Viewing Parish Registers - Searching the Records Online

Searching Parish Registers can be a pain, especially if you have to look through an entire book or volume of a particular Parish.

Fig. 1

Searching the records online, can be alot less hassle than travelling to your local County Record Office and going through the records to find an ancestor. Online, you can simply type in the name or place you are looking for, you with the click of a button you can have your results almost instantly.

Fig. 2 Fig. 3

The website that has the most Parish Register records available for people to search is TheGenealogist, and they are continuing to add more.

Searching for an Ancestor in the Parish Registers

To begin my search, I logged into TheGenealogist. I then chose to search "Derby Marriage Registers" for an ancestor (see Fig.1). Once I had chosen to search these marriage registers, I was presented with a search form - I simply had to type in my search terms (the name of my ancestor), and choose the Parish where they married. (If you are not sure of the Parish, there is the option to search all of them.)

Fig. 4

I typed "Thomas Jones" into the search box, and chose "Tickenhall 1628 - 1812" as the Parish (see Fig.2 & 3). I got two results for my search - I found my ancestor in the second result, married to Mary Baxter in 1748 (see Fig.4)