Civil Registration Index playing up again

If you've been experiencing problems in the last week using the 'old style' Irish Civil Registration Indexes on the Family Search site, you're not alone.

It's gone 'wobbly' again. If you get past the intermittently frozen screen and/or semi-permanent clock/timer, you're likely to find no filters are available for your search and finally receive a 'no results' notification. Must be the season... It went 'on the blink' in April last year, too. It took several weeks to fix it and some would argue that it's never worked as well as it used to, ever since.

Of course, there is the option of moving over to the 'new style' Indexes collection but that's not behaving itself brilliantly, either! This is, however, the route that Family Search would like us to take. They seem determined to force us to make the switch, like it or not (and there's a lot of us falling into the NOT category). The new site simply doesn't offer sufficient opportunity to refine searches, and thereby narrow down results.

Apparently engineers are trying to resolve the technical problems.

Latest updates from Ireland Genealogy Projects

Updates from IGP Archives during March:

CLARE
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Clare, Sept 1852-May 1853
Photos - Castle Bunratty & Dirty Nelly's Pub, est. 1620

DERRY
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Londonderry, Sept 1852-Oct 1853

DUBLIN
Mt. Jerome, Dublin Pt 20 & 21 (more than 3,000 gravestones)

GALWAY
Moylough Cemetery, County Galway

KERRY
Photos -
Muckross House & Dennehy, Patrick or Coakley, Timothy
Kilbannivane Burial Ground
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Kerry, Jan 1852-Oct 1853

LAOIS
Church Records - Mount Mellick (R.C.) Baptisms M-O
Assorted R.C. Baptisms - Connor, Fitzpatrick, Kennedy.

LIMERICK
Photos - Kilfinnane, St Andrews, Church of Ireland.

LONGFORD
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Longford, July 1852 - May 1853

MONAGHAN
Glennan Presbyterian Church Graveyard - additional photos
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Monaghan, Sept 1852-May 1853

ROSCOMMON
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Roscommon, Jun 1853-Oct 1853

TIPPERARY
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Tipperary, Jun 1853-Oct 1853

WICKLOW
Headstones - Bray - St Pauls Graveyard, (CoI) (partial)
Headstones - St Patrick's Enniskerry - Part 5
Royal Irish Constabulary with native county of Wicklow, Sept 1852-Oct 1853.

Irish Genealogy Toolkit is the Research Help partner of IGP Archives.

Dates for your Diary: April

Tuesday 5 April: Release of the 1911 Scotland Census on www.ScotlandsPeople.gov.uk.

Wednesday 6 April: Sources for Military History Seminar organised by Library Association of Ireland and Local Studies Group. 10-4. National Library of Ireland, Kildare St, Dublin. €30 for Library Association of Ireland members, €40 for non-members and €20 for the un-waged. Lunch not included. Booking essential: scoleman@sdublincoco.ie.

Wednesday 6 April: Road Bowling - a way of life in Armagh, by Brian Toal. 7-8pm. Free. St Patrick's Trian, Armagh. Booking required: arlene.scully@armagh. gov.uk.

Thursday 7 April: Resourcing Local History in County Cork, by Richard Forrest. Dunmanway Historical Society. 8pm. Cox's Hall, Dunmanway.

Saturday 9 April: The Irish in Newfoundland, by Aiden O'Hara, 2.15pm. A Madwoman in the Attic: the Davises of Cloragh, Rathfarnhan, by Selina Guinness, 3.15pm. Irish Family History Society. Dublin City Library & Archive, Pearse Street, Dublin. Free. Open to non-members. No booking required.

Tuesday 12 April: Evening Open Meeting, Genealogical Society of Ireland. Dun Laoghaire College of Further Education, Cumberland Street. 8-10pm. €3.

Tuesday 12 April: The 1641 Depositions as an aid to the genealogist, by Jane Ohlmeyer. Genealogical Society of Ireland. 8pm. Laoghaire College of Further Education, Cumberland St., Dun Laoghaire. Open to all.

Tuesday 12 April: The Aghadoe and River Laune Crossiers, by Dr Griffin Murray. Killarney Library, Tralee. 7.30pm

Tuesday 12 April: GENEALOGY WORKSHOP - All you need to know to research your family history, using local, national, and online resources, by Rosaleen Underwood MAPGI. Cork City & County Archives, Seamus Murphy Bldg, Great William O’Brien St, Blackpool, Cork. 6-8.30pm. Free. Advance booking recommended.

Wednesday 13 April: GENEALOGY WORKSHOP - All you need to know to research your family history, using local, national, and online resources, by Rosaleen Underwood MAPGI. Cork City & County Archives, Seamus Murphy Bldg, Great William O’Brien St, Blackpool, Cork. 2.30-5pm. Free. Advance booking recommended.

