Website Wednesday - London Lives

London Lives makes available, in a fully digitised and searchable form, a wide range of primary sources about eighteenth-century London, with a particular focus on plebeian Londoners. This resource includes over 240,000 manuscript and printed pages from eight London archives and is supplemented by fifteen datasets created by other projects. It provides access to historical records containing over 3.35 million name instances. Facilities are provided to allow users to link together records relating to the same individual, and to compile biographies of the best documented individuals.  

The lives of plebeian Londoners most often intersected with institutional records when they were caught up in the criminal justice system, or sought poor relief or medical treatment.  The choice of sources was designed to capture this pattern of interaction, but London Lives also seeks to include comprehensive archival collections. 

Criminal justice

• Old Bailey Proceedings, the largest printed source detailing the lives of non-elite people ever produced. 
• Ordinary's Accounts (OA): biographies of executed criminals written by the chaplain of Newgate Prison.
• Sessions Papers (PS): manuscript documents which provide additional evidence about the crimes tried at the Old Bailey and other courts, as well as documents concerning poor relief.
• Criminal Registers (CR): lists of prisoners held in Newgate Prison.
• Coroners's Inquests (IC): documents relating to deaths thought to be suspicious, but which did not result in a formal prosecution.

Poor Relief

Official responsibility for poor relief lay with London's parishes, of which there were more than one hundred, many of which have left very rich archives. The records of three parishes have been comprehensively digitised for this project:

• St Botolph Aldgate (straddling the eastern boundary between the City of London and Middlesex)
• St Clement Danes (Westminster)
• St Dionis Backchurch (City of London)

These parishes were chosen for the quality of their records, and the extent to which they exemplify different parts of London. Each of the selected parishes had a distinctive social and occupational composition. These records are supplemented with externally created datasets of settlement and workhouse records from two further parishes:

• St Martin in the Fields (Westminster)
• St Luke Chelsea (just to the west of the built up area of London)

Charity for the poor 

Charity also came from the guilds and associational charities.  The database includes the records of one London guild, the Carpenters' Company. This was one of the less prestigious companies and included a number of plebeian members. It also distributed considerable charitable funds to its members.  Also included are partial transcriptions of the registers of the Marine Society, a charity which provided training at sea for poor boys.

Medical care 

Medical care for the poor was provided in parochial workhouses, reflected in the parish records, and hospitals.  The database includes the records of one of the royal hospitals, St Thomas's Hospital, including its detailed admissions and discharge registers.

New Records for the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland

Many genealogists with Irish ancestry are familiar with the fate of the Public Record Office of Dunbin.  On 30 June 1922, Office was destroyed in a fire during the Irish Civil War. Centuries of Irish historical records were lost, including many of those relating to family history. 

 
In 2022, to mark the 100^th anniversary of the fire, the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland (VRTI) was launched – an ambitious attempt to reconstruct the Public Record Office of Ireland with digitised copies of Irish documents from around the world.  The treasury is an ever-growing, open-access resource, freely and permanently available online to all those interested in Ireland’s deep history, at home and abroad.

On 30 June 2025, to mark its third anniversary, the VRTI announced that it had added a major new collection of records, including 60,000 19^th-century census records.

A spokesperson for the VRTI has said that although some of the new census records on the VRTI include the census fragments already available on the National Archives of Ireland’s website, the majority were new collections, from transcripts and duplicates from archives and other cultural institutions across the island of Ireland and around the world.

Dr Peter Crooks of Trinity College Dublin, Academic Director of the VRTI, said: “What we have uncovered after years of painstaking archival work will help families across the world trace their story deeper into the Irish past.”

So take a look at the VRTI and see what records they may have to help you discover more about your Irish ancestors.

Week 27 (July 2-8) Family Business

This week 52 Ancestors is focusing on 'Family Business'.  While many of my ancestors were farmers and farm labourers, there were also a number of business owners, including my great great grandfather John Thompson Argent.

John Thompson Argent was born 3 November 1819 in West Bergholt, Essex and baptised 10 December 1819, the son of John Argent and Amy (Watts).

 John's father, also named John, was listed as a miller on his son's baptism record.  John Senior ran the Newbridge Mill in West Bergholt, and John Junior would grow up to learn the trade from his father.  

The family can be followed through the census records with both father and son listed as living at Newbridge Mill, West Bergholt in the 1841 census.  By the 1851 census John Jr has taken over the mill from his father and is listed as a miller and farmer of 100 acres living with his wife Emma, son John and daughters Emma and Ada, as well as 2 servants.  The same census lists John Senior as Miller and Farmer living in Crouch Street, St Mary at the Walls, Colchester.

Newbridge Mill, West Bergholt

John Thompson Argent continues to be listed as Miller and Farmer at Newbridge Mill in the 1861, 1871, 1881 and 1891 censuses, running this business until his death on 22 January 1894.

Website Wednesday - The Digital Panopticon

The Digital Panopticon traces London convicts in Britain and Australia, 1780-1925.  The database traces the lives of 90,000 convicts sentenced at the Old Bailey between 1780 and 1875, linking Old Bailey trials to relevant entries in fifty databases of criminal justice and civil records. The 'Life Archives' allow users to discover both the pre- and post-trial histories of Old Bailey convicts. They allow users to see differences between the punishment sentences handed down by the court and the punishments convicts actually experienced, and make it possible to compare the impact of imprisonment and transportation on convicts' lives. 

