Over 2.5 million court registers added to findmypast.ie

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For immediate release

Over 2.5 million court registers added to findmypast.ie

Records dating back as far as 1842

Leading Irish family history website findmypast.ie has made an additional 2.5 million court records available to search online in its Irish Petty Sessions Court Registers 1828-1912 record set, which exposes the petty crimes Ireland’s residents committed and how they were punished.

The additions feature forty-four new courts in nineteen counties around Ireland. A further fifty-five courts have been supplemented with records from additional years. This brings the total Petty Sessions Court Registers on findmypast.ie to over 12 million records.

Notable new courts that have been added are the Limerick City Children’s Court and two courts with pre-famine records – Moynalty, Co. Meath and Nenagh, Co. Tipperary. As well as that, for the first time, seven new courts from Co. Longford have been added, bringing online over a quarter of a million new records for the county. Also well represented with totally new courts are Laois (five) and Cork (four).

Being drunk in a public place, being drunk in charge of a cart, failure to pay rent and allowing livestock to wander on the road are among some of the most common misdemeanors that our ancestors found themselves in court for. Although most defendants got away with a fine, the variety of cases heard gives a real flavour for life in Ireland at the time.

Cliona Weldon, General Manager of findmypast.ie, said “We are really excited about this add-on to our Petty Sessions court records. As usual, the stories you can find in them really paint a picture of what life was like in towns and villages in Ireland at the time. From harrowing stories in the Limerick City Children’s Court to amusing ones in Longford’s seven new courts, there is something for everyone in there”.

New courts have been added to the following counties: Clare, Cork, Donegal, Dublin, Galway, Kerry, Kildare, Laois, Limerick, Longford, Louth, Mayo, Meath, Monaghan, Offaly, Sligo, Tipperary, Waterford and Westmeath.

To find out if you have ancestors who had their day in court visit www.findmypast.ie

Lantern Slides digitized by Church of Ireland Representative Church Body Library

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In the Irish Times on 4 Jun 2013 there is an article called “Newly discovered images of Edwardian Dublin’s Herbert Park Expo.” Lantern slides were found that include the expo and several other areas around Ireland such as Belfast and Newtown County Mayo. The Expo was a World’s Fair and one of the images is of a building with Canada written on it. I wonder if that was the Canadian exhibit at the Expo. These are lovely images.

The Church of Ireland Representative Church Body Library have digitized these images and made them available on their Archive of the Month page for June.

After you have viewed a slide show you can view the images again and find labels attached. Not many can identify the people in the images but they are interesting and focus on a particular time in Ireland.

©2013 – Blair Archival Research All Rights Reserved

Ruth’s Recommendations

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This is another long list of favourites. I have been busy getting ready for the Ontario Genealogical Society Conference this weekend. Happy reading everyone.

Irish Genealogy News has several posts of interest. The first is “Too many histories…” Hedge School debate online.” It is the latest podcast from the Hedge School.

The next post is “More Church of Ireland transcriptions go online.” This is the latest release to the Anglican Record Project. The last post is “So what? So plenty!” which is about the Irish Government’s intention to put the civil registration indexes online.

The British GENES blog also has several posts of interest. The first is “Republic of Ireland’s GRO indexes to go online at IrishGenealogy.ie” The next is “1895 Scottish Valuation Roll now online.” The last post is “Scottish Online Catalogue Project” which is going to be a wonderful resource for people researching Scotland.

Chris’ other blog is Scotland: Walking in Eternity and here he had a post called “The Tourist’s Matrimonial Guide Through Scotland.” This is a wonderful post and provides a warning to tourists about Scottish marriage customs.

The “Are My Roots Showing?” blog has a couple of good posts. The first is “Evidentia and Mastering Genealogical Proof” where she looks at how the program Evidentia has been adapting to the release of Thomas W. Jones’ book “Mastering Genealogical Proof.” The second post is “My Digital Filing System for Genealogy (Windows).” This came about via the new group on Facebook called “The Organized Genealogist.” I think we are all looking for ways to organize our collections and doing it right the first time.

Dick Eastman had a post called “Save Library & Archives Canada: How Ordinary Citizens can Make an Impact.” If you want to make an impact then check this out.

The Genealogy Canada blog has a post called “Want to track down descendants of immigrants who were on the Empress of Ireland.” If you had people on the Empress of Ireland when it went down in the St. Lawrence River on 29 May 1914 then you need to read this post.

John Grenham’s has a column entitled “Genealogy in Time” where he looks at the ranking system of genealogy websites. He starts with Genealogy in Time which is a Canadian website and says it is ranked as the fifth largest family history website in the world.

GeneaPress announces that “Southern California Genealogy Jamboree: Free Live-Streamed Sessions Announced.” Sign up now to attend the free live streamed sessions from Jamboree.

The Genealogy’s Star blog had a post called “2,000,000,000th Holding Record goes into WorldCat.org.” If you haven’t used WorldCat.org then you need to go and check it out.

The Anglo-Celtic Connections blog had an interested post called “The First 20 Hours – How to Learn Anything.” It is an interesting video.

The last blog post is from a blog I follow not because of genealogy but because of a general interest. They had a post this week that crossed general interest with genealogy. The post entitled “Simply Divine” is about St. Werburgh’s Church in Dublin. This is of interest to me because in the late 1700s my family worshiped there and one collateral ancestor is buried there. I enjoyed the brief history but what really caught my attention was the photographic essay of the church. The last time I was in Dublin the church was closed so I never got to go inside. This helps make up for a missed opportunity but it also makes me more intent on getting in to see it the next time I am in Dublin.

What were your favourite blog posts?

Let me know in the comments below.

Other bloggers that write their own lists are:

Jana’s Genealogy and Family History Blog

Genealogy Insider – Genealogy News Corral

©2013 – Blair Archival Research All Rights Reserved