British India Office records - findmypast [Archive] - Genealogists' Forum

kiterunner

28-01-14, 17:10

Just noticed this:
British India Office Births and Baptisms 1712-1965 (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-united-kingdom-records/british-india-office-births-and-baptisms)
British India Office Marriages 1713-1969 (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-united-kingdom-records/british-india-office-marriages)
British India Office Deaths and Burials 1709-1965 (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-united-kingdom-records/british-india-office-deaths-and-burials)
British India Office Wills and Probate 1774-1948 (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-united-kingdom-records/british-india-office-wills-and-probate)
British India Office Army and Navy Pensions (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-united-kingdom-records/british-india-office-army-and-navy-pensions#./british-india-office-army-and-navy-pensions?&_suid=139099204947507347979989816722)
East India Company and Civil Service Pensions (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-united-kingdom-records/east-india-company-and-civil-service-pensions#./east-india-company-and-civil-service-pensions?&_suid=139099211810601662138043642415)
British India Office Assistant Surgeons (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-united-kingdom-records/british-india-office-assistant-surgeons#./british-india-office-assistant-surgeons?&_suid=1390992160266019860355868559026)

Pinch me, someone!

I think I shall be taking a break from those PCC wills on ancestry and getting a sub to FMP quick!

kiterunner

28-01-14, 17:27

Can someone please confirm that these records are available if you have a "Britain Full Subscription" before I take the plunge?

Crafty Sue

28-01-14, 17:40

I have a full sub, plus I have 38 credits & I've managed to view a transcription & the image. Just checked & I still have 38 credits left :)

Hope that helps Kiterunner :)

Sue

kiterunner

28-01-14, 17:50

Thanks, Sue.

kiterunner

28-01-14, 18:28

Just want to warn people who are using pay-as-you-go credits that the "transcription" is just an index entry with very little information and costs the same number of credits as viewing the image would.

kiterunner

28-01-14, 18:49

Because these databases use FMP's new search facility, you can specify the spouse's name on a marriage search, and you can kind of search for parents' names on baptisms but because you have to use the "keyword" field for those, it doesn't allow for variants.

Kit

29-01-14, 01:42

Woohoo. The day the kids go back to school!!!!

I wont be around for a while.

Kit

29-01-14, 02:15

proof after many years. My 3g grandmother was only referred to as "a heathen woman". :( Not idea how to trace her now.

Janet

29-01-14, 02:29

How sad and frustrating for you, Toni. Maybe you'll find a clue someday, just not where you were expecting it.

kiterunner

29-01-14, 09:42

I have added some more database links to the original post.

Kit

29-01-14, 10:31

Kate do you have any idea how to search by parents?

kiterunner

29-01-14, 11:41

maggie_4_7

29-01-14, 13:54

proof after many years. My 3g grandmother was only referred to as "a heathen woman". :( Not idea how to trace her now.

I'm sure there will be a way do not give up :)

Shona

29-01-14, 14:52

proof after many years. My 3g grandmother was only referred to as "a heathen woman". :( Not idea how to trace her now.

Was that in a marriage record or on baptisms of her children?

Kit

29-01-14, 19:40

If you mean on the births and baptisms search, then as I said before, you can put parents' names in the keywords field, but it is somewhat hit and miss as it will not search for variants of the names that way. You can do the same on the marriages search to search for father's name.

Thanks, I'll try that.

I'm sure there will be a way do not give up :)

I wont. It's taken me a few years to prove the mother was Indian. The sister's transcription said Heathen Woman but not my 2g grandmother. I'm more sad that was how she was referred to than the inability to research further.

Was that in a marriage record or on baptisms of her children?

It was in the baptism of her children.

tenterfieldjulie

30-01-14, 08:16

Kit, as the children would have been baptised in a Christian church, calling someone a heathen then, is the same as calling someone a pagan. It just means that she was not baptised as a Christian, it would not have been meant to be a slur on her character. With most baptism records now, if the person is a different religion to the church where the child is being baptised, it is usually noted. If one of the parents is not baptised, it is usually noted as mother or father not baptised. In genealogy we use baptism records as evidence of birth, but that is not the purpose that they are kept for, it is for religious use.

Kit

30-01-14, 08:42

Thanks Julie, that does make me feel better. However few 'native' women were named. I've seen them referred to as Christian Natives, to distinguish from the 'heathens' but I guess it could be the whole woman are not important thing, especially when not English.

