West Middlesex Family History Society

Research

This section provides a range of information intended to be useful to those researching their families in West Middlesex.

• Our area. In 1978 the founding of our Society was co-ordinated by the Federation of Family History Societies, and it was agreed that our Society should cover the parishes to the west and south of the county while the Central Middlesex FHS and the London and North Middlesex FHS between them would cover the rest of the county. Then in 2001 these last two joined forces to form the current London, Westminster and Middlesex FHS. The Parish Maps page shows our area using a set of four maps.


• Detail identifying each of the old parish churches, and where their parish registers may be found, is provided by means of a lookup on our Parish Information page.


• Summary information on all places of worship we have been able to idenify in our area is provided on the Church index page.


• A Burial places index is also provided of all places of burial in the area. This includes churches and municipal cemeteries.


• Only a few of the 'Old' Poor Law records survive today, and none are indexed online as yet. (We have an ongoing project to achieve this). This page summarises the position across our area.


• Taking a wider view, we also provide a Gazetteer of the Greater London area which is a searchable database of 600 place names in Greater London, and identifies in which of nine Family History Society areas each place belongs.


• When it gets down to the detail, if your research cannot be done online then you will need to visit a Records Office. Our Records Offices and Libraries page provides basic information, including website address, for all the relevant Record Offices for our area.


• Other organisations may have the information you need. A list of local history societies and similar organisations is provided here.


• If your research is specific to a surname then it may be that one of our members has already done related research which could be of interest. Use our Surname Interests page to see if you can take a short cut for part of your research.


• Many of the items in our library, which are the result of research by members, are also held by those members most involved in the subject. These Indexes held by members are listed in the Journal each quarter, and may also be seen here using the link provided.


• There is then the enormous potential of the internet for family history research. This is a very large subject, and can never be complete, but we give our best shot at identifying the main websites to visit starting from our Links to other websites page.


• DNA testing is much talked about. See DNA Testing for a link to some very sound advice prepared for our benefit by the FFHS.


• The Newspapers page provides information on West Middlesex newspapers which can be searched online from the British Newspaper Archive, and the much larger collection of newspaper titles which are part of the British Newspaper Collection held at the British Library.


• The Family History Federation Really Useful Bulletin is issued monthly, and contains some excellent articles on particular family history research topics. Almost all past issues may be accessed from this page.


• The Professional Research page provides some advice if you are thinking about hiring a professional genealogist researcher.