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Ancestry.com.au February 2010
ancestry newsletter - get the most from ancestry.com.au
In this month's newsletter we look at the following: We hope that you enjoy this edition of our newsletter.

The Ancestry.com.au Team
Shake Your Family Tree Day - 23 February 2010

To help encourage more Australians to unearth personal treasures, the National Archives of Australia is once again hosting Shake Your Family Tree Day in all their offices around the country.

You are invited to participate in a variety of activities, seminars, conservation clinics and tours. Learn how to locate family treasures that could include service records, immigration and citizenship applications, copyright registrations, letters and photographs. It is also a great opportunity to see what's on offer at the National Archives.

Learn more about Shake Your Family Tree Day
England & Wales Birth, Marriage and Death records

At the heart of all research into family history are Birth, Marriage and Death records. As such, we have spent 4 years making improvements to the England & Wales Birth, Marriage and Deaths indexes on Ancestry.com.au - they are now fully name searchable!

Online for the first time, you can now search records spanning 1837-2005 by name - there's now no need to trawl through individual index pages. Simply put in your ancestor's details - name, place of birth etc. Remember, the more detail you put in, the more relevant your results will be. You'll get the most relevant matches at the top of the results, so you'll find locating your ancestors is much faster.

Search England & Wales Birth, Marriage and Death Indexes
Gretna Green Marriage Registers 1794-1895

Just the mention of the name Gretna Green conjures up visions of eloping young lovers, climbing through windows and down ladders before running away to Scotland to get married.

Why Scotland? Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act of 1753 changed English law so that anyone under the age of 21 had to have the consent of guardians or parents to marry and the marriage had to be celebrated in church, entered in the parish register and signed by both parties. In Scotland, however, the minimum age limit had remained at 16 and no parental consent was required.

As Gretna Green was on the London to Edinburgh stagecoach route, and was the first stopping point across the border, it was a popular destination for many underage English couples and those who were opposed to being married in a church.

Now, through our Ancestry World Archives Project, we've made one of the oldest and largest of the Gretna Green marriage registers available to everyone.

The Lang registers were kept by self-proclaimed and prolific "priests", father and son David and Simon Lang. These marriage registers, kept between 1750 and 1834, contain the names of nearly 25,000 individuals - about 50% of the marriages approximated to have occurred in Gretna during those years.

Learn more about the preservation of the Lang registers

Start searching Gretna Green Marriage Registers 1794-1895
The Mercury Indexes to Birth, Marriage and Death Notices 1854-1962

The Mercury is Tasmania's largest-circulating daily newspaper, published in Hobart. Beginning in 1854 as a twice-weekly publication under the name The Hobarton Mercury, it became The Hobart Town Daily Mercury in 1858 and has been published daily ever since.

Compiled from two published indexes - the O'Shea Indexes to The Mercury 1854-1930 and Whitton's Indexes to The Mercury 1858-1899 - this collection contains indexes to birth and death notices between 1854 and 1930 and marriage notices from 1854 up to 1962.

As this database is only an index, additional information may be found in the original birth, marriage and death notices published in the newspaper. With the event date and the date the notice was published in the newspaper it shouldn't be very difficult to locate the original entry.

Search The Mercury Birth, Marriage and Death indexes

Ancestry World Archives Project: UK Prison Hulk Registers and Letter Books 1802-1849

Before they made the harrowing journey to this large brown land, many convicts spent time aboard the Prison Hulks - decommissioned ships, moored in the Thames Estuary or Plymouth Harbour, used as 'temporary' prisons by the British government. Some were awaiting trial, and others were awaiting a place aboard a ship bound for the colony.

The appalling living conditions on board these floating prisons, and poor hygiene, meant disease spread quickly. In fact, many of the convicts sent to New South Wales in the early years were already disease-ridden when they departed England and a considerable loss of life through typhoid and cholera epidemics was the result.

These records reach back to the very earliest days of the settlement and are now available for keying as part of the Ancestry World Archives Project (AWAP).

Learn more about the UK Prison Hulk Registers and Letter Books project
We want your ancestor's story...
If you're one of our many Ancestry.com.au members who've got a great family story to tell and would be willing to share it, we'd like to hear from you.

  1. Send us a brief account, in 150-200 words, of the ancestor you discovered and their personal story.
  2. Send us your ancestor's full name and all key vital dates available – birth, marriage (when, where and to whom), children, occupation, etc.
  3. Include any historical records you've found through your search – birth, marriage, military records, etc.
  4. Along with any additional mementos you've discovered along the way – photos, medals, awards, etc.
  5. And lastly, don't forget to include your name, where you are from and your contact details including your phone number and email address.
Please email your brief outline or story to mystory@ancestry.com.au (or paste this address into an e-mail).

As an Ancestry member your privacy is always our first concern, therefore please be assured that even if you do respond to this email, nothing further will be done with the information you provide without your prior approval.

We look forward to hearing your story.

The Ancestry.com.au Team

Comments?
To comment or submit to the Ancestry Newsletter, email editor@ancestry.com.au. By submitting stories or other information, you grant Ancestry.com Operations Inc. a license to distribute or republish your contributions at its discretion, with credit to you as the submitter. We may edit your contribution for content, length, and/or clarity.

Questions?
Contact us by filling out our Online Queries Form or call us on 1800 251 838 (toll free from Australia) or 0800 442 100 (toll free from NZ) 9am-4pm Mon to Fri (AEST).

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