Wednesday 2 March 2016

IGRS updates Early Irish Birth and Death Indexes

The Irish Genealogical Research Society has updated its Early Irish Births Index and Early Irish Deaths Index with several thousand extra entries.

Both Indexes, as well as the much larger Early Irish Marriages Index, were created and are co-ordinated by Roz McCutcheon, a Vice-President and Fellow of the Society. She says that the latest update to the Early Irish Births Index was helped greatly by a rich resource: the Civil Service Evidence of Age Index. This has allowed Roz to boost the Births Index to just over 10,400 entries.

The Deaths Index is growing at a more sedate pace than the Births Index as the available sources are fewer. It now holds 6,300 entries.

“In my introductions to each of the Early Irish (1660 to 1863) BMD Indexes, I stress that the databases are indeed indexes, and do not set out to be a full record of each event," says Roz. "Using the pointers in each Index, researchers should always consult the original record, and never more so than in the case of the Civil Service Index, as the documents attached to each entry are often full of additional information about the person concerned."

The next update will be to the Early Irish Marriage Index, which currently notes just over 70,000 entries, recording the names of more than 155,000 brides, grooms and sundry relations. This Index is a public access database; the Birth and Death Indexes have a free public surname-search facility but only IGRS members can access the full database.