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DIARY DATES

LEARN ANY TIME, ANYWHERE Online talks & courses

1 million+ records from the collections of National Records of Scotland available online for the first time

Thousands of volumes of historical records from the collections of National Records of Scotland (NRS) are now available online for the first time, covering 1559-1900

London Fire Brigade reports 1915-1918 released

The impact of air raids on London during World War I is highlighted with the release of London Fire Brigade reports at FindMyPast

Neanderthals disappeared from north west Europe much earlier than originally thought

Neanderthal fossil remains from the key site of Spy Cave in Belgium may be up to 44,200 years old – around 5,000 years older than previously thought, new research has revealed

3.4 million entries added to the National Burial Index for England and Wales

FindMyPast has announced a 'major update' of 3.4 million new and exclusive records, in a partnership with the Family History Federation

Coming soon – The House History Show

Working with the #HouseHistoryHour team of leading UK house historians, Family Tree will be holding the House History Show, online, on 15 May 2021

150,000 records added to the military record collection at The Genealogist

With records from Britain, Canada and a number of Indian registers and directories, these searchable records contain lists of men and women who served their country in various capacities connected to the military, and not just on the front line

Millions of Lithuanian-Jewish records added to MyHeritage

Over 2.5 centuries of history are covered in a new addition to MyHeritage, with the release of a new collection of historical records: Lithuanian-Jewish Records from LitvakSIG, 1795–1940

Over 1 million people attended RootsTech Connect 2021

ROOTSTECH ROUND-UP LATEST GENEALOGY NEWS FROM AROUND THE GLOBE

Massachusetts Catholic Cemetery Records now available online

Discover burial records spanning more than a century in a new searchable database of Catholic cemetery records for Massachusetts that will eventually contain up to one million names

Reaching out for reunions

Two new developments at Vivid-Pix are helping people around the world to use the power of photographs to bring families together

50 million faces animated after RootsTech launch

Within a week of its launch at RootsTech, the new My Heritage tool, Deep Nostalgia™ has seen 50 million faces animated after being uploaded to the site

Ancestry publish 2.2 million new prison and criminal records

If you have an ancestor who fell foul of the law in the 19th and early 20th century, you might be lucky enough to find them listed among the millions of entries in Ancestry’s latest criminal and prison records release

TheGenealog ist adds 2,738 more parishes of Tithe Maps to Map Explorer™

Over 30 counties of geo-referenced tithe maps have been added to TheGenealogist to date

New project to capture oral histories of people stranded at sea during the pandemic

A new project from the National Maritime Museum is working with ITF Seafarers’ Trust and The Mission to Seafarers, to record oral histories of seafarers who have been unable to dock in ports across the globe because of the COVID-19 pandemic

Heraldry: your get started guide

Mike Bedford delves into the basics of heraldry, and suggests where to see coats of arms when you’re out and about 

Learning about THE RECORDS

Chris Paton presents a records masterclass, with a step-by-step guide to assessing which records might give you the information you’re searching for, where these records might be found, and what to do if you can’t locate the information you need 

Twiglets

From Italy to Ireland

The Old Palace School Bombing

Regular readers will know Paul Chiddicks’ from his Dear Paul column of genealogy funnies,  but here his investigations take on a more  sombre role. Paul spent years researching the story of the largest ever loss of life for the Fire Brigade. One of the firefighters to perish in this terrible World War II event was his great-aunt

Thinking outside the box

Improve your family history search skills with the Family Tree Academy. This issue, David Annal demonstrates the value of tracing your tree in a different direction

WORKING MEN’S CLUBS: Rescuing the working man?

Working Men’s Clubs were designed to educate the working classes. It is quite the Victorian notion that working class men had to be rescued from themselves, explains Lisa Edwards. Here she steps back in time to examine their history, their premises, and the role of just one such club in her home town today

The More Than Oliver Twist Project

Historians and social scientists were heavily involved in the project, as were volunteers, who together worked tirelessly in a remarkable venture, the ‘More Than Oliver Twist Project’, that came to fruition at the end of 2020. Helen Tovey attended the e-launch

CASE CLOSED (AT LAST!)

Sometimes with a family history problem, a fresh pair of eyes and a look at a different set of documents can work wonders. Mary Evans pieced together part of Family Tree reader Kerr Clement’s story, and Graham Caldwell completed the tale

ARE YOU UP FOR AN 17th & 18th century adventure?

Sue Paul’s book, Jeopardy of Every Wind: The Biography of Captain Thomas Bowrey, tells the incredible story of a young child from 17th-century London escaping alone to a new life in the East Indies. How was this story pieced together? By the discovery of a chest full of papers in the roof of the English manor house

Your DNA WORKSHOP

Welcome to the DNA Workshop! In every issue DNA adviser Karen Evans will be unpacking a reader case study, and giving step-by-step tips for you to use in your DNA research at home. It’s time to unlock the story of your genes…

Novels, novelties & More

Read on & see where these tales will take you

Your questions answered

Photo 1 Photo 2 Photo 3 Connections across

Your letters

Mysteries, marriages en masse & more

A trip down the winding pathways of cyperspace

This month, Diane Lindsay weighs up the pros and cons of information at the touch of a button, compared to the pre-internet days when adding ancestors to the family tree almost always necessitated leaving the house in pursuit of maybe just one gem of a fact…