Blog

  1. Help With Your Family History: You Tube Channel

    I have just launched a new Family History You Tube Channel called ‘Heritage on Heritage’. This will offer help with family history for beginners and, in due course, deal with more advanced discussion topics regarding genealogy, family history and other history-related matters.

    If you are new to family history then finding your way around the plethora of websites offering genealogical data can be bewildering. There are so many family history websites that it’s hard to know where to start and how to proceed. Large commercial companies such as Ancestry and Findmypast have the funds to target researchers via advertising and also the wherewithal to ensure their websites are the ones which head the page when it comes to search engine results. These commercial companies are, of course, primarily concerned with profit margins and, despite skilful advertising, a particular website may not actually be the best way forward for you. As you start out, and even when you have more experience, it’s important to know which sources you should be using and the best methods of accessing them.

    In my first video I offer help to buy copies of English and Welsh birth, marriage and death certificates online. You will need these to build a verified family tree, once you have found the relevant birth, marriage or death event in the General Register Office indexes. You should be careful when ordering certificates through a third party as you may end up paying much more than you need to. For example, Ancestry makes a charge of £22.99 per certificate, whereas you can buy the same thing for £9.25 using the government’s certificate ordering website at https://www.gro.gov.uk/. You can find my video ‘The Essential Guide to Buying Birth, Marriage, and Death Certificates’ at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiKbl7pqV5s. This takes you through each stage of what you need to do to order certificates. If you subscribe to the Heritage on Heritage Channel you will receive notifications when I release a new ‘Help with Family History’ video.

    Meanwhile my Family History e-Course offers the opportunity to build, hone and improve your research technique.

     

    Marriage certificates, such as this one, together with birth and death certificates are a vital tool in family history