarchical structure of archives, county record offices (CROs) are the next port of call. As the title suggests, a county record office is a central repository for administrative documents relating to the county, and each county has at least one. (Some have more than one, like Devon, which has three; the Devon Record Office in Exeter, the North Devon Record Office in Barnstaple and the Plymouth and West Devon Record Office in Plymouth.)
In general, most CROs hold census returns, rate books, electoral registers, trade directories, photos and prints, local government documents, maps, parish registers, civil registration indexes, private company and family papers and local history books for every place within the county (rather than just a few towns and villages covered by a local studies centre). In some cases a CRO will store duplicate copies of material held by local study centres, but in other areas the two types of repository will hold completely different sets of records on any given place within that county. It is always worth visiting the local studies
