If you have ancestors from England and Wales, then, you know, you need to become
very familiar with a 1939 Register. And today, we're going to dive into it so that you can be
more confident when you explore that collection on Findmypast. Hey, Fanatics! I'm so excited to
have you here. My name's Devon Noel Lee with Family History Fanatics. And we love helping
you enjoy the journey of family history. As I was preparing for this video, I discovered that
the 1939 Register was the most comprehensive survey conducted on civilians in England and
Wales. And while US researchers love that the 1940s Census is available to start tracking
their most recent ancestors, England and Wales have a record loss. Similar to the 1890 Census
record loss in the United States. The 1931 Census for the UK was destroyed by fire,
and they never took the 1941 Census because they were kind of in the middle of something big. So,
the 1939 Register is the way you research around the record loss gap between 1921 and 1951. There
are a number of way places online where you can access a part of the 1939 Register. But the most
complete collection of the record for 1939 is over on Findmypast. Now, you can do a person search
or an address search. So, if you know a specific location, you can put that in,
I'm just going to focus on person searches, and I'm going to type in John Tyner.
Now, I know our fan John Tyner is from Ireland. But I figured his name was fun to use. So now,
there are 13 results that I can go explore. So, you will be able to see the year people were born,
the boroughs they're located in, the county, the country, and then a specific address.
When you click PREVIEW, you're going to see a listing of everybody's in the household. I'm
going to go back to this one because I've looked at it the most. You can see I have
all these checkmarks. You've already looked at this. Thanks, Findmypast. I appreciate you
telling me what I looked at. So, hopefully, you're asking who's in the record? Great question. The
people that are in the record are over 41 million individuals who were living in England and Wales.
There are some caveats. You might also find some foreign visitors, particularly those who
were involved with the foreign embassies as well as in the consulate's offices. So, who's not in
the record collection? if you're from any of these locations, you're probably not in the record. And
if your English and Welsh ancestors happen to be traveling, they're not going to be there. Because
it recorded where you were on a specific day. And if you weren't there, they couldn't be counted.
That doesn't mean you were never counted. In actuality, you were accounted in a
separate register. And in the Show Notes for the video, that's over on my blog,
I'll have a link to what other collections you're supposed to investigate. Now, military personnel
were also not supposed to be part of this record collection. They have a separate collection
for that time period. However, if they were off duty or if they were retired military personnel,
they could be in this collection. What are you gonna find? That's a great question. I'm glad
you asked it. The name- records are based on names. After that, an exact birth date.
Not a lot of records give us exact birth dates for individuals. So, this is pretty
unique to this record collection and pretty valuable. You find the gender. You find addresses,
you know. Why the star is there? Because just a moment ago, I told you
the date of the registration recorded the address where people were that day. So, if they had left
London or other big cities to go to the country in order to be more safe, they're going to be out
in the country. If they were migrant workers that lived in one location, but they travel to another
location for seasonal work, their address is going to be there if they're there on that date. So,
if your ancestor isn't in a residence location you think they're supposed to be, don't rule them out.
And don't assume that's where they're always lived because maybe they were
in these situations I just mentioned. Because of the nature of this Register, in trying to assess
what the civilians had to support the war effort, occupations was very important. But there was
also a recording of secondary skills that people had. That they may not be involved in right now,
that might be beneficial to the war effort. And so, be careful. There might be lots of little
skills there, and you want to keep track of that. The next is marital status, and actually,
the marital status is a little bit confusing to me. And I'll tell you why when I show the actual
records. You're going to stick around for that. You're going to see name changes when somebody's
name is crossed out and another one it was written above it. It always. It wasn't always just
an error. Many times the researchers on Findmypast have found that it represents
a surname change for married woman. And then when ... Women. When you see a date beside it,
that is likely the date that they got married. So, you want to pay attention to these notices.
However, the one I'm about to show you has a name change, and she's marked it single. So, I'm a lot
confused. There's two other things that you're going to see. You're going to see a Schedule
Number and a National Registration Number. The number given to each household or institution
is the Schedule Number. And the number given to each individual person- man, woman, child
that that is the National Registration Number. Now, there are a couple of things you won't find,
and then we're going to dive into the records. You won't find relationships.
So, you're going to see a household, and you're not going to know how they're related.
So, you've got to be careful and not make an assumption if there's children in the house.
Remember they're recorded on the date that they were there. What happens if a a niece
or a nephew was visiting the father or mother in the home? Now, they look like children rather than
nieces and nephews. So, be very careful. The other thing is you don't see places of birth.