Kit

30-01-14, 08:44

I just had a brain wave and think I know who is in a mystery photo I have. I can't prove it though as the person was born in 1917 and the transcription on FMP doesn't name the parents. Does anyone thing that in years to come the image and full transcription will appear on FMP?

kiterunner

30-01-14, 09:02

A few people have asked on the FMP blog whether there are more records and images to be added, but there hasn't been an answer yet. I have seen a few of those transcriptions less than 100 years old without parents' names and my guess is that when they become more than 100 years old, the parents' names may become available. Just a guess though.

I am still wondering whether "native of Madras" on my ancestor's marriage record from 1838 means that she was ethnically Indian (or part so), does anyone know, please?

Kit

30-01-14, 09:53

I don't know Kate, all mine are in Bengal, so far. Do you have any others that say something similar?

I have one woman who I have been told was Indian but she had her full name on the register, nothing else to identify her. I haven't tried to go backwards yet though to prove it. I'm going over what I already have to verify it is all true now that we have the images.

kiterunner

30-01-14, 10:58

I've come across quite a few that say "Indo-British" or "Anglo-Indian" or "Eurasian" or something like that, but I haven't found any others that say "native of Madras" yet. It's a shame we can't browse through the registers.

Kit

30-01-14, 11:14

I agree. We also can't submit a correction which is annoying as I have found 2 so far that needed amending.

Margaret in Burton

30-01-14, 11:46

A cousin of mine went to the India Office many years ago and found all of the baptisms for our mutual GG Grandfather and his siblings. I've been cross checking them with those on FMP this morning and have one that is definitely not online. I did find one that was listed as Neivey instead of Newey. Just searched for the first name only.

Definitely some missing.

kiterunner

30-01-14, 17:03

Is anyone else getting some weird random search results?

Kit

30-01-14, 19:34

I get all sorts of dates even if I put in a date plus or minus something. I'm looking at the early 1900s at the moment for a few common names and don't want pages. I still get older results, but not the hundred results I get without the restrictions.

Margaret in Burton

30-01-14, 22:44

I've been searching on one name only which doesn't seem to be common on there so have had few results. I haven't used any other fields.

Kit

30-01-14, 22:48

I was searching here, there and everywhere in excitement but am slowly working my way through what I already have and know then I'll tackle the bits I don't know.

Kit

03-02-14, 10:09

I am still wondering whether "native of Madras" on my ancestor's marriage record from 1838 means that she was ethnically Indian (or part so), does anyone know, please?

I have one that says 'resident in Dinapore'. Did you work out if your 'native of Madras' means they are Indian or part thereof and do you think 'resident in Dinapore' also means she was Indian?

I can't find a birth for her.

kiterunner

03-02-14, 11:05

I have one that says 'resident in Dinapore'. Did you work out if your 'native of Madras' means they are Indian or part thereof and do you think 'resident in Dinapore' also means she was Indian?

I haven't managed to figure it out, Kit. I had a look through some other marriages at the same place but didn't manage to find enough to draw a firm conclusion. I think "resident in Dinapore" could just mean she lived there but again, maybe looking through some of the other marriages at the same place to see what it says on them might help.

Kit

03-02-14, 11:18

Well that wasn't too hard. The next 2 marriages says a 'native woman' of Dinapore but I'm still not sure what to think.

Mary from Italy

04-02-14, 01:07

I would think that if it says "native woman" she was ethnically Indian, but if it says someone was a "native of Dinapore" they were just born there, and could be of any ethnicity.

Kit

04-02-14, 06:56

Mine was actually 'resident of' rather than native but I understand what you mean. :)

kiterunner

06-02-14, 18:56

I'm a little bit underwhelmed by FMP's latest news item:
British in India Success story: findmypast’s Estelle discovers a knight’s secret past
http://blog.findmypast.co.uk/2014/british-in-india-success-story-findmypasts-estelle-discovers-a-knights-secret-past/

As far as I can see, the knight is her grandmother's cousin Gerald Priestley, and she already knew he had been knighted for his service in the Indian Civil Service, and the only thing she seems to have found out about him is that he got married, which she could have found out before by looking on FamilySearch! All the rest of the article is about his wife's family, who are only related to Estelle by Gerald's marriage.

My quick Google search for "Sir Gerald Priestley" came up with a family history page which says that he later married a divorcee (i.e. his second wife), Evelyn May Ledward, nee Burnage, at Kloof (South Africa) after 1959, so when Sir Gerald was in his seventies. I have to say that if he was my relative, I would be looking into that instead of his first father-in-law's sisters-in-law!

Also, I don't get what she means about getting the names of the first wife's grandparents to "take my tree even further back". I wouldn't have thought they belonged in her tree? Why bother tracing back the ancestors of your grandmother's cousin's wife?

