History of the Society

In July 1978 the Federation of Family History Societies co-ordinated the foundation of three family history societies to cover the City of London and the former county of Middlesex. From west to east, these were the West Middlesex Family History Society, the Westminster and Central Middlesex Family History Society and the London and North Middlesex Family History Society. This division continued until 2001 when the latter two societies combined forces to form what was renamed the London, Westminster and Middlesex Family History Society.

West Middlesex Family History Society now covers 32 of the ancient parishes in the west and south-west of the ancient county of Middlesex. The parishes are listed on our Area of Interest page, and can be seen in map form on the Parish Map page. Given the complexity of the metropolitan area we also provide a Gazetteer for the Greater London area page to help identify which family history society has records for any location in Greater London.

The inaugural meeting of West Middlesex Family History Society was held on 19th July 1978 at Hounslow Manor School, Hounslow. The late John Rayment addressed the gathering and the first Executive Committee was elected, chaired by David Hawkings.

The structure and activities of the Society were soon established, with a regular programme of invited speakers, a journal and the beginnings of important transcription and indexing work. The latter included the foundation of the West Middlesex Marriage Index under the management of Vic Gale and an active programme to record monumental inscriptions from local churchyards. The venue for meetings changed first to the Old Town Hall in Hounslow in 1980, and then to Montague Hall, Hounslow in 1984, where they remained up to February 2018, after which the Society moved to their new home the St. John's Centre, St. John's Road, Isleworth.

Through the 1980s the Society was busy with indexing work on the 1851 Census returns for the registration districts within our area, the results of which were published as a series of microfiche. This project saw the first use of home computers for indexing work in the Society and the transition away from the traditional use of paper slips for sorting work.

The Society held its first one-day conference at Isleworth in October 1984 on the theme From Ag. Lab. to London Commuter and joined in a conference with the other Middlesex societies for the first time at the Bishopsgate Institute for a London Miscellany in July 1986.

The first directory of members' interests was published as a booklet in 1985, with further editions being produced at intervals of about three years. In 1993 the format was changed to microfiche, and then in 2015 the directory went online from our Surname Interests page.

The wider use of home computers in the early 1990s led to the Society's decision to digitise the West Middlesex Marriage Index. Further expansion of this index continued as project work into the 2000s. In 2001 the Society purchased its first personal computer, and the Marriage Index was copied there so it could be used at family history fairs. The index was subsequently made available via FamilyHistoryOnline (now ceased) in 2004, and is now accessible to members from the Members Data Searches section of this website, and to subscribed members of Find My Past or of Genes Reunited using their respective search facilities.

During the 1990s society members were also very busy with work on the 1881 Census project, co-ordinated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the first of the national census indexes to become available. The 1990s also saw the publication of a book on the village of Harmondsworth and some of the earlier memorial inscription work. In 2002 further project work led to the publication of a CD of war memorial inscriptions, and the first two volumes in a series of local parish histories. Since 2016 the content of the War Memorials CD has been made available to members along with the rest of our digitised records accessible from the Members Data Searches page.

Over the years the Society has been impacted by the increasing age of its members, and in 2015 it reached a crisis in that it ran for most of that year without either a Chairman or Secretary, leading to an Extraordinary General Meeting held on 17th September 2015 requiring members to vote on a proposal to wind up the Society. Thankfully at this meeting the guest speaker was Kirsty Gray, Managing Director of Family Wise Ltd., and Kirsty volunteered to take on the Chairman's role, Brian Page volunteered to be vice-chairman, Roland Bostock volunteered to be Secretary, and a further five individuals volunteered to bring the committee up to full strength with 12 members. From then the Society has been going from strength to strength.




Society news

Notice Board

The Notice Board was last updated on 28th January 2024.

Next Meeting

Our next meeting is on Thursday 21st March 2024. This will be a hybrid Zoom meeting with the speaker being at St. John's Centre. It's the AGM followed by David Shailes giving a talk on 'Brentford Gas'.

Next Fair

Our next family history fair is the Family History Show - London at Kempton Park Racecourse on Saturday 5th October 2024.


Previous news


Recent updates

9-March-2024

Digitised journals now go back to 1982, all fully indexed.

8-March-2024

The Last Accounts page has been updated to show the Society's signed 2023 accounts.

8-March-2024

The Society's Safeguarding Policy has been updated.

8-March-2024

Committee minutes for January 2024 added to Members Area.

26-February-2024

Digitised journals now go back to 1983, all fully indexed.

16-February-2024

New image (and tip) of the month.

8-January-2024

A brochure advertising the 43rd West London Local History Conference is added to our Sponsored Events page.


Previous updates


© Copyright West Middlesex Family History Society 2007-2020  
A Member of the Federation of Family History Societies. Registered Charity No. 291906