Milltown Burial Records

If you are researching relatives who lived in Belfast and were Roman Catholic, then chances are you will come across Milltown Cemetery – Belfast’s largest burial ground, located deep in the West of the city.

Tom Hartley's excellent book about Milltown

Milltown is in close proximity to Belfast City Cemetery, which is owned by the Council and therefore included in this invaluable online database of interred individuals.

Milltown, however, is not owned by the Council and therefore is not included in the database. So, if you wish to do some research on the present locations of some ancestors’ burial spots, you might have to do a bit more leg-work.

Thankfully, Milltown houses an office right at its entrance where you can direct such enquiries (either in person or via telephone on +44 28 9061 3972), but they are only able to help locate graves for which you have the exact names of the persons in question, as well as the dates on which they died.

For deaths that took place more than 50 years ago, the best / free method of identifying dates of death is through the online GRONI search facility, but if you happen to be in Belfast, then you might prefer using the microfiche copies of Milltown’s burial records, which are held at PRONI under reference MIC1D/91. These records contain:

• The name of the deceased.
• The age of the deceased.
• The last address of the deceased.
• The longitude/latitude of the grave’s location.

Additional records held under MIC1D/91/4 can be cross-referenced to tell you who purchased the grave plots in the first place.

If you make the trip to Milltown, you will  find the staff quite helpful. However, even if they are able to give you the section number and approximate row in which to find the grave, faded inscriptions and overgrown grass can make this a tricky exercise. Milltown is notoriously crowded and difficult to manoeuvre around, so this process requires a bit of a patience.

My great-uncle's plaque was hidden for years at Milltown due to overgrown bushes.

So, what I would advise is that once you find the right section, look along the sides of the headstones and try to find ones with readable grave numbers. Each section is organised by lettered rows; within each row, the graves are numbered in order from left-to right, so if you are given a grave location such as WD-24, go to one of the latter rows and try to spot some Ws. This will give you a rough indicator of where to focus your search.

Copyright: Tom Hartley

If all of this sounds like tedious, time-consuming guesswork, then you are absolutely correct. Some people get lucky and have living relatives who know the location of every single grave in the family. Others, like myself, spend an hour trampling over resting places overflowing with soil, searching for the right spot, only to find an empty space where the headstone should be.

So, just be advised that if you intend to undertake some grave-searching, bring some thick boots, a notebook, and steely determination.

Workhouse Records

A major focus of my genealogical research has been on Workhouses, the 19^th century institutions that took in thousands of people in various stages of despair and destitution.

Copyright: National Archives

Often, the Workhouse rears its head when you are trying to obtain information on where an ancestor was born or died. If either event occurred in the Workhouse, then the Workhouse will be recorded on the certificate, but not much other information will be given. You might want to know:

• How long were they in the Workhouse?
• On what date did they enter?
• Did they go in alone?
• What was the reason for entering?

Depending on the period of time you are looking at, there can be different answers for each of the above questions, so what I want to focus on is how you can best navigate the multitude of records that survive for the Workhouse, and making sure that you use all that is available to you.

In the case of the Belfast Workhouse, I started my quest at PRONI on the eCatalogue Search. A simple search for ‘Workhouse’ brings up over 1100 results, so you can save yourself some time that I didn’t by browsing instead for the Belfast Board of Guardians index (if you are searching for another Workhouse in Northern Ireland, then refer to this index page instead.)

From here, you will get an overview of every type of record that is held on that Workhouse, including:

• Indoor Registers.
• Minute Books.
• Record of Operations.
• Return of Births.
• Return of Deaths.

This is where it falls to you to connect the dots.

To use myself as an example again, I tend to start with the Returns of Births/Deaths if I have a specific event in mind to research. These are ordered by the months that they cover and are easy to order up (assuming the event occurred more than 100 years ago – otherwise you are looking at a Freedom of Information request.)

Once you have located the event in the register book, you should see a reference number in the far-left column and/or in an ‘Observation’ column further along. The number on the left is typically to reflect a person’s chronological entry in the current book, while the other number is typically to reflect a person’s entry in another book – likely the Indoor Register.

In this case, order up the Indoor Registers (same procedure) and browse chronologically until you come to the person’s number and it could tell you:

• Age and date when he/she first entered the Workhouse.
• If he/she came with family.
• Where he/she had been living.
• His/her occupation.
• When he/she left the Workhouse (or died there.)

My 2x-great-grandmther's Indoor Register entry.

