This register served as an emergency census at the outbreak of World War II and was used in part to handle applications for ration books. It is free to carry out a search, but it will cost you £6.95 to view a full page from the original Record.
This register is a fantastic resource because, after the 1911 census, it is the most up-to-date record of the population that is accessible for all to see. This Register will give you, among other things:
- Names of all people living in a household.
- Dates of birth.
- Occupations.
- Marital Status.
While the release at Find My Past covers only England and Wales, the Northern Irish edition is held by PRONI and is available to the public under the Freedom of Information Act. If you send off a quick message using PRONI's online enquiry form with the names and addresses of the people you would like to find in the 1939 Register, then PRONI should have no problem in releasing their entries to you.
However, both PRONI and Find My Past only release information covering those born over 100 years ago, so you will have to supply the death certificates at your own cost if you wish to obtain the entries for anyone who is deceased but was born less than 100 years ago.
Personally, I am thrilled by this release. My great-great grandmother moved to Liverpool in the early 1900s and I never knew her date of birth. Now, thanks to the 1939 Register, I can check off one more item on my Family History Bucket List.
As with any database that involves transcribing old handwriting, there are some errors to be found in the names, but thankfully the Advanced Search facility allows the public to search by Street Name and other options to help locate the people you wish to find.
The folks over at Find My Past really deserve more thanks than I can give them. This was a huge project to undertake, and no doubt required a great deal of funding and hard work to see through. The contribution this will make to twentieth-century genealogical research cannot be overstated.
Just a great pity that Findmypast couldn't be bothered to recognise the hard work of Guy Etchells and myself (Steven Smyrl, working through CIGO), without which this launch would never have been possible. We both successfully lobbied for public access to data from the National Register by challenging the NHS Information Service's stance that the public had no right of access to any data recorded. We raised the issue with the UK Information Commissioner and won!
ReplyDeleteIt's just a great a pity that Big Business can't acknowledge the vital work of the little guys through whose work they stand to make so much money!
www.cigo.ie