Thursday 14 April: Dress in the Edwardian Era, by Alex Ward of the National Museum of Ireland. 1pm. National Library of Ireland, Kildare St, Dublin. 1pm. Free.

Tuesday 19 April: Treasures of the Linen Hall Library, by John Killen. Coleraine Historical Society. 8pm. Town Hall Coleraine.

Tuesday 19 April: Online Archives & History: the census of Ireland 1901/1911, by Catriona Crowe. National Gallery of Ireland. 10.30-11.15 Merrion Square West, Dublin 2. Free. No booking required.

Thursday 21 April: From a Photograph to a Family Genealogy - a research case study. Clare Roots Society. 8pm. Ennis Civic Rooms.

Tuesday 26 April: Treasures of the Linen Hall Library, by John Killen. National Gallery of Ireland. 10.30-11.15 Merrion Square West, Dublin 2. Free. No booking required.

Wednesday 27 April: Morning Open Meeting, Genealogical Society of Ireland. Weir's, Lower George's Street, Dun Laoghaire. 10.30-12.30. €3 inc coffee/tea.

Wednesday 27 April: Ulster Plantation, by Paul Logue. North Belfast Historical Society. 8pm Grove Centre, 120 York Road.

Thursday 28 April: Kilkenny in the 18th century, by Dr Kevin Whelan. Kilkenny Archaeological Society. 8pm Rothe House, Parliament Street, Kilkenny. €5.

1926 census release: possible 2011 release

Although it would require a change to legislation, the Minister of Heritage has signalled that releasing the 1926 census may be possible within the year.

The full story is in today's Irish Times.

More Ship Passenger lists

Some 227,000 names of Ship Passengers have been added to the Irish Family History Foundation's website www.RootsIreland.ie.

These records, via the Centre for Migration Studies in Omagh, Co Tyrone, are of passengers, mostly of Irish origin, on ships travelling from Irish and British ports to ports in North America (United States and Canada) from 1791 to 1897.

PRONI reopens

The Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI) has reopened to the public this morning in its spanking new purpose-built home in Belfast's Titanic Quarter.

Anyone who has visited the old premises in Balmoral Avenue will be especially appreciative of the scale of the 'upgrade' to the facilities of the £30m reincarnation. The Public Search Room has doubled in size, with 52 computer desks (one of which is height adjustable for disabled users), eight large format desks and 22 microfilm readers, two of which are microfilm printers.

The Reading Room is also considerably more spacious than Balmoral Avenue with 78 seats, most of which have access to power for laptops. Two are height adjustable for disabled users, and eight are large format 'map' tables.

PRONI has also introduced a self service camera facility for digital copying.

The new records office is home to some 40km of records and is located just one mile from the city centre in the burgeoning Titanic Quarter. In addition to the huge Odyssey entertainment complex, local amenities include the Titanic Signature Project (opening April 2012), the restoration of the Titanic and Olympic slipways, the restoration of the Nomadic - the tug boat which took travellers to the Titanic, Belfast Metropolitan College (opening September 2011), a film studio, a hotel and the Northern Ireland Science Park. It is accessible via bus, rail, road and approximately five minutes away from George Best Belfast City Airport.

For further details see www.proni.gov.uk

Irish ancestors in England, Scotland or Wales?

To coincide with UK Census Day*, Ancestry.co.uk is offering 24 hours of free access to its 1841-1901 UK census record indexes for one day only: tomorrow, 27 March (see Stop Press below).

The offer allows access to all Ancestry's British indexes but if you want to see the original historical images, you have to take up a 14-day free trial.

Bear in mind that the 14-day trial requires you to sign up for a subscription and provide credit/debit card details; if you don't cancel the trial by phone or email within 14 days, your card will be charged the full price of the subscription. (Cancelling is not difficult, but remembering to do it can be!)

Millions of Irish-born appear in these censuses. Even before the famine, there had long been a tradition of seasonal migration, especially from the West and South West of Ireland, and short-term casual work in dockyards, mines and construction. But it wasn't until the 19th century that a permanent move to Britain's urban centres became more common.

Some stats of the Irish-born population of England, Scotland and Wales (these figures don't include the children of Irish migrants born in Britain):

• 1841: 415,725
• 1851: 727,326
• 1861: 805,717
• 1871: 774,310
• 1881: 781,119
• 1891: 653,122
• 1901: 631,629

Most settled in urban centres near their ports of entry. In 1851, the four towns with the largest Irish-born population were London (108,548), Liverpool (83,813), Glasgow (59801), and Manchester (52,504).

These settlement patterns remained fairly constant until after the First World War.

Throughout the 19th century, Ireland was a part of Britain so there are no passenger lists or other records of travel across the Irish Sea (no more than there are today for passengers travelling by train or coach from Scotland to London or Cardiff).

