Genealogy Chat

I would like to thank Ann for contacting me and explaining in very clear detail how to use Ancestry free searches to look at images. This has put a new lease of life and usefulness into Ancestry, and her tip has saved me hours of useless trawling through miles of irrelevant search results, which always ignore my criteria when I'm looking for a specific BMD reference. This site and the people who use it are worth their weight in gold !

Thanks Helen, for the formatting tip off. I couldn't understand why when I re-edited my post it didn't make any difference to the formatting. That is most peculiar, isn't it ?. In a nutshell then, you cannot start a new line by pressing the<enter> key when writing out the first post of a thread ! (or pasting in a formatted passage created in notepad) . I hope GR administrators are aware of this since it doesn't half mess things up !

Rachel, Thank you for the tip off. I had difficulty understanding what you were telling me because you forgot to tell me I was supposed to be looking at the original scan image, which is of the index page. Having sussed this out I still struggled to read it until I chose JPEG as the format to read it in, then enlarged it . I'm not surprised it was mistranscribed having seen it, but I agree that it most looks like page 523 rather than 323. Mystery solved , thank you very much . I've learned something new. Frank

Regarding your format of the initial request - GR always crunches up the first message, no matter HOW many carriage returns you do (interesting its still called this, even when there is no longer a carriage to return!) What to do in future is to put the first message as 'see below' and then add your request as a reply to your own thread. That way all your paragraphs will be preserved. nell

My great grandfather and g grandmother are in the index on different pages!!! (Yes really, on the micro fiche in the library) They are apparently nowhere near each other - I always assumed it was an error in the original index. Fortunately you only need one of a couple to send for the certificate! Anne

Frank On FreeBMD if you click on the glasses symbol at the side of a transcribed entry it tkaes you to the index page. If you look, the page number is 523 not 323 for Mr Odd.

Thanks Jim, I hadn't considered alternative spellings fro Amelia Merton , which seems to be a possibility . However it is spelt , unfortunately I can't tie her up with ArthurThomas Odd . They seem to have married in the same quarter of the same year in the same area but are on completely different pages ! I have sent for my father in laws birth certificate which should give the correct names of both parties I'm searching for in this wedding, hopefully with correct spellings. This hopefully will clarify matters, but I may have given the Register Office the wrong spelling for my grandma in law ... Merton (or its soundalike) .

Name: Amela Mehrtens Year of Registration: 1907 Quarter of Registration: Jan-Feb-Mar District: Islington County: Greater London, London, Middlesex Volume: 1b Page: 523 zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz HAVE SEEN IMAGE Amelia Mehrtens

Frank I don't know if you can search only using a page number, either. I only meant you could search under the name Amelia Merton to see if her marriage entry details were the same as Arthur's.

Thanks folks, he should have married Amelia Merton, her marriage so far not found on Free BMD , so I'm still looking. Thanks ! PS i don't know how to use Ancestry free to view when I know a page number. I only see names and years being asked for. ? ?

If you know who he married, do a search for her and see what turns up.

If you look on Ancestry (free to view indexes), the page number looks like 1b 523. If you already know the spouse's name, you could check that her marriage entry is the same number.

they probably made a mistake transcribing the page numbers. If that's the filed used to group entries, then you will see msileading results. You can check the oroginal images on ancestry. Jim

I'm using FreeBMD to look up the marriage details of Arthur Thomas Odd..born c1888. Islington) and this is what I find on page 323:- ---------------------------- Marriages Mar 1907 ----------------------------- HALLETT Emma Islington 1b 323 Hurndell Fred Islington 1b 323 Hurndell Frederick Islington 1b 323 Odd Arthur Thomas Islington 1b 323 Sullivan John Islington 1b 323 According to Free BMD that year 1907 marriages are 100% transcribed and there are only supposed to be 2 entries per page in that year. Clearly Emma Hallett didn't marry 4 men on that day. So what has gone wrong here ? I know who Arthur Thomas Odd is supposed to have married, and she isn't on this page, unless unkown to his decendants he married Emma Hallett and later re-married. Can anyone shed any light on this please ? >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Edited to try to improve formatting, for some reason all the 'new line' carriage returns haven't worked.