Two more local histories of London at British History Online

British History Online has added two more local histories of London:

• Old and New London, volume 6 (1878) by Edward Walford, which "describes the southern suburbs of London, from Chiswick, Putney and Hammersmith in the west, to Streatham and Norwood in the south, and Southwark, Bermondsey, Greenwich and Eltham in the east"; and
• The Environs of London, volume 1, County of Surrey (1792) by Daniel Lysons, which "covers much of present-day south London, including Bermondsey, Croydon, Kingston-upon-Thames and Lambeth".

Advertising Standards Authority upholds complaints against Ancestry.co.uk

The Advertising Standards Authority (UK) has upheld complaints against a magazine ad placed by Ancestry.co.uk. The ASA found that

• the ad's claims about online access to censuses (in a Scottish edition of the magazine) were misleading because Ancestry did not offer access to Scottish censuses (although it has since added a transcript for 1841, as I wrote about two weeks ago);
• the ad's phrase "everything you'll ever need to research your family tree" was misleading because Ancestry does not provide copies of documents such as parish registers and BMD certificates; and
• the ad's "free access" claim was not misleading, even though full use requires a subscription, because it referred only to the BMD index, which is indeed free (although it requires users to register).

The Advertising Standards Authority is an independent body set up by the advertising industry, not a government regulator.

Updates at FreeBMD and FreeCEN

On June 26th, another 1.2 million records were added to FreeBMD: 717 thousand births, 455 thousand marriages, and 58 thousand deaths. Included, among others, are

• 141 thousand births from 1855,
• 123 thousand births from 1865,
• 94 thousand births from 1869,
• 86 thousand births from 1851, and
• 63 thousand births from 1880.

And on June 24th, FreeCEN added census data from

• Argyllshire, Ayrshire, Dumfries-shire, Lanarkshire, Midlothian, Morayshire, and Ross and Cromarty in 1841;
• Aberdeenshire, Ayrshire, Bute, Cornwall, Midlothian, Morayshire, and Roxburghshire in 1851;
• Cornwall, Devon, Hampshire, Lancashire, Lincolnshire, Sussex, Staffordshire, and Yorkshire (West Riding) in 1861;
• Cornwall, Denbighshire, and Herefordshire in 1871;
• Cornwall in 1881; and
• Norfolk, Nottinghamshire, Sussex, and Yorkshire (West Riding) in 1891.

This brings the FreeCEN database to a grand total of 7.7 million individuals.

New search engine for Rootsweb mailing lists

A new search engine for the Rootsweb mailing lists lets you search across multiple lists and time periods.

Apprentice carpenters, 1654-1694

British History Online has posted a transcript of Records of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters, Volume I: Apprentices' Entry Books 1654-1694. This book, originally published in 1913, includes "records of nearly 3,000 apprentices, their families and places of origin, and the member of the Company to whom they were bound." A name index is included. Some entries are in Latin.

FreeBMD updated

FreeBMD was updated on June 9th, with the addition of 2.3 million records. The new records include, among others,

• 264 thousand births from 1865,
• 204 thousand births from 1880,
• 155 thousand births from 1839,
• 132 thousand marriages from 1882, and
• 86 thousand births from 1838.

FreeBMD now contains 151 million English and Welsh civil registration records. (Of these, 117 million are distinct. The duplicates are intentionally double-keyed to help ensure accuracy.)

Teacher registrations (1870-1948) at British Origins

British Origins has added a database with information on nearly 100,000 teachers, most of them in England and Wales. The records come originally from the the Teachers Registration Council, which operated a voluntary register from 1914 to 1948. Some of the registered teachers began their careers as early as 1870. When registration was abandoned in 1948, the records were deposited with the Society of Genealogists.

1841 Scotland census at Ancestry

Ancestry.com now has the 1841 census of Scotland. This is a transcript, with no linked images. Tip: You have to click on an individual (i.e. "view record") to see the occupation (if any) and the address. These never appear when viewing a table of search results or even in the table you get from "view other family members". Here's hoping that images will be added soon.