Therefore, these censuses may be the only documentary proof you'll find of an ancestor having made the journey. Even if your genealogy research takes you into the New World, you should check these records because many Irish emigrants spent time in England, Scotland and Wales working and saving for their fare to North America, Australia and New Zealand.

Enjoy the census records!

*2011 Census Day is 27 March in Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, but on 10 April in the Republic of Ireland.

27 March 1.30pm. Stop Press: Due to technical problems, some researchers haven't been able to access the records. This has now been resolved and Ancestry is extending the free access to midnight on Monday by way of apology to all.

Update on Cork, Dublin and Monaghan records

IrishGenealogy.ie has issued the following update on its project to index and computerise parish records:

'The current position in relation to the addition of new records is:

Cork - Work has just been completed on the remaining records from Cork & Ross Roman Catholic records except for further records from Cork City which have been completed by Cork County Library.

Dublin - Work is ongoing to complete the remaining Dublin City Roman Catholic records. A completion date of May 2011 is now likely for these.

Monaghan - Work is ongoing for a set of Roman Catholic records for the county. These are due for completion in the next few weeks.

Overall - No firm date has been set for the addition of further records yet, but we will provide a further update on the website soon. Apologies for the delay in the addition of this extra data to the website.'

Good news for some. Bad news for others.

Many thanks to Eva Bowden-Wade for the tip-off!

Mocavo's first Irish records to appear this week

Ireland Genealogy Projects (igp-web.com) will be the first Irish site to be indexed by Mocavo, the week-old genealogy search engine that's exciting researchers around the world.

"We have an absolute interest in Irish records," Mocavo's CEO and founder Cliff Shaw told Irish Genealogy News, adding that FailteRomhat.com and CMCPR.net would be next in the queue. "We're hoping the community can help us find more sites."

Researchers can do this easily by following the 'Suggest a Site' link at the foot of every page of Mocavo. The sooner sites are put forward, the sooner they can be crawled and their records made available to a wider audience. There's a fast turnaround; IGP-web's resources will be indexed and returning results in Mocavo by the end of this week – just five days after arriving in the Suggestion Inbox.

Mocavo operates in the same way as Google, Yahoo, Bing and other familiar search engines. You enter your query and a list of web pages appears. A search for '"James O'Grady" Down', for example, returns 96 pages. The first 10 include cemetery records for St Patrick's, King County, Wisconsin; the full texts of several books usually found only in archives; a random notice of payment of a nephew's passenger fare from a user-generated site on Family Tree Maker; and details of a marriage in a personal family history website.

Records from FamilySearch, the mammoth database run by the Church of the Latter-Day Saints, are not included. However, Shaw says this may change. "We're talking to them and would love to include their content."

At present, the new kid on the block is very USA-centric, but that emphasis should shift as the site develops and fulfils its boast of being the World's largest free genealogy search engine. Given Cliff Shaw's track-record, this may well be achieved rather quickly. Among his previous successes are GenForum, which he created 14 years ago and is now owned by Ancestry.com; GenCircles, a mayor publishing site; and Family Tree Legends, the popular genealogy software package. The latter two businesses are now owned by MyHeritage.com.

Clearly Shaw knows a thing or two about innovation in the genealogy sector! And while he won't announce any site statistics just yet, he is excited by the positive early reaction to Mocavo.

"This is the strongest launch I've ever been part of, and has the fastest growth of anything I've ever done."

Roots Ireland extends advanced search facility

Good news from the Irish Family History Foundation, the organisation behind the popular RootsIreland website.

The Advanced Search facility, previously being trialled in just eight areas of Ireland, has been extended (see Coverage below). The facility adds a number of fields to the search criteria for Birth/Baptism and Marriage records. It also has a knock-on effect on how much you have to pay.

For Marriage records: In addition to Standard Search fields you can now search using any or all of the following:

• Spouse's First Name
• Spouse's Surname
• Father's First Name
• Father's Surname
• Mother's First Name
• Mother's Surname

Be aware that the parents' first names and the mother's maiden name may not have been recorded in the original record.

For Birth/Baptism records: In addition to all the search fields in the Standard Search you can now search by Mother's first name or surname, or both. Combining these details with the Father's first name and/or surname should enable you to discover records for all siblings from the same family.

Coverage: All Family History Centres under the IFHF umbrella are now available with Advanced Search except Limerick and Sligo. Roots Ireland covers all counties of Ireland with the exception of Carlow, Clare, South/West Cork, Kerry, Monaghan, Waterford and Wexford, and Dublin City.

Payment: When using the Advanced Search option you cannot purchase individual records unless only one match is located. However, you can purchase the entire result set at a reduced cost. It is, therefore, essential to enter as much detail as possible into the search fields in order to restrict the resulting number of matches. You can then decide to purchase all these records at a reduced cost.

Before you undertake an advanced search be sure to check out the SOURCES page for the county you wish to search.