Births Deaths & Marriages Office research

kilsmum

Have my appointment to view the records in the Births Death & Marriages office in Cork next Tuesday after waiting for a year to get an appointment.

Just wondering has anyone on this forum done it in the past and how much information/help they received - I want to be as prepared as possible to get as much out of the session that I can.

Thanks in advance

Kilsmum

pinkypinky

Kilsmum,

I wasn't even aware that this could be done.
Out of curiosity, why have you gone this route instead of using the LDS site to find the index references and then ordering directly from Roscommon?

Please do report back and let us know the procedure/what you got out of it.

Thanks,
Pinky

kilsmum

Pinky,

When I started doing my family tree I was working on information from relatives which turned out to be largely incorrect!

I have basically come to a halt on a number of areas in my tree and when I phoned up the Births Deaths & Marriages office last year asking them about getting certs they told me about it.

My problem is that the family names I am researching are probably the most common in Ireland so when I looked them up on the LDS I was getting loads of results coupled with the fact that I was going in the complete wrong direction in some cases due to the incorrect information.

I will let you know how I get on.

Kilsmum:)

genie

The level of helpfulness and co-operation in Registration Offices must vary greatly from county to county as in Markievicz House in Sligo, they have no time for genealogists at all. :rolleyes:

Best of luck with your search!

Wyldwood

Kilsmum

I've done research in Adelaide Street several times now. The most important thing is to have a list made out of which registers you want to view. You get to see the original books with all the information as originally recorded. Take plenty of blank A4 pages with you as you will be noting the information on the relevant records. There are signs up saying you can't photograph them (but you are in a room by yourself with the books & your mobile phone).
If you're looking at city registers you need to know the registration district no. for the area you need. If you need guidance try looking at the Guys Directories on corkpastandpresent.ie they are listed in them.
I found the level of assistance varied. You will be assigned a staff member to get the books for you, this person will pop in and out to see if you need the books changed. On two occasions I had difficulty with a person who wasn't Irish and wasn't familiar with the various registration districts & kept bringing me wrong registers which is frustrating. This is why it is so important to know exactly which registration districts you need. For instance, Glanmire/Glounthaune is in Carrignavar South but I got Carrignavar North books.
They will give you a good bundle of registers at a time so have a pre-written list to give them as this saves time &, when you have to wait so long for an appointment (& you're paying €20), time is precious.
If you have any further questions just ask

PS should add that I found loads of information on my ancestors doing research in Adelaide Street.

kilsmum

Thanks Genie & Wyldwood,

Wyldwood - its great to hear from someone that has actually had experience of Adelaide Street because I wouldn't have thought to find out the registration districts beforehand.

Do they have any relation to the census D.E.D.s?

I can agree with you on the level of helpfulness. I got lucky once trying to locate my grandmothers sister. The girl at the counter looked it up for me and I got the cert based on what she found which would have taken me ages because the registrar had dropped the O in O'Brien - I could have been looking for a needle in a haystack!

Im trying to trace my great grandfathers family on my mothers side in particular and they originally came from Friars Walk but I don't know for sure of their address. It would be great to track down my great grandfathers birth cert and find out his mothers name. This could then confirm if the person that signed his marriage register was in fact his sister and it would tell me if his brother was living in his house when he died in 1911.

So many questions! would you mind letting me know where I could find the registration information in Guys.

My areas of interest are Fair Hill, Friars Walk, Glenny in Riverstick, Widderlings Square which is northside near Shandon I think.

Thanks as always for your input and help

Much appreciated,

Kilsmum

Wyldwood

Hello again Kilsmum

the Dispensary & Registration districts are the same thing but not DEDs. If you pick a Guys for around the years you are researching the districts are given on the relevant page for each area - Riverstick (Glinny) is listed in the 1907 Directory as being in Ballymartle, Kinsale district. For the city, just go to the street listings (not the alphabetical) and after the name of each street the Reg. Dist. is given in brackets. Fair Hill could be either 2 or 3 depending whether the house was on the east or west side of street. Friar's Walk is listed in 1907 as being in No 7 Dist. Shandon area could be 3 or 4?
Double check any certs you already have for those areas the registration district is on the top right hand side.

kilsmum

Thanks Wyldwood,

I had some job going through the Guys Directory to even find the street directory I wasn't sure what to find it under. I didn't find Friars Walk but found another few I was looking for.

Looks like I would need to be very sure of where the people came from - I thought it was more computer generated and that you could give the name of the person, date of birth, general area, fathers name etc.

Thank god I asked!!!!

Yet again thanks for all your help - I really appreciate it:)

Kilsmum

Wyldwood

Kilsmum

no computers involved I'm afraid, though it would make searching so much easier!
You're on your own with the books. One tip is that although most books have an index (either a separate book or in the back of the register) there are some omissions so if you feel that a record should be there but isn't in the index it's worth flicking through the book, although they are huge. Don't forget to check with and without O' & also Mc/Mac. It's great when you find a record for an ancestor you didn't know existed. I found my grgrgrandfather's death at a known address & had no record of him before that.
Arrive on the dot of 10 to give yourself as much searching time as possible.
So sorry, should have told you that the city streets are under City Directory. In the 1907 Guys Friars Walk is on page 493.

Wyldwood

kilsmum

Thanks Wyldwood - found Friars Walk finally thanks to you!!!

