Family Research in Birmingham

Basic resources

Introduction
If you're just starting research in Birmingham then you must visit the Birmingham History Forum at http://forum.birminghamhistory.co.uk/ where you'll meet a lot of very helpful and experienced Brummies.

You might also like to join a Rootsweb mailing list. Open your email programme and send a message to
eng-warks-birmingham-request@rootsweb.com.
leaving the re line empty and just typing the word subscribe into the subject field. The page http://lists.rootsweb.com/index/intl/ENG/ENG-WARKS-BIRMINGHAM.html has the details. This will assure you of the friendliest and most competent help and advice anywhere on the web—and all for free! You can choose different modes of participation and the welcoming message will explain how to do this. The list is dedicated to genealogy in Birmingham and, who knows, perhaps you'll discover some distant cousins.
There is also a group dedicated to research in Warwickshire.
Now you're well on your way to becoming an expert. But there are more basic resources you should know about.


First stop for those with easy access to it will of course be Birmingham Central Library. This is the largest of its kind (whatever that means) in Europe. The entire 6th and 7th floors are dedicated to genealogy and local history. They have a treasure trove of books, maps, trade directories, films and fîche on all matters of interest to researchers.
Here is a list of the Birmingham parish registers held at the Library. You can research the catalogues online. The staff are also helpful in answering postal enquiries:
  Birmingham Central Library
  Chamberlain Square
  Birmingham B3 3HQ
  Tel +44 (0)121 303 3421/5
  Fax +44 (0)121 303 1396


Civil registration of births, marriages and deaths in England began in 1837. Prior to this date the major source of genealogical information is the parish registers which have been in existence since 1538. For births, marriages and deaths since 1837 you can buy a copy of the certificate. Some of these events are not registered, but the very great majority are, and can be acquired from Birmingham at lightning speed. As the records are indexed, you don't even have to know the exact parish where an event took place. Fortunately, the Birmingham Register Office will accept email and fax orders and take credit cards. Give them enough information to identify an event, but not too much (for a marriage the names and an approximate year will normally suffice. For a birth don't give exact names for both parents unless it's say a Smith you're after, because if the registrar for any reason entered conflicting information you may not get your certificate). The staff are incredibly kind, helpful and efficient (no, I'm not related, just a *very* satisfied customer). The current price of a certificate is currently £7.00 plus postage. This may vary to other countries. I always give credit card details which means I don't have to find out the exact cost beforehand. Send orders to:
  Birmingham Register Office
  Holliday Wharf
  Holliday Street
  Birmingham B1 1TJ
  Tel: +44 (0)121 675 1000
  Fax: +44 (0)121 675 1050
  eMail: register_office@birmingham.gov.uk
  Web: www.birmingham.gov.uk/registeroffice
For certificates outside of Greater Birmingham you will have to either write to the relevant register office itself, usually stating the parish where an event took place, or failing that appear in person at the Records Office in London. I get round this last problem by paying a professional researcher who regularly visits Central London to order the certificate for me. I pay about £3 on top of the price of the certificate, and this includes a five year search and postage. Cyndi's List or Family Tree Magazine are both full of ads for such people. Alternatively, you can write off to the GRO at Southport:
  General Register Office
  PO Box 2
  Southport
  Merseyside PR8 2JD
  Tel +44 (0)870 243 77 88
  eMail: certificate.services@ons.gov.uk
  Web: www.statistics.gov.uk/registration
To order certificates you need the GRO reference from the births, marriages and deaths index, which you may be able to access at your local library or LDS Family History Center. If you cannot provide this reference you can ask for a 3 year search to be done, but beware—the fee is high and the success rate poor in my experience.

Recently the very laudable project to digitize the BMD indexes has gone online with a searchable database of many million births, deaths and marriages in the British Isles since 1837. On the basis of the information found here certificates can be ordered. This is a tremendous resource for those of us researching from abroad as the indexes are otherwise practically inaccessible. With a few more volunteers the FreeBMD database will be complete within a few years. The downside is the many erroneous entries that such a project inevitably involves. Still, far be it from me to criticize it, it's a magic resource! Also look out for the Family Research Link (1837 Online) Company, who are offering digital images of the same on a commercial basis.

Batch numbers:

Shropshire Staffordshire Warwickshire Worcestershire

It is practically impossible to research your family without very soon coming into contact with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS, Mormons). They have filmed many parish registers etc and make these accessible at negligible cost at their many Family History Centers around the world. Much of the British material has been put online at the Familysearch site. This includes the International Genealogical Index (IGI), a collection of, last I heard, 705 million mainly birth and marriage entries, and this can be searched online. The books of Birmingham's larger churches (such as St Martin's, St Philip's, St George's; also St Peter & St Paul's parish church of Aston and St Mary's parish church of Handsworth) are included in the index.
Also at Familysearch you will find the Family History Library Catalog, which is a searchable database of the 2 million available films arranged by place and name. You will also find a list of all Family History Centers, and there will most likely be one fairly near you (mine's about 20 km away in Darmstadt). Most of these centers—which can be used free of charge—have the IGI and the localities catalog on CD-ROM. The staff are also very helpful.

Census dates:

10 March 1801 27 May 1811 28 May 1821 30 May 1831 06 June 1841 30 March 1851 07 April 1861 02 April 1871 03 April 1881 05 April 1891 31 March 1901 02 April 1911 19 June 1921 26 April 1931 (records destroyed) None 1941

Arguably the resource likely to get you the furthest in the shortest possible time is the population censuses. These are conducted every 10 years and are made available to the public after 100 years for reasons of data protection. There are partial censuses in existence for the years before, but returns have only been preserved on a wide scale since 1841. Unfortunately, the information collated that year is of little value to family historians and to make matters worse the LDS films of it are so poor that many have been withdrawn. The census from 1851 on normally gives for each address the names of all those present on the evening the census taker called. This will in most cases mean a complete family including the relationship between the members, occupations, ages and places of birth. Whilst the information is not always correct (inhabitants made mistakes, were illiterate, had something to hide, lied, etc, ditto for the census takers. The transcription and subsequent digitization have also compounded the problem), it is a wonderful way of tracking siblings, tracing movements or opening other avenues of research. Here again the LDS have presented us with a couple of tools par excellence. The census 1881 has been name indexed and can be bought for a fraction of its true value. It includes a national index and the data for all counties, including Scotland, in a collection of 24 CDs. Since 23rd October 2002 it has also been freely available online at the Familysearch site.
We Warwickshire researchers are fortunate in that the 1851 census for this county (together with Devon and Norfolk) has also been name indexed and can be bought on a single CD-ROM. Both of these resources are an absolute must for researchers in Birmingham. They can be ordered in several English speaking countries. I ordered mine from Birmingham [LDS Distribution Centre, 399 Garretts Green Lane, Birmingham B33 0UH, Tel: +44 (0)121 785 2200, Fax: 0121 789 7686] and paid only £29.75 for the 1881 and £3.65 for the 1851, including postage to Germany! The US address is: LDS Distribution Center, 1999 W 1700 S, Salt Lake City, UT 84104-4235, Tel: 1-800-537-5950. Further details can be found on the Familysearch site.
Recently, the indexed 1841, 1851, 1861, 1971, 1881, 1891 and 1901 censuses have gone online for a subscription at ancestry.co.uk and other sites. They provide good quality scans of the original pages and have really made researching the last 200 years a doddle. They let you try out the full functionality of the site for a week for free. An absolute must.


Wills are another important resource, in many cases giving—apart from "flesh on the bones"—hints on family relations and connections. Proved wills have been indexed nationally since 1858 and the indexes are available at records offices like Birmingham Central Library. The index (calendar) gives the details necessary for locating a will. A copy of the will can be ordered for about £5 (not £2 as claimed in some books) from Probate Registry, Castle Chambers, Clifford Street, York Y01 9RG. Unfortunately, the unhelpful people there will only accept payment from abroad through a British(!) bank or International Money Order. Ah, splendid isolation.
For the years up until 1858 Birmingham wills can be accessed at Lichfield Record Office:
  Lichfield Record Office
  Archivist-in-Charge
  Martin Sanders
  The Friary
  Lichfield
  Staffordshire WS13 6QG
  eMail: lichfield.record.office@staffordshire.gov.uk

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