Even if this gives you all of the information that you sought, it is still worth your time looking through the Minute Books in case any reference is made to your ancestor. Honestly, this can be a long shot, but if you do find a reference then it can give some depth to his/her situation.

As I mentioned earlier, reasons for entering the Workhouse varied as time went on. Where illegitimate pregnancy might have been the cause of a 6-month stay in the 1890's, a short-term medical emergency could have been the reason in the 1930's (as was the case with two separate ancestors of mine.)

So, if you hear/see 'Workhouse' and feel alarm bells going off, just seek out your local public record office and start putting together the pieces of the puzzle.

If you have any problems in that regard or have questions about anything I have discussed here, then please get in touch. Always happy to help.

Public Record Office of Northern Ireland

I first came to learn about the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI) when I enquired about any surviving records for the old Belfast Workhouse, as I knew that my great-grandmother had been born there in May 1900. While reading through discussions about the Workhouse on Belfast Forum, I kept seeing this five-digit acronym and decided to see for myself what is was all about. The official website told me that all I needed to visit was a piece of formal identification, so off I went the next day on my first trip, armed with my Passport and not a clue of what to do when I got there.

It was as straightforward as everyone made it out to be: go in the revolving front door, speak to the staff at Reception, fill in a 1-page form, show your ID, sit for a photo, and voila: you are a full-fledged PRONI member.

Copyright: DCAL

I remember being unquestionably intimidated by the scale of this building. It isn’t big in any grand, skyscraper sort of way, but right from the moment of entry you get the sense of what a large undertaking had and was still going on in order to hold all of the information that is contained within its walls. I happened to be visiting with a friend, but for any solo first-timers, it is easy to feel isolated and unsure of what to do. So, if you go there alone:

My first tip: make sure that you have pressed your membership card against the keypad at reception before you venture upstairs. After literally hundreds of visits, I still get to the Search Room, swipe my card, realise it is not activated, and then have to trek back down to Reception.

My second tip: spend some time by yourself on the computers in the Search Room that let you browse the entire PRONI index. You will do yourself a massive favour if you spend some time getting to know what types of materials PRONI holds, how to order them up, and even what the reference codes mean (I feel like I should have BG/7 tattooed on my forehead at this point.)

Copyright: British Genes

My third tip: bring some loose change with you. For little over £1, you can get a photocopy card with 5 credits. This is a godsend for when you want to print off records held on microfilm (e.g. baptisms, marriages, grave purchases.) Also, the nearest ATM is at the Odyssey Arena, so unless you want to be running back and forth across Titanic Quarter every time you want a scan of a 1903 street directory, try to remember to stick a few silver coins in your pocket.

Other than that, PRONI is what you make of it. If you spend half a day there, you will hear accents from North America, Canada, Australia, Eastern Europe, Asia, and anywhere else that a long-gone Irish clan lay down some roots more than a lifetime ago.

PRONI can be particularly useful for tracing more recent ancestors, especially compared to the pricier General Register Office office in Belfast city centre. For example, I had been told about a great-great-aunt who I never knew about, but wanted to uncover as much as possible. I didn't have enough to go on to find her in the 1911 census, so I was at a loss where to start. But finding her address on a 1916 school record for my great-grandmother (yep, *that* one) I was able to go through the directories held at PRONI and open for free consultation at all times in the Search Room. I went through them one-by-one and found her at that 1916 address all the way up until 1944. Then, travelling a whole 4 feet to the microfilm reel for Milltown’s burial records, I scanned through the pages for 1944, and within a few minutes I had found her date of death and grave-site - all without spending a penny.

Personally, the most exciting set of records held by PRONI is the 1939 National Register. After 1911, it is the nearest thing to a census that we have, as it will give the names, ages, and occupations of each person at a given address. Using the online enquiry form, you can apply for access to your family's entry, provided you have an exact or close estimation of their address. It is hoped that the entire Register will soon be available to view digitally, but until then, PRONI is the only way you are going to find out how your Northern Irish family was faring at the outbreak of World War II and introduction of ration books.

Redacted copy of my paternal grandparents' entry.

PRONI is and will hopefully remain the first port of call for anyone wanting to research Irish history. It holds millions of records in what must be an endless storage area (think of the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark) and yet, I had never heard of it before March 2013. In a nice twist of fate, I wound up working next door just 6 months later, and since then I continue to use as many lunch-breaks and early finishes as possible to get lost in its archives.

Copyright: Donal McCann

Learn more about PRONI and what it does by watching this short video below: