Genealogy Chat

Im thinking of subscribing to above site with FreeBMD not being complete yet. Can anyone tell me if I look up a marriage does it give names of spouses like on ancestry or do you have to look them up seperately. Carole

Hi Carole You use one unit for each page you view, which you select by search criteria. What you see is an actual scan of the page, so when spouses names are included (1910 and after, I can't remember exactly) then they will be displayed too. Sally

Usually, if you are looking for confirmation, if you find one spouse, and have an idea of the others name, you might find a corresponding reference on the second search. (you only have to search the same quarter) but yes 1837 CAN be expensive.... Bob but is quite often cheaper than a journey to the nearest reference office/library

There is also Family Relatives which is good for 1866-1920. Min sub £6 and it can be cheaper than 1837 as for the years indicated the records are fully searchable. For instance if you needed to search for a birth for Alexander Taylor and you knew it was between 1915 and 1920, if you search on 1837 it will offer you 24 pages to view (£2.40) and you won't know if there is someone of that nname on each page until you look. On Family Relatives you can ask it for all the Alexander Taylors registered in those years and it will cost 2 units (20p) for every set of 20 it churns out. So, usually cheaper (as long as you're not after a very common name) and much quicker too. Family Relatives cannot match up brides and grooms though, except for 1912 onwards when the spouse name is recorded. Biggest downfal of the site is that you cannot include middle names. For instance, I would like to look for the death of my rellie, John Tyler Smith, but I would have to search for John Smith!! The results would tell me the middle names, but the results list would be massive! Merry

Its necessary for full details to order certs after 1920-its basically the internet equivalent to the manual method of looking up the quarterly microfiche sheets in your library. see it this way......... If you travel by car,bus,train to the library,pay for a parking ticket etc,then youre talking at least £5,and the extra time invoved ,which by my estimate would be 5-10 times the amount of time spent. In short,if your research is important top you between 1920 and the present day,and time is of a premium,1837 is a must-£5 would enable you to do 70 lookups(70 quarters) in the bulk buy option.