Free access to Ancestry's Canadian Military collection

To mark Remembrance Day, Ancestry.ca is offering free access to more than 4.4million military records from today until Tuesday 12 November (11.59pm Eastern Time).

The collections included in this offer cover the First and Second World War, the Rebellion of 1837 and the War of 1812.

The following popular records sets are included:

• Canada, Military Honours and Award Citation Cards, 1900-1961, containing almost 70,000 records
• Canada, Nominal Rolls and Paylists for the Volunteer Militia, 1857-1922, contains more than 1.6 million records
• Canada, CEF Commonwealth War Graves Registers, 1914-1919, contains over 56,000 records from the War Grave Registers for service personnel of the Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF) who died during the First World War in Belgium, France and the United Kingdom.
• Canada, British Army and Canadian Militia Muster Rolls and Pay Lists, 1795-1850
• Pension Applications For Widows and Family of British Military Officers, 1776-1881

You can read the full list of record sets included in the Canadian Military Collection by clicking the image above.

With the 1921 Census of Canada also available with free access (see blogpost), Ancestry.ca is certainly the place for searching this weekend if you have ancestors who emigrated from Ireland to Canada.

To view these records you will need to register for free with Ancestry.ca with your name and email address. Once you have registered, you'll be sent a user name and password to access the records.

Witches, Spies & Stockholm Syndrome: launch 28 Nov

Witches, Spies & Stockholm Syndrome, Life in Medieval Ireland by Finbar Dwyer is described as a popular history of Medieval Ireland and will be launched on 28 November (venue details below).

Finbar is the founder of IrishHistoryPodcast.ie, and brings his personal, knowledgeable take on history to a series of free recordings and accompanying blog posts. They're often fun, even if the subject matter is less so, and he enlivens history learning with his quirky selection of tales.

His new book takes a similar approach. He offers a unique portrait of life as it was lived in medieval Ireland. Against the backdrop of what was often a violent and chaotic period of history, Finbar explores the personal stories of those whose recollections have been preserved, finding in them continual relevance and human interest.

The book will be launched by Franc Myles at The Cobblestone pub, 77 North King Street, Smithfield, Dublin, at 7:30pm on Thursday, 28 November.

The 256-page hardback is published by New Island, and available through online booksellers.

Cavan emigration exhibition opens in Bailieborough

The Breaking and Laveing the Countery exhibition opens today at Bailieborough Library, Co Cavan.

It covers 19th-century emigration and focuses on the numbers of people leaving the county, their parish origins, their various destinations abroad, and the system of chain migration. Real-life emigrant stories illustrate the the lives that statistical information fails to illuminate.

The exhibition is open during normal Library hours until the end of December and admission is free.

Venue: Bailieborough Library, Market House, Bailieborough, Co Cavan.

More details: Tel: +353 (0)42 9665779 or email.

Third edition for libraries & archives reference book

Irish Libraries, Archives, Museums & Genealogical Centres, A Visitors Guide is one of those books that every self-respecting reference shelf needs to support. The fact it has just been completely updated for its third edition is testament to its value to researchers of all kinds, not just family historians.

It's target audience is the Diaspora, but it's of use to any researcher, no matter where they call home. Its pages contain details and descriptions of the accessible collections in Irish repositories, along with all the usual practical information about operating hours, access and service arrangements and contact names, addresses and emails.

Vital reference details for each parish in Ireland are also provided for tithe and valuation records from c1830 in the record offices in Belfast and Dublin.

The guide also provides information of practical benefit to many other interested parties: academic researchers, professionals in the area of business, education, marketing, medicine, law and technology, as well as vacationers interested in learning about local resources available to them.

Compiled by Robert K. O'Neill, the 395-page paperback has just been published by the Ulster Historical Foundation and can be purchased for £14.99 from BooksIreland.

RootsIreland adds more Presbyterian bmds for Armagh

A good-sized bunch of baptism, marriage and burial records from Presbyterian registers has been released today by Armagh Ancestry onto the RootsIreland database.

Baptisms
Ahorey :  1832–1843
Clare :  1824–1837
Creggan :  1835–1871
Eglish :  1854–1866
Lislooney :  1835–1865
Loughgall (Cloveneden) : 1840–1872
Middletown :  1829–1873
Richhill :  1854–1869
Tandragee :  1835–1865

Marriages
Clare :  1828
Creggan :  1837–1844
Tandragee :  1835–1845

Burials
Creggan :  1860–1926
Eglish :  1858–1893

1st Presbyterian
Marriages
Portadown :  1838–1859

2nd Presbyterian
Baptisms
Armagh :  1825–1864

3rd Presbyterian
Baptisms
Armagh :  1837–1864

Reformed Presbyterian
Baptisms
Ballenon :  1810–1877

Marriages
Ballenon :  1859

Burials
Ballenon :  1849–1889

Tickets go on sale for WDYTYA? Live 2014

Tickets have gone on sale today for WDYTYA?Live 2014 at Olympia, London. You can buy them here. A one-day ticket is £16, a two-day is £26 and a three-day is £33.

