-
Find London wills
No city plays a bigger part in family history than London. Even if you don't think of your family as Londoners, it's likely that at least some of your ancestors passed through the capital, in search of wealth, jobs or a better life. Now you can find out more about these people with our new collection of London wills.
London Wills, 1523–1858, is the latest result of our partnership with London Metropolitan Archives. Wills are among the most personal records available to family historians. They offer not just a snapshot of an ancestor's wealth and possessions, but often vital clues about their family connections and even their personality.
Before the proving of wills (known as probate) was centralised in 1858, wills in England and Wales were proved in church courts. These had a complex hierarchy, from individual parishes right up to the Prerogative Courts of Canterbury and York.
Our new collection contains thousands of wills that were proved in the City of London or in Surrey – remember that much of what is now 'south of the river' in London was once in that county.
Where a person's will was proved usually depended on where their property was. Many people who didn't actually live in London owned property in the capital, so their records may well be among our collection.
Inevitably not everyone left a will. But these records provide a rich opportunity to learn more about your London-based forebears. In many cases you'll find details of their burial, close family members and friendships, and sometimes even a complete inventory of their possessions. So, you can build a fascinating picture of how your family lived, centuries ago.
These records are available to Premium and Worldwide members. Renew your membership now
Top tipParish records
Use our London Parish Records, 1538–1980 to follow up leads you find in these wills – or use the burial records to estimate when a will was proved. -
West Yorkshire
parish records
We've been busy adding millions of parish registers to our site, as we strive to create the most comprehensive archive of pre–1837 birth, marriage and death records. Our latest addition is a huge collection of records from West Yorkshire, tracing the region's history and people from Civil War battles to miners' strikes.
From Akworth to Yeadon, this collection includes registers from more than 500 parishes in the area covered by the West Yorkshire Archive Service. During the Industrial Revolution, the population of this region swelled, as people flocked to take advantage of new opportunities.
Perhaps your ancestors worked in the great woollen mills of Leeds, Bradford, Wakefield or Huddersfield? Or maybe they sheared the sheep or mined the coalfields that made West Yorkshire's prosperity possible? They might even have helped construct some of the great factories or commercial halls where fine cloth was traded, worked on the canals or railways, or built the great engines that drove industry.
In total, West Yorkshire Parish Records, 1538–1980, includes more than 8 million records. Most of these are the usual parish registers of baptisms, marriages and burials. So, you can move back through the generations and build a timeline of the key events in your ancestors' lives. Families often stayed in the same parish for many years, so uncover one ancestor, and you'll often open the floodgates to countless more.
The collection also includes registers of confirmations in parish churches. You can see the name, age, address and date of first communion for each young church-goer as they confirmed their commitment to God.All our parish records are available to Premium and Worldwide members. Renew your membership now
Top tipDade registers
Many of the West Yorkshire registers created from around 1777 until 1812 are far more detailed than most parish records. You may discover parents' and even grandparents' names, occupations and addresses. See an example. -
Explore more
probate records
The National Probate Calendar is the single most important resource for finding your ancestors' wills after 1861 – and our site is the only place you can find it online. Now we've added 20,000 more records, to make our collection even more comprehensive.
Our version of the Calendar covers most years from 1861 to 1941, indexing the wills of more than 6 million people. The newly added records cover surnames from L-P in 1925 and those from Q-S in 1930. These alone account for around 630 pages. We've also checked all the record transcriptions, to make sure they're accurate and fixed any problems we could find in the scanned images.
You can search these records by name and date of death, and the calendar entries will give extra information such as the value of the estate and the names of executors, who would probably have been close family members or friends. Armed with this information you can then order the original documents – usually including a detailed will – from the Principal Probate Registry.
Don't forget that these records cover the whole of England and Wales, and include many poorer people as well as the wealthy – anyone who left any property should be listed. Even people who didn't write a will should be included as long as probate was granted.
We've also updated another important probate collection. Andrews Newspaper Index Cards 1790–1976 includes official notices of wills and unclaimed estates, plus birth, marriage and death notices and obituaries. The records were compiled from newspaper and gazette clippings, and were often used by heir hunters. We've now filled in a gap of around 800 records which were previously unavailable.
Learn more about our probate records
Our probate records are available to Premium and Worldwide members. Renew your membership now
Top tip
Date of deathIf you can find an ancestor in the National Probate Calendar, this will tell you when they died. You can then search for them in our official Death Indexes and order their death certificate.
-
Have you tried... Cassini Maps
Old maps are among the most evocative family history resources. They let you go beyond names and dates to explore the historical worlds your ancestors inhabited. Thanks to our new partnership with Cassini, you can now order personalised maps tailored to the time and place in which your family lived.
You've probably heard of Ordnance Survey maps. They began in 1805 with the first black-and-white 1:50,000 plans of England and Wales. Various revisions followed, with the first colour maps in Edwardian times. As early as 1855, though, a six-inches-to-the-mile County Series provided much more detail, showing populated areas in enough detail to identify individual buildings. This was immediately followed by the most meticulous of all, the 1:2,500 County Series.
Now all of these maps are available to you. Cassini specialises in high-quality reproductions of these historical maps, available to download directly to your computer. The maps range from the Old Series right down to the New Popular Edition of the 1940s. All you have to do is enter a postcode or place name to see the options available for your chosen area.
These maps reveal your ancestors' home towns. Not only do they show where they lived but also how these places changed over time, especially with the rapid population growth of the 19th century. The 1:2,500 series in particular can give you an insight into your forebears' communities – local industries, farming patterns and housing density.
You can discover forgotten place names and even trace your ancestors' journeys to work. Then compare your historical chart to a modern map to see what remains of that historical world.
Explore the maps now
Top tipLocal listings
You can learn more about the places where our ancestors lived using our gazetteers. These include detailed descriptions of towns and villages all over the country. -
Ask the experts
Welcome to our Ask the experts section. This is where we answer your questions on all things genealogical, so if you have any pressing queries, send us your questions now*.
If your question doesn't appear here, you can email our Member Services team at support@ancestry.co.uk or call 0800 404 9723, and they'll help you with your research.
This month's questions are answered by professional genealogists Chris Paton and Anthony Adolph.
Chris Paton is a professional genealogist with expert knowledge of records from all over the UK.
Anthony Adolph has been a genealogist for 20 years, and has worked on TV shows such as Gene Detectives and Extraordinary Ancestors.Cotton work
Q. I'm experiencing difficulties in finding a birth record for Alfred Cotton born in Birmingham, Warwickshire, as recorded on several census records. I've been able to find one birth record and ordered a certificate, but it was the wrong record.
Alfred Cotton was born to Eliza Cotton and I suspect that Eliza wasn't married at the time. She later married a William Spode and was recorded as a 'spinster' on her marriage certificate.
The fact that he was born in Birmingham is a mystery as Eliza was born and bred in Stoke-upon-Trent, my home town. Alfred died in March 1919, aged 72 years.
Andrea Washington
A. William Spode and Eliza married in 1848 in Stoke on Trent, and the 1851 Census shows that that Alfred Cotton, William's stepson, was aged 4, apparently confirmed by his age at death in 1919 of 72.
The official Birth Indexes have an Alfred Coton born in Aston in 1847 and an Alfred Coton in Warwick, 1846. If neither is correct, consider other options. It may be that the birth was never registered, as until 1875 the responsibility for registration in fact lay with the registrar, and not the parents. However, a church baptism may well have been recorded. It may also have not been transferred into the nationally compiled GRO birth indexes, so a search through the local records in Birmingham may find it.
It's possible though that you have found the right certificate, but that the parental information was falsified, particularly if Alfred was illegitimate. Try to identify what became of the family noted in the record you have. If you can't find them, it may lean towards this as a possibility. Alfred's marriage certificate may list his true father.
Chris Paton
Born in America
Q. My ancestor James Lyden was born about 1821, in 'America' according to his census returns. The entry 'America' for James Lyden's birthplace is intriguing (and rather vague). Although the port of Hull, where he first appears on the census, was a significant waypoint for emigration to America from the 1830s onwards, this implies James came the other way, for some reason.
On his marriage certificate, his father is given as Isaac Lyden, a carriage builder. On census night 1861, James was one of a crew of eight on board the vessel Northumberland, which I haven't identified yet. He doesn't appear on earlier censuses, but 1861 was the first census where they recorded the crew of ships at sea, so he may have been at sea in 1841 and 1851.
In 1871 (in South Shields) James is still described as a 'mariner', and his birthplace is still given as 'America'. However, there is a faint annotation on the original census page next to his entry: the letters OS and BS. I have seen these before - on ships' crew lists, where they mean 'Ordinary Seaman' and 'British Subject'. Any ideas on how I can find out more?
Alan Davies
A. We all have such a fixed idea of people leaving Europe to settle in America that we find it hard to believe anyone ever came back, but genealogical research keeps revealing examples. Winston Churchill's mother was an American, who came back to marry into a titled English family. As for your James Lyden, perhaps his career as a sailor was what brought him here, and he just decided to stay.
America has had censuses from 1790, all available at Ancestry.co.uk (with a Worldwide membership), so you can try to trace Isaac, and perhaps his own forebears, using them. Perhaps it was only Isaac who went over, presumably to capitalise on the huge American market for carriages.
James's status as a British Subject opens up two possibilities. Maybe Isaac was actually a British soldier, stationed in part of 'America' (such as Canada) that remained British, in which case he may appear in the Registrar General's indexes of army baptisms, which you can check at The National Archives, Kew. Also there are the indexes of naturalisation, which you can also check for James, in case he became a British Subject by that means.
Anthony Adolph*Terms and Conditions apply: I understand that by sending questions to 'Ask the experts', I grant Ancestry.com Operations Inc. a perpetual license to distribute or republish such questions at its discretion, with credit to me. I release Ancestry.com Operations Inc., its agents and assigns, from any obligation to make payment hereunder and from any liability incurred in connection with the use of the questions. Ancestry.com Operations Inc. may edit the questions for content, length, and/or clarity. I warrant that I am at least 18 years of age.
|
| Previous article: | Print this newsletter | Next article: |
Question submission agreement
I understand that by submitting stories or other information, I grant Ancestry.com Operations Inc. a perpetual license to distribute or republish my contributions at its discretion, with credit to me as the submitter. I release Ancestry.com Operations Inc., its agents and assigns, from any obligation to make payment hereunder and from any liability incurred in connection with the use of the text or materials submitted. Ancestry.com Operations Inc. may edit my contribution for content, length, and/or clarity. I warrant that I am at least 18 years of age.
I accept