Datasets include :

Trial Records

• Old Bailey Proceedings 1740-1913
• Old Bailey Associated Records 1740-1834
• Newgate Calendars of Prisoners for Trial 1782-1853
• England and Wales Criminal Registers 1791-1892

Post-Trial and Sentencing Records

• Capital Convictions at the Old Bailey 1760-1837
• Home Office Criminal Entry Books 1782-1876
• Judges Reports on Criminals 1784-1827
• Petitions for Pardon 1797-1858

Transportation Records

• Middlesex Convicts Delivered For Transportation 1785-1792
• British Transportation Registers 1787-1867
• Convict Indents (Ship and Arrival Registers) 1788-1868
• Surgeons Notes from Transport Vessels 1817-1857

Colony Records

• New South Wales Convict Indexes 1788-1873
• New South Wales Convict Savings Bank Books 1824-1868
• Van Diemen's Land Founders and Survivors Convicts 1802-1853
• Van Diemen's Land Founders and Survivors Convict Biographies 1812-1853
• Van Diemen's Land Convict Labour Contracts 1848-1857
• Western Australia Character Books and General Registers 1850-1868
• Western Australia Convict Probation Records 1850-1868

Imprisonment Records

• Bridewell House of Correction Prisoners 1740-1795
• Deaths in London Prisons 1760-1869
• Hulks Registers 1801-1879
• Prison Registers 1770-1951
• Middlesex House of Detention Calendars 1836-1889
• Newgate Calendars of Prisoners 1855-1931
• UK Convict Prison Captions and Transfer Papers 1843-1871
• UK Licences for the Parole of Convicts 1853-1925
• Metropolitan Police Register of Habitual Criminals 1881-1925
• Prisoner Photograph Albums 1871-1873

Records of Convict Tattoos

• Tattoos, 1793-1925

Civil Records

• Records Associated with London Lives 1740-1800
• Census Returns for England and Wales 1841-1911
• FreeBMD Deaths, 1837-1925 

Week 26 (June 25-July 1) Favorite Name

The given names of our eighteenth and nineteenth century British ancestors were drawn from a surprisingly small pool.  The four most popular male names were carried by one in every two males, and the top thirteen male names were carried by 87% of the male population.

In the 1700s the top five names for each gender were :
Boys - John, William, Thomas, Richard and James
Girls - Mary, Elizabeth, Ann, Sarah and Jane

In the 1800s the top five names for each gender were :
Boys - John, William, James, George and Charles
Girls - Mary, Anna, Emma, Elizabeth and Margaret

There were, of course, always fads among names - copying that of the current Monarch and their family, for example, or using a traditional name common in your own family, or following popular fads.  Horatio, for example, made a brief surge in popularity after Nelson's victory at Trafalgar.  Similarly, Adolf disappeared from German communities after World War 2.

Then there were also the commonly used spelling variations, abbreviations and diminutives.  For example, if you don’t know that Polly was a diminutive of Mary or that Nellie was a diminutive of Ellen and Eleanor and Helen, you may struggle to find your ancestors’ entries.  Harry for Henry, Bill for William, Fred or Alf for Alfred, Dick for Richard, Charlie or Lottie for Charlotte, Maggie, Meg or Maisie for Margaret.  Elizabeth was another extremely common name with multiple diminutives - Eliza, Liz, Lizzie, Betty, Betsy, Beth, Bessie, Lisbeth, Liza - the list goes on.  

I have one female ancestor, baptised Elizabeth, who was known throughout her life as Betsy.  This was the name she used in census records, her children's birth/baptism records and on her death certificate and burial record.  The only time I can ever find her referred to as Elizabeth is at her baptism.

Family Tree US Magazine

The latest issue of Family Tree US magazine is now available free online for Campaspe Library members via our subscription to Libby eMagazines. 

Inside this month's issue :  

• What's in a (Papal) name?
• Tear down that brick wall
• 23andMe declares bankruptcy
• Budget cuts threaten libraries and archives
• Military Honors
• Best websites
• Signs of life : vital records
• America the beautiful
• Book reports
• Tree tips
• Fraternal records
• Using the FamilySearch Catalogues
• Saving diaries, calendars and planners
• Using record hints
• Organising genelaogy 

Website Wednesday - Families in British India Society

Did your family spend time in India during the time of British rule?   The Families In British India Society (FIBIS) is a self-help organisation devoted to members researching their British India family history and the background against which their ancestors led their lives in India under British rule.

Their database has a number of resources available to search, and recently 15,376 names from the Times of India arrival and departure notices for 1896 have now been uploaded to the FIBIS database website. This batch comprises of 8,023 arrivals and 7,353 departures and brings the total number of arrival and departure notices transcribed by this project to 501,298.

The FIBIS database contains a number of other resources, including bonds, cemeteries and monuments, censuses, civil service records, directories, maritime records, military records, railways, schools and orphanages, and wills and probate.  All are fee to search.