The 2014 show will commemorate the centenary of WWI so the Imperial War Museum will be taking up a prominent position and a new series of workshops on the theme will be held in SoG Studio 4.

Only the Society of Genealogists' timetable of workshops, which includes a couple of Irish-themed lectures, is available so far. These workshops are free to attend on the day on a first come, first served basis, but if you want to reserve a seat, you can book (£2 each) when buying advance tickets to the show.

The show will be open Thursday 20 February to Saturday 22 February, 9:30am – 5:30pm.

Early Bird offer: If you book in the next two weeks you can take advantage of a special Early Bird offer of £22 for two (same day) tickets. Simply click here and quote EARLY2422 in the Code box when you've selected the day you want to attend.

Beyond the Grave: 3-day conference in Limerick

A three-day conference examining the social and physical acts surround death and burial in both modern and ancient Ireland will be held 25–27 April next year as part of the Limerick City of Culture 2014 celebration.

The conference aims to explore various aspects of death and burial with subjects ranging from social, political and religious viewpoints; the physical act of burial; graveyard studies; genealogy; iconography; typography; cartography; cultural heritage; and how to conserve and develop graveyards for the future.

Organised by Limerick City Museum & Archives and Mary Immaculate College Limerick (MIC), the conference will include a full programme of lectures. It will also see the launch of the History of Mount Saint Lawrence Cemetery by Matthew Potter and the release of Phase 2 of the Mount Saint Lawrence Transcriptions project.

Phase 1 of the Mount St Lawrence transcriptions saw an online searchable database produced of the cemetery's handwritten burial registers. This was done by a partnership between Limerick City Archives and the History Department of MIC. The 70,000+ entries were released in August (see blogpost) and are free to access.

Phase 2 of the project will produce an online map of all the burial plots in the 16.5-acre cemetery.

More details of the conference will be revealed in the New Year, but if you have any queries or wish to submit a paper for the conference, please email.

A small source from the small county of Carlow

Flyleaf Press has released another resource in its wonderful Small Sources series. This one, the ninth, is a list of Tenants of the Knight of Kerry shortly after he inherited the LaTouche estate in County Carlow. Most of the tenants are from the parish of Dunleckney (around Bagenalstown). The list relates to a letter, dated September 1856, held by the National Library of Ireland.

See the list on Flyleaf's blog.

Petty Sessions collection at 17.5m records – and counting

FindMyPast.ie has released another big batch of Petty Sessions Court Records 1828-1912. This batch held another 2.3million entries and, as well as topping up the online record count for six courts, it introduced some 40 new courts in 13 counties around Ireland.

These are the Petty Sessions Courts represented in this latest release:

Cavan: Bailieborough, Ballyjamesduff, Kilnaleck, Mountnugent, Mullagh, Virginia
Clare: Ennistymon, Tulla
Cork: Castlemartyr, Youghal
Donegal: Ramleton
Dublin: Balbriggan, Arran,
Galway: Derrynea, Galway, Moycullen, Oranmore, Oughterard, Portumna
Kildare: Clane, Curragh, Kildare, Kilmeague, Naas, Newbridge, Newbridge TC, Robertstown
Kilkenny: Freshford
Laois: Rathdowney
Mayo: Westport
Meath: Athboy, Crossakiel, Georges Cross Navan, Kells, Navan, Slane
Offaly: Clara, Philipstown
Waterford: Ardmore, Callaghane, Clashmore, Waterford City (inc Police Court & St Patrick's Hall)
Wexford: Duncormick, Taghmon

As you can see, one of the new Kildare courts is The Curragh, which should prove a real boon to family historians with military ancestors as it has been an army base since 1855.

When the digitisation work began on the National Archives of Ireland's Petty Sessions Court collection, it was estimated that the registers held somewhere between twelve and fifteen million entries. This has proved to be an under-estimation. With a seriously impressive 17.5million records already online, there's still more to come! Another big tranche of 2.5million records is expected later this month, wtih one last tranche waiting in the wings for the grande finale.

Find out more about the Irish Petty Sessions Court Order Books.

Death and Dying in Dublin, 1500–2000: Call for papers

A one-day conference will be held on Saturday 12 April 2014 at Glasnevin Cemetery to explore the social, economic, legal and medical aspects of dying in Dublin 1500 to 2000. Surrounded by very tangible signs and monuments about our ancestors attitudes towards death, this conference will explore how their societies really coped with death, loss and grief.

The Dublin City Research Group is inviting relevant papers from researchers in all disciplines who are undertaking work on post-medieval Dublin.

Proposed abstracts (200-400 words) should be emailed by Friday 28 November. Further details.