That is one beneficial piece of information that can help you tie people together.
So, you need to also be careful there. They don't tell you where they're from. And if you have two
people named John Tyner from the same place or born on the same day, it's going to be hard to
try to figure out which one is yours. Before we continue, I want to personally invite you to our
livestreams. They happen every other Friday. Be sure to check the channel page of Family History
Fanatics to find out when we have the next liv stream or sign-up for our newsletter so
you'll never miss another episode or when we go live. So, here is John Tyner's household.
And we have the date of birth- the first of July 1877. We can see that he is a journeyman,
who can also be a heavy worker. That's his secondary occupation. He's married. And those are
those numbers I told you- the household number and the person number. And this is likely his wife,
Ellen Tyner. There's her birthday. Ah, she's a little bit older- kind of like me and Andy.
And her occupation. Now, we can go and view the image. Right now, we can add it to our tree,
but I want to show you something cool that Findmypast has on here. Scroll down further
and notice they have a map. They've taken the specific address that is associated with John
and placed it on a map right there. And then you can zoom in and zoom out. And figure out
what landmarks and features. And what part of Wales this individual is living in. So,
it's pretty cool. The next feature I want you to pay attention to is over here on the right. This
is kind of like record hints on other platforms. Is this person? It's saying we found a John Tyner,
born about the same time period, living in Wales in the 1911 Census. Is this is your person?
As well as the civil deaths and burials records. pretty cool. And you can have a gateway into other
records. If you find them up here on the Register, you might be able to find bonus records. So,
thank you, Findmypast, for those record hints. If you keep scrolling down, you're going to
have some social history. Some context, the historical time period. Not only do they give
you facts about overall England and Wales, but they also give you facts about this location.
And you can see the most popular names at the time. And you can then go search in other records,
such using the John Tyner. Search and continue on your way. Now, as an American and Canadian
researcher, this record looks a lot like a census record. As you zoom in, you have names. You have
household clusters and such. But it's it's not exactly the same. The other thing I want to call
your attention to is that in genealogy, we tell you to go and make sure you look at all sides
of the page. And it looks like these lines keep continuing on to the right side. But that those
pages are restricted by the national government of England. And so, you won't really be able to
see much of the information over here. But don't exclude this extra little column, because there's
some other tidbits. On some pages, they have some cool things that you want to explore. So, let's
go back to. Because I actually advanced. Let's go back to the one I was actually looking at.
So, here is John Tyner. These icons are in the way. And he's at 50 Hills Terrace. And
notice there's another 50. So, this is our two separate households living at the same place.
We always like to check those things out, don't we? So, here's John and Ellen. And they're there
where their household number and their individual numbers. We have their specific birth dates. That
they're married. And then the occupation. In this secondary information, right there.
Did you see this black bar across the name? Britain has a lot of privacy restrictions.
And so, you want to check back in this collection often. Because periodically, as people come out of
that privacy restriction, either they were born more than 100 and some odd years ago,
or they're deceased. And evidence has been provided to say that they are deceased. Then these
privacy restrictions will come off Findmypast. And you'll be able to see that name. But remember
I also said that their surname changes? So, here's an example we have Dorothy Owen. And it
was crossed out, and Bridger was put above it. And there is a date which is possibly, quite possibly,
her marriage record. But I get confused because it says single. Yeah. So it is, from what I gather,
from what I've learned is, this is a potential surname switch from when she was married
and a potential marriage date. It's up to you to use these clues to go validate that information.
Now, if you find that this record pertains to your family, you want to save it by clicking ADD
TO YOUR TREE. And we talked about adding records to tree on other videos. You just go find your
person in your tree. Leave a note. Click ATTACH. And you're good to go. Now, I am just beginning my
discovery of the 1939 Register over in Britain. If you have more questions, do me a favor,
it'll be mutually beneficial. Leave that question in the comments section of this video. Because
then I will go ask my colleagues that are far more expert in the 1939 Register and have them
come back and provide an answer. And in so doing, not only are you going to get your answer, but I'm
going to learn as well. I hope you don't think that's too greedy. I truly believe that we learn
together as we share information. Findmypast has a lot of records that you want to explore on their
site- Catholic records, newspapers, and oh so much more. So if you want to learn about Findmypast
records, click on this playlist right there and continue the education journey. If you're ready
for something new, then who knows what it's on? Check out this video right here. Quiet.