"Martin Brown" wrote

Bob Hobden wrote:
"Kathy" wrote

Sacha, are you around on the 15th and 16th September? I shall be
visiting Exeter Record Office and thought I might take a trip westward
for an afternoon. Would love to meet you, Ray and Oscar Underfoot :-}
Please could you let me know on
kathleendotmcintoshatmypostofficedotcodotuk?

If you are doing your Family Tree I hope you have better luck at a
Records Office than I ever have, never anything at all and some of the
staff are certainly not helpful like the ones on the TV. Good luck.

Apart from the dragons that infest the Durham County records office I have
found most of the other County records office and local history staff
reasonably helpful. You cannot expect them to have the right book open at
the right page for you when you arrive as usually happens on TV.

If you have done your homework then the Records office is one place to find
the microfilms of the actual marriage and birth certificates. It speeds
things up enormously if you already have a prepared list of what you are
looking for gleaned from IGI or FreeBMD.

Tricky bit is playing guess the parish church in larger towns.


Why waste time and money going to a Records Office to look at a microfilm of
a Cert when you can order an official copy online for £9 once you have the
Volume and Ref No. There is also no need to know the Church involved.
Certainly cheaper than travelling the Country as I've done in the past and
to no avail.
It's once you are back past 1837 (probably nearer 1800 in reality) it gets
more difficult and Records Offices become more useful (if you guess
correctly and have some luck).

-- Regards
Bob Hobden
W.of London. UK