Welcome to the Family History Social

This week TheGenealogist has expanded its growing headstone and war memorial record collections with some interesting new additions to both. The headstone records cover 53 new cemeteries and the various war memorials are from Australia, Britain, Canada and the USA.

The International Headstone collection is an ongoing project where every stone photographed or transcribed earns volunteers credits, which they can spend on subscriptions at TheGenealogist.co.uk or products from GenealogySupplies.com. If you would like to join, you can find out more about the scheme at: https://ukindexer.co.uk/headstone/

  Anthony Eden, Earl of Avon’s grave in Alvediston, Wiltshire on TheGenealogist

The headstone for the Earl of Avon, Anthony Eden, is included in this release. This politician served three periods as British Foreign Secretary and then succeeded Winston Churchill as Prime Minister from 1955 to 1957. He is laid to rest at Alvediston in Wiltshire.

Anthony Eden, Earl of Avon’s grave in Alvediston, Wiltshire on TheGenealogist

Also published online this week are an additional 64,920 War Memorial records which include a complete roll of honour for both WW1 and WW2 for Shetland, with men's units and the Shetland village in which they had resided. There are other war memorials in this release that cover the country including the Abercarn Tinplaters Memorial Institute in Wales. There are plaques and monuments in Bedford, Bolton, Lancashire, London, Merseyside, Greater Manchester, Warwickshire and even further afield in Canada, Western Australia and the USA. One of the Canadian memorials is a fascinating, but sadly very worn, WW2 memorial from Calgary in Canada that names 227 aircrew from Australia and New Zealand who died while training in Calgary, revealing just how dangerous WW2 aviation was.

War Memorial at Battery Park, New York, USA, on TheGenealogist

From the USA TheGenealogist has uploaded some WW1 and WW2 war memorials from New York, including a fine one in Battery Park. This is a roll of those men and women who lost their lives in the Atlantic coastal waters in WW2 and had no known grave as a result of U-boat action. The war memorial gives researchers the ranks, units and the US state from which they had come, and the shockingly large number of Americans included is a salutary lesson when in Britain we are often only aware of our own countrymen/women who died at sea from enemy action against the convoys.

Lastly there are a number of Boer War memorials - for example the tribute within Blackpool Town Hall that commemorates the 74 Blackpool men who volunteered to join various units for service in South Africa.

These new records are all available as part of the Diamond Subscription at TheGenealogist.

To find out more about the UKIndexer volunteer project, you can read the following article:

https://www.thegenealogist.co.uk/featuredarticles/2018/family-history-can-be-a-rewarding-hobby-790/

New records to search from TheGenealogist

Edward Bright by David Ogborne http://www.itsaboutmaldon.co.uk/edwardbright/) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

• Containing names and address details for subscribers the telephone directories are a useful resource for discovering ancestors who had a phone
• Find private names and small businessmen’s addresses. If your ancestor worked as a fishmonger, butcher, ironmonger or bootmaker, then all these and more feature in the fascinating records.
• The difference between the turn of the century directories and the 1938 South Wales District Directory is marked by the number of new telephone subscribers, so making it possible to find many more ancestor’s names and addresses.

• These new records reveal the names of U.S. military as well as U.S. and some Allied civilians who were prisoners of war and internees
• Covering the years 1942 - 1947, Prisoners of both Germany and Japan are included in this collection
• The record for each prisoner provides:
  • Name
  • Casualty status
  • Rank
  • Service number
  • PoW camp
  • Regiment, branch of service or civilian status
  • Home town or place of enlistment
  • Date reported
  • Race
  • State of residence

Robert A “Bob” Hoover by WPPilot (Own work)

[CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Prisoner of War records on TheGenealogist.

Leading British Genealogy Website, TheGenealogist, has added over 150,000 World War II Prisoner of War records to its already significant military records collection. These new records detail Officers and other ranks from the British Army, Royal Navy, RAF and those members of the British Empire land forces that were held as Prisoners of War in Germany and German Occupied territories.

This release will allow researchers to discover servicemen held by the Germans between 1939-1945 and includes many of the brave escapees whose stories of breaking out and dashing to freedom have captured the imagination for decades.

These records allow us to:

• Research POWs who served in Armies and other land forces of Britain and the Empire 1939-45 along with the Naval and Air Forces of Great Britain and the Empire 1939-1945

• Find names and details of men who were captured and incarcerated in German POW camps in Europe

• Check the details such as names, service numbers, and regiments of ancestors that were German POWs

• Search for daring escapees from within the camp lists

• Research where your military ancestors were held, revealing their camp number and location

• Discover the ranks, POW numbers, Service numbers and Regiments of those held

Covering the Nazi German camps in Europe, these lists are taken from official alphabetical nominal registers and reveal names and other particulars of:

• 94,608 British POWs in Germany, including Officers and other ranks

• 39,805 POWs from Empire Land Forces

• 19,250 Naval & Air Force POWs from Britain & its Empire

Joining an already comprehensive range of military records on TheGenealogist that span from 1661 to the 1940s, these lists are a useful addition for researchers. TheGenealogist’s military collections already include Army, Navy and Air Force Lists, Dambuster records, First World War POWs, plus many other records.

Examining some of the names of WWII Prisoners of War released online at TheGenealogist.co.uk allows us to uncover the brave and determined Allied servicemen who made escape attempts from the Nazi German PoW Camps. One brave serviceman, although hampered by being a double amputee from an air accident from before the war, still did his duty to try and escape.

The famous WW2 Air Ace with no legs - Douglas Bader

Recent developments at TheGenealogist have seen the release of over 650,000 individuals who died in the First World War. Details include name, rank, regiment, place of birth, place of residence, place of enlistment, service number and the cause, date and place of death. These records are uniquely linked to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to show you where your ancestor is commemorated.

Soldiers Who Died in the Great War has been added to the huge military collection on TheGenealogist, encompassing many unique record sets from Casualty Lists and War Memorials,  to Rolls of Honour and much more.

Further details are available from TheGenealogist website.

From Senior Officers captured, to the NCOs and Privates in the Infantry, the records are all found in the exclusive ‘Prisoner of War’ collection on TheGenealogist.  You can search all ranks for the first time on any family history website, giving access to the many soldiers, sailors and airmen captured and held behind enemy lines.

The records are fully searchable and provide the main details including, forename, surname, rank, regiment and the date the information was received. Records are found quickly and easily using the specific ‘Prisoner of War’ interface on TheGenealogist. 

Mark Bayley, Head of Online Content at TheGenealogist comments: “The new Prisoner of War records we’ve published are a great new unique resource for all family historians. If our ancestors were either officers or in the lower ranks, there’s now more chance than ever to discover their details including when they were taken prisoner and when they were released. Sadly many men never returned and our records will hopefully show the brave men who endured the terrible hardships of the Prisoner of War camps will not be forgotten and can now easily be traced by their descendants.”

More details can be found here on TheGenealogist.