Canadian WW1 Records

The website Canadiana has put online the militia lists of each unit of the Canadian Expeditionary Force as of August 1914 (the beginning of World War I). Each record lists the name of each member of the unit, rank, country of birth and date and place of enlistment. Some records also list next of kin and address. Canada was unprepared at the start of World War I. It had only 3,100 men under arms. As volunteers were quickly recruited and organized in Canada, members of the Canadian Expeditionary Force were sent to Europe to help reinforce these newly formed units. Therefore, when looking for ancestors in this collection, be aware that they most likely left Canada under one unit and then were reassigned to a different unit as soon as they arrived in Britain. This collection can be searched by keyword (such as name) and date range. Access is free.

Family History Month

August and Family History Month are now over.  Thanks to all those people who attended my classes in Rochester and Echuca - your enthusiasm has been greatly appreciated.  My apologies to those in Kyabram whose sessions were cancelled while I was ill, I hope to reschedule soon.  During September I will upload the handouts from all my classes onto the Campaspe Regional Library Genealogy page, and will try to keep them updated regularly.  Questions, comments and feedback will be welcomed.
I have always enjoyed running these classes and this year has been no exception.  Not only is it wonderful to see other people's enthusiasm for family history, preparing for and running these classes fires up my own enthusiasm as well.  There is always something new to discover, another hint to track down, another detail to add to my family history.  Not much housework this weekend - I'm going to be researching!
Thanks everyone - I hope to see you in the library again soon!

Naval Records on Ancestry

Ancestry has started a new collection of UK naval officers and ratings (non-commissioned seaman) service records for the period from 1802 to 1919. This encompasses the World War I time period. This collection of some 89,000 records consists primarily of pension applications and supporting service records. Officers and ratings were awarded pensions after 20 years of service in the Royal Navy. Typical information includes the name of the sailor, rank or rating, a list of ships and service dates and remarks. Some records also include muster and pay registers. Please note: no service records are listed past 1912. That means you can’t use this collection to find out what ships your ancestors served on in World War I.  Ancestry is a subscription database, but Ancestry Library Edition is free to use in any Campaspe Regional Library branch.

Change to English Marriage Certificates

David Cameron has announced that mothers’ names will be added to marriage certificates in England and Wales. Speaking to the Relationships Alliance on Tuesday (19 August), the Prime Minister said that the current system of only recording fathers “[did not] reflect modern Britain” and that he has asked the Home Office to address the situation. The announcement signals a victory for a major online campaign on Change.org that has been signed by over 70,000 supporters, including family historians.

Ancestry UK Naval Records

Ancestry.co.uk has started a new collection of UK naval officers and ratings (non-commissioned seaman) service records for the period from 1802 to 1919. This encompasses the World War I time period. This collection of some 89,000 records consists primarily of pension applications and supporting service records. Officers and ratings were awarded pensions after 20 years of service in the Royal Navy. Typical information includes the name of the sailor, rank or rating, a list of ships and service dates and remarks. Some records also include muster and pay registers. Please note: no service records are listed past 1912. That means you can’t use this collection to find out what ships your ancestors served on in World War I. Ancestry records can be accessed FREE on any public computers in Campaspe Regional Library or on your own device using our free wifi.

New Zealand WW1 Records

Archives New Zealand and the National Library have put online the World War I service files of some 141,000 individuals. This collection constitutes essentially of all of the WWI service records in the government’s possession. Many of the service records are several pages long and contain detailed information on each soldier (see examples below). This collection is part of the government’s WW100 centenary program. The service records can be searched by name or service number.

International Committee of the Red Cross

Millions of First World War prisoner records held by the International Committee of the Red Cross have been uploaded to the web for the first time.

Available for free through a new web portal, the vast collection provides details of people who were held in prisoner of war camps across Europe between 1914-1918.
Created by their captors, the records were submitted to the International Prisoners-of-War Agency, which was set up by the ICRC at the start of the conflict to help restore contact between prisoners and their families at home.
Researchers will generally be able to locate an index card for each individual, providing basic details about their imprisonment and reference numbers for any related documents held elsewhere in the database.
Cards containing tracing requests made by prisoners’ next of kin can also be consulted.
Although all civilian-internee index cards from the ICRC’s archives in Switzerland are now online, roughly 20 per cent of the cards for military prisoners from Belgium, France, the UK and Germany are yet to be digitised.
According to the organisation, the missing records will be steadily uploaded over the next six months, with approximately 5 million index cards representing 2.5 million prisoners of the war available through website by the end of 2014.

In addition, the ICRC has also uploaded a large collection of historic postcards and reports on the conditions in which internees were being held at camps across Europe, Egypt, India, Russia and Japan.
Thanks to Who Do You Think You Are Magazine for highlighting this resource.