Press Release from Ancestry Canada
500 years of London history to launch online
– 77 million names
London, UK – 4 September, 2008 – The most comprehensive
collection of historical London records, covering 500 years
of the city’s history, is to be made available online
for the first time. Following a lengthy tendering process,
Ancestry[i] has secured the exclusive online rights to digitize
and host key records from London Metropolitan Archives (LMA)
and Guildhall Library Manuscripts.
LMA’s historical record collection, which is owned
and managed by the City of London, is considered to be of
international importance, particularly given London’s
prominence at the centre of the British Empire for almost
300 years from the mid-1700s.
As the City of London’s official partner, Ancestry,
which has a global network of nine family history websites,
will be responsible for providing access to The LMA Collection.
Original record images and more than 77 million names searchable
using key information such as name, date and place, will be
available on Ancestry.ca, Canada’s No.1 family and social
history website.
Dating from the early 16th Century through to 2006, the collection
details the lives of both princes and paupers. Included are
parish records, school records, electoral registers, wills,
lists of workhouse labourers from the Poor Law ledgers and
a comprehensive list of those granted ‘Freedom of the
City’ .
Ancestry.ca spokesperson Karen Peterson comments: “This
collection is particularly exciting for the family history
research industry because it breaks what we call the ‘1837
barrier’, which is the year official record keeping
began.”
“Again, advances in technology will enable so many
people, who previously were not able to physically find and
search through these rare records, the ability to do so with
ease.”
The collection will take several years to index and image.
Until now, those wishing to view records have had to visit
LMA or the Guildhall Library, both based in Central London.
Online access to LMA records has long been anticipated by
family history enthusiasts around the world: it will allow
millions of people with ancestors who lived in or passed through
London at some point in time to trace their roots, whether
it be to the City’s slums or its more affluent boroughs.
The first records will launch on Ancestry.ca in early 2009,
with the following prioritised for launch in the coming year:
· Parish records – records from more than 10,000
Greater London parish registers of baptisms, marriages and
burials dating from the 1530s to the 20th Century
· Poor Law documents - relating to the administration
of poor relief, including workhouse registers from 1834 onwards
· London school admissions – records from 843
individual London schools dating from the early Victorian
times through to 1911, providing admission and personal details
for millions of London students
Dr Deborah Jenkins, Assistant Director of the City of London’s
Department of Libraries, Archives and Guildhall Art Library,
comments: “It has always been the City of London’s
goal to make these important collections available to the
wider public through digitisation and so we are delighted
to announce Ancestry as our official partner in bringing 500
years of London’s history online.”
The records will be available to Ancestry’s World Deluxe
Members. Many Canadian genealogical societies and local libraries
will also have access to the records through their organisational
membership.
***** NOTE: The last paragraph
is applicable to anyone outside of UK, i.e. Ancestry.com or
Ancestry.ca.
Anyone with a UK membership,
upgraded to Premium, will be able to access these records
without changing to World Membership
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