I could have been searching all day otherwise - the Guys book has a lot of pages.

As a matter of interest did you do all the research on your own? My sister is mad to come in with me but Im not sure if its allowed and the B, D & M office never answer the phone!

Thanks and Regards,


Kilsmum

Wyldwood

Hi Kilsmum

You can take your sister along, my hubby came with me once & shared the searching.
Be aware that the Births, Marriages & Deaths are all in separate books by year, so if you are looking for deaths in a particular area, say Friars Walk (Dist. no 7) then ask for the span of years you need e.g: Cork City Dist 7 deaths 1864- 1900 or whatever, & they will bring you all the books for those years. Same with Births & Marriages. Thats why a list is handy to have.
Just hope the Reg Districts you need didn't change much over the years because they did tend to change from time to time as they became amalgamated or divided. So have a quick glance through one when you first get them to be sure they cover the area you need.

Good Luck & let us know how you get on

Wyldwood

kilsmum

Thanks for all your sound advice Wyldwood - I really appreciate it.

Might be handy to have an extra pair of hands to help out.

Will let you know how it goes - here's hoping!


Kilsmum:)

Wyldwood

pinkypinky wrote: »

I wasn't even aware that this could be done.
Out of curiosity, why have you gone this route instead of using the LDS site to find the index references and then ordering directly from Roscommon?

Pinky
the difference between using the LDS index & going to the registration office is that for €20 you can spend the day searching the original registers & find lots of very useful genealogical info including records of ancestors you may not have known about. It beats the index hands down & the subsequent wait to see if the cert you ordered from Roscommon is the right one. Only problem is that the waiting time for appointments is over a year long in Cork.

Wyldwood

Wyldwood

Kilsmum

One last tip. When you're in Adelaide Court on Tues. it's worth making another appointment for next year (book 2 days in case you need extra time), you can always cancel if you don't feel the need closer to the time. I find that I have another list ready to go every year.

Wyldwood

P. Breathnach

Wyldwood wrote: »

the difference between using the LDS index & going to the registration office is that for €20 you can spend the day searching the original registers & find lots of very useful genealogical info including records of ancestors you may not have known about. It beats the index hands down & the subsequent wait to see if the cert you ordered from Roscommon is the right one. Only problem is that the waiting time for appointments is over a year long in Cork.

As a point of general interest: Am I right to suppose that there are at least two, and perhaps three, official records of events? One made at local level (including churches in the case of marriage records); then a copy made at the district registration office if it is not also the local office; then a copy sent from the district office to the national register?

There are gaps in my knowledge of one ancestral family (according to the 1911 census, there were six children born in the family and five were still living in 1911: I have only four names). My next intended move was to check church records, but one or both of the missing children might have been born later than the cut-off date for the microfilms in the NLI.

My Plan B, should they not be traceable in the NLI, was to enquire about access to church records at local level. I had no Plan C. It now looks as if trawling through local registers might be an option.

shanew

The RC records in the NLI are microfilms of the original registers - so not much point in checking both, unless there are sections of the registers missing from the film, or there are difficult to read sections

Note the films only cover up to the 1880s or so


Shane

shanew

I misread your post - see now that the missing child could have been baptised/born after the film cut-off.

Which parish were the children born ?


S.

pinkypinky

Wyldwood wrote: »

Pinky
the difference between using the LDS index & going to the registration office is that for €20 you can spend the day searching the original registers & find lots of very useful genealogical info including records of ancestors you may not have known about. It beats the index hands down & the subsequent wait to see if the cert you ordered from Roscommon is the right one. Only problem is that the waiting time for appointments is over a year long in Cork.

Wyldwood

I'm amused that someone thinks I need to know this! :rolleyes: I have to totally disagree. I found more new ancestors in the 2 weeks after the LDS index went online than in the 7 years of manual searching before that! What I meant by saying I didn't know you could do that was I didn't know you could do that in the Cork office.

P. Breathnach

shanew wrote: »

I misread your post - see now that the missing child could have been baptised/born after the film cut-off.

Which parish were the children born ?

Arklow (but this is not the Walsh family I mentioned in other threads).

These great-grandparents married in 1873. The births of which I know happened in 1879, 1881, 1888, and (subject to checking) 1889 or 1891. Quite a wide spread -- he was a seaman, and might have been away for long spells.

The cutoff date for the microfilm is 1880.

shanew

you've probably already seen the website for the parish - it's at http://www.arklowparish.ie/

Hopefully they can advise on the post 1880 records



S.

P. Breathnach

shanew wrote: »

you've probably already seen the website for the parish - it's at http://www.arklowparish.ie/

Hopefully they can advise on the post 1880 records

It was on my to-do list, but in another form: I have made contact with a local historian who is willing to give me some help when I can get my act together and make the trip to Arklow.

The bald facts of family history are not very interesting (to me, anyway). I want to get a sense of place, and an idea of the time and circumstances in which my ancestors lived. I know that one ancestral place in Arklow is still standing, but that the houses into which my two grandparents were born are long gone.

Wyldwood

pinkypinky wrote: »

I'm amused that someone thinks I need to know this! :rolleyes:

Apologies for misinterpreting your question. It appeared you were asking why anyone would choose to go to the Registers rather than the index. Don't think there was any need for the "sarcasm" smilie.