Friday 18 January 2013

Irish Civil Registration records live on FindMyPast.ie

Further to my earlier post about FindMyPast Ireland's Irish Family History Day on 24 January, I've just discovered that the Civil Registration Indexes are already available online to ALL FindMyPast subscribers.

If you have the appropriate subscription – one that covers Ireland! – you can search the 21million new birth, marriage and death records to your heart's content on any of the FindMyPast databases: UK US,   Australia & NZ.

In Ireland, Civil Registration of non-Catholic marriages began in 1845. It was only in 1864 that ALL marriages, plus all births and deaths had to be registered.

When you identify a record in these indexes, you make a note of its volume and page number reference and you can then order copies of the full register entries from the General Register Office.

The indexes are arranged on FindMyPast as follows:
  • Ireland Births 1864–1958
  • Ireland Marriages 1845–1958
  • Ireland Deaths 1864–1958
Please be aware that bmds in Antrim, Armagh, Derry-Londonderry, Down, Fermanagh and Tyrone are included in this collection up to 1921 only.

I've just had a good recce and I'm pleased to see that the marriage records can be searched using the names of both spouses (unlike in the free version available at familysearch.org).

If, however, you only know one name, you can still search the records to find likely marriage records. The transcriptions include the names of potential spouses. By potential, I mean the names of other bride/grooms on adjacent register pages. For example, if I search for Katie Santry's marriage in 1907 in Clonakilty, the transcript tells me that her spouse was one of four men: Daniel Driscoll, Lawrence Keohane, Michael Moxley, Timothy O'Regan.

To find out which one, you'd have to obtain a copy of the marriage certificate, using her name and the references provided (in this case: Clonakilty Q1 1907, Vol 5, Page 55). Since I already have her certificate, I know it was Daniel Driscoll that she married.

If you're not already a subscriber, you can try out this new collection – absolutely free – next week on Irish Family History Day. The Promotional Code to obtain free credits will be announced on that morning and will be published here on Irish Genealogy News.