Liverpool & South West Lancashire FHS - Forum

I am new to tracing family history but saw as website regarding a project relating to St Anthonys database that mentioned it would hold details on Irish immigrants- I tried to get more information by emailing on the address given on the website but the emails bounced back as undelivered. I also sent a note to the address given on Scotland Road but have not received a reply. I wondered if anyone new if it is a current project or if its an old out of date website or if anyone has used it & if so what sort of information do they hold and how do you get access to that information.

I am visiting Liverpool in a couple of weeks and I am planning a visit to the Central Library to get an idea of what records etc they hold and what I can access there. For my first visit I was planning to go on a Tuesday when the Help desk is available . I presume I will need to join the library to access any records? And if I do join then can anything be accessed from my own PC or can they only be accessed on site at the Central Library?

Hi and welcome to the forum.

I have an idea that this database has been down for quite a while, you could check whether a copy has been deposited with the Liverpool Record Office, however there may not be any more detail than the baptisms, marriages and burials which you can search either for the earlier years on Ancestry, or many later years are available on microfilm at the library.

Good to see you will be visiting, bring two forms of ID with you, gas and electric bills will do fine, and get yourself a readers card, this will enable you to use the computers and also the archives. Microfilms and fiches are freely available to use.

You can search the catalogue here https://liverpool.gov.uk/libraries/arch ... y-history/ and also if you think some of what you would like to see might be in document form in the archives, using this contact page you can order them booking a place in the archives for the time you want to search. You should give them 48 hours notice to have archives available.

Using your readers card, the library computers have both Ancestry and Findmypast freely available.

As Mary said this website has been unavailable for some time. It was an ambitious project and perhaps they tried to do too much then abandoned the project or perhaps the volunteers involved moved on to other things and were not replaced? A few years ago I posted on here about the database including non-RC records. A lot of the burial records on the database were from St Mary's CE (Parish) Cemetery, Cambridge Street. One of the problems with documenting Irish migration and the Famine era in particular is the absence of identifying information on burial records.

The St Anthony's Database included burials of non-Irish C of E people because there was no way to determine who was and who wasn't Irish from the burial records. It was also difficult to separate English born Catholics from Irish-born Catholics they would have needed to look into each person's background to make a judgement as to whether they were a migrant or not. Even when you can identify an Irish RC burial you don't know exactly when they arrived in Liverpool because the journey between Ireland and England was internal travel, like going from Scotland to England, so no travel or immigration records. You could suggest that a burial around 1847 for someone with an Irish surname was due to the Famine but they could have been in Liverpool pre-Famine. Even if you look at the death certificate and it says Fever they could have still been long-term residents of Liverpool as Famine Fever also killed English people.

St Mary's is no longer a cemetery it has been built on but there is a plaque nearby with some information on it. I don't know where they got the figures from it looks like an estimate to me. Most Famine deaths appear to have been from Fever rather than starvation so I don't agree that they "died in extreme poverty" as the plaque suggests. Extreme is one of those buzzwords that gets people's attention. The Liverpool Parish officials and the local RC priests tried to ensure that people were fed and received appropriate medical care but some people will have slipped through the net. A lot of people feared the Workhouse and authorities in general.

http://openplaques.org/plaques/8488


Blue

Here is a screen grab below of a burial record for Bridget Brady. You can see the categories of records available on the left. Burials were likely burials that took place at St Anthony's or St Anthony's were involved in some way such as the funeral was at St Anthony's and the burial was elsewhere. Pauper Burials will be burials at C of E parish cemeteries (ie St Mary's Cambridge Street, St Martin in the Fields, Walton Park). Marriages and Baptisms are more straight forward they will have been transcribed from St Anthony's registers.




Here is the original record from St Mary's CE Parish Cemetery, Cambridge Street:-




St Anthony's registers are on Ancestry and some are available to view free on Family Search when signed in:-

https://www.familysearch.org/search/cat ... %20Library


As you can see the database recorded events rather than individual migrants. It was useful as a reference but not comprehensive enough to properly document individuals who were part of the Irish migration to Liverpool in the 19th century. That would be too difficult a task. St Anthony's is just one church used by Irish people in Liverpool it's probably best to look at census records first then look for baptisms, marriages and burials on Ancestry. Ancestry has a Liverpool collection if you go to 'card catalogue' and search for Liverpool you will find various Liverpool records available. Most Irish people will be found on the Liverpool RC baptisms, marriages and burials but they may also appear in the C of E records particularly C of E marriages as many Catholics used to marry in C of E churches for convenience.


Blue

Thanks Blue, you have such a wide knowledge of the records appertaining to Liverpool.

Hi,

Lancashire On Line have the Burials from 1859-1894 Surname Indexed
Plus Baptisms 1804-1828 also indexed.

If that's any help.

Not very good at posting links perhaps Blue can help with that.

Regards Margie

margie wrote: ↑

08 May 2018 11:42

Hi,

Lancashire On Line have the Burials from 1859-1894 Surname Indexed
Plus Baptisms 1804-1828 also indexed.

If that's any help.

Not very good at posting links perhaps Blue can help with that.

Regards Margie

Transcripts for St Anthony's on Lancs OPC:-

http://www.lan-opc.org.uk/Liverpool/Vau ... index.html


Blue

Thanks for all the replies - I've been away a few days so have only just picked them up. I will certainly use the links etc to dig further. I do have a further question regarding records in Ireland - how easy is it to obtain copies of birth/death/marriage certificates from Ireland? And generally finding information about Irish ancestors? Im looking forward to my visit to Liverpool Records Office and to getting a readers card. Thanks again

Cheaper than England so long as you have the correct details. Take a look at the top post for ordering but keep scrolling down for many suggested links for research in Ireland https://www.lswlfhs.org.uk/phpBB3/viewt ... 14&t=13912

Hayfamily wrote: ↑

16 May 2018 01:07

Thanks for all the replies - I've been away a few days so have only just picked them up. I will certainly use the links etc to dig further. I do have a further question regarding records in Ireland - how easy is it to obtain copies of birth/death/marriage certificates from Ireland? And generally finding information about Irish ancestors? Im looking forward to my visit to Liverpool Records Office and to getting a readers card. Thanks again

Irish research can be difficult for a number of reasons. Our ancestors were often recorded as just being born in Ireland or if we are lucky we are given a county too. A lot of people's Irish ancestors left Ireland before the start of civil registration so we have to look at parish records. Unfortunately a lot of parish records are not available to us due to the surviving records starting at a later date than the time period we are researching. Availability generally depends largely on the time period you are researching. Civil registration of births and deaths dates from 1864. Registration of non RC marriages dates from 1845, RC marriages from 1864. Many records are now available free on Irish Genealogy ie:-

https://civilrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/ ... search.jsp


Many RC parish records are also available online with search engines on Ancestry and Find My Past to make it easier to find records of interest. You can browse these records here:-

https://registers.nli.ie/


Few census records have survived the best of these, the 1901 and 1911 census for Ireland are free online here:-

http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/search/



Blue