Kit

09-02-14, 02:04

I agree, not sure she really knows what she is doing. I also wonder if he is actually related to her at all, given her lack of understanding.

Margaret in Burton

09-02-14, 08:02

That's how some people get absolutely huge trees, they tag on people that aren't even blood related. A lot of us know of someone who has tagged someone else's tree to their own when there is only a tenuous link.

An example that I could do:
Anstey Nomad's husband and I are connected via a brother of an ancestor of her husband who married one of my 3 X great grandmothers. It was her second marriage, my connection is through her first husband. No blood connection to AN's OH at all, but if I was that way inclined I could tag all of her research onto my tree.

I probably couldn't because she isn't going to give it to me.

Mary from Italy

09-02-14, 13:22

I agree, not sure she really knows what she is doing.

She used to be on the staff of GenesReunited, if I remember rightly :)

Kit

09-02-14, 23:14

That's how some people get absolutely huge trees, they tag on people that aren't even blood related.

I have a few non related people on my tree but most of them are to show that inlaws are related to each other and how families were connected.

I also put in non related, living, people if they have provided information that helped me with my tree. Generally they are connected to someone in the tree, but are not blood related.

She used to be on the staff of GenesReunited, if I remember rightly :)

Not sure how to respond to that. :eek:

Margaret in Burton

10-02-14, 06:32

I have a few non related people on my tree but most of them are to show that inlaws are related to each other and how families were connected.

I also put in non related, living, people if they have provided information that helped me with my tree. Generally they are connected to someone in the tree, but are not blood related.

Not sure how to respond to that. :eek:

I'm referring to people who tag on someone else's whole family when it isn't connected. I had someone do that. In the early days when I didn't know better I sent someone a gedcom. They were connected to my husbands side of the family. They added my side too I have never made that mistake since.

Kit

10-02-14, 10:04

I'm too lazy to do that. All the effort of attaching is too hard.

I hate adding sources, although I know it is important but I guess those who add a whole tree that doesn't belong to them don't bother with sources.

kiterunner

25-12-15, 16:23

These have been updated today. I wasn't expecting any "Findmypast Fridays" this week because of Christmas, but I have just seen the email, and they have added a :
Society of Genealogists index of BMD's (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-world-Records/british-in-india?utm_source=fmp&utm_medium=email&utm_content=739599-A-13-A&utm_campaign=fridays&utm_term=FMP-CAM-Fridays-251215-12-AU&dclid=CK-km9LC98kCFdg8GwodQzsL-Q)
and they have added extra records to the Births and Baptisms (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-world-Records/british-india-office-births-and-baptisms?utm_source=fmp&utm_medium=email&utm_content=739599-A-13-A&utm_campaign=fridays&utm_term=FMP-CAM-Fridays-251215-12-AU&dclid=CLbFvOzC98kCFceeGwodHNoALA)
and the Wills and Probate (http://search.findmypast.co.uk/search-world-Records/british-india-office-wills-and-probate?utm_source=fmp&utm_medium=email&utm_content=739599-A-13-A&utm_campaign=fridays&utm_term=FMP-CAM-Fridays-251215-12-AU&dclid=COH6of3C98kCFdU6GwodmOMGZg)

James18

25-12-15, 16:57

No results for Eighteen -- I was hoping my grandfather maybe had a secret family whilst he was serving in India. :p

Kit

25-12-15, 22:54

I wish they would say what is new. I've been through everything they had in the past and will now have to start all over again.

ElizabethHerts

09-02-18, 12:21

Over 56,000 records have been added to our collection of British in India records. The new additions consist contain biographical and service data on the families and officers of the East India Company taken from an index compiled by Lieutenant-Colonel Kendall Percy-Smith.

The collection allows you to explore names of British people who either lived, worked or travelled in India from as early as 1664 up to 1961. This collection includes carefully indexed records of births, marriages, divorces and deaths. With one record you may reveal numerous family names and extensive biographical details.

Kit

09-02-18, 22:33

Interesting. I wonder if my elusive people are in this new batch?

Thanks Eliza

Kit

13-02-18, 04:59

I wonder if my elusive people are in this new batch

My 4g grandmother is in the new batch. :d

Her surname only, no birth date, no parents names and she doesn't appear to die either. :rolleyes:

One step at a time.

Tilly Mint

13-02-18, 15:35

I still cant find my g grandmother, Julia Ansboro nee Henry. She is on all the birth certs I have for the children but I've not found her birth, marriage or death yet.....:mad: I have the cert for my g grandfathers 2nd wife - Minna Collins but no birth or death....I'm getting less patient now;)