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Researching can be a rewarding though time consuming process. Hopefully i can give some advice as to how to go about researching the archives available. Researching family history can be carried out in much the same way but here i will concentrate on researching a relatives Military past.
Researching Military history is no different to any other research, its easier the more you know ………. Or think you know. Caution and patience are to be used in equal measures.
Family tale had my Great Great Grandfather in the charge of the light brigade, it turns out he was a Blacksmith attached to one of the Cavalry units in the Crimea. It is essential to check and then double check all your records and results.
There are many aids on the Internet that will assist your research, my first research was carried out by a professional researcher on my behalf at The National Archives in Kew, London. A lot of records are now available online, most of which only available through subscription but many others available free.
Lets for arguments sake look for a relative who died in Military service. The easiest option is to search the CWGC archives available online at,
www.cwgc.org
This may take sometime if you have no details to go on, all you can do is search through the surnames etc and see if any detail seems to fit in with your circumstance ie home town, again though caution is the key word.
I used a similar search engine to research the War memorial which is linked to the CWGC site to backup findings, Geoffs search engine I found to be invaluable.
www.hut-six.co.uk/cgi-bin/search14-21.php
These records can give you crucial details such as service numbers and recorded burial sites as well as Regimental details.
From here I then used the site at www.ancestry.co.uk/ to access all sorts of records, this is a subscription site but they do trial periods for free which can be used to source the details you may seek. The sort of results you may get are,
Cencus records.
Medal index cards.
Service / Pension records
These records are constantly being updated so if there is nothing there now, there may well be in the future.
After you have got details from these sources you can then use the wealth of online help at various Forums to help confirm details further. I would strongly recommend the sites detailed in my links page, they have helped so much in my own research, please if you do use them consider a small donation to assist in the running of them. See my links page to see other sites that I have used, these by no means are the be all and end all, researching is all about personal quests so get searching and good luck.
Family tale had my Great Great Grandfather in the charge of the light brigade, it turns out he was a Blacksmith attached to one of the Cavalry units in the Crimea. It is essential to check and then double check all your records and results.
There are many aids on the Internet that will assist your research, my first research was carried out by a professional researcher on my behalf at The National Archives in Kew, London. A lot of records are now available online, most of which only available through subscription but many others available free.
Lets for arguments sake look for a relative who died in Military service. The easiest option is to search the CWGC archives available online at,
www.cwgc.org
This may take sometime if you have no details to go on, all you can do is search through the surnames etc and see if any detail seems to fit in with your circumstance ie home town, again though caution is the key word.
I used a similar search engine to research the War memorial which is linked to the CWGC site to backup findings, Geoffs search engine I found to be invaluable.
www.hut-six.co.uk/cgi-bin/search14-21.php
These records can give you crucial details such as service numbers and recorded burial sites as well as Regimental details.
From here I then used the site at www.ancestry.co.uk/ to access all sorts of records, this is a subscription site but they do trial periods for free which can be used to source the details you may seek. The sort of results you may get are,
Cencus records.
Medal index cards.
Service / Pension records
These records are constantly being updated so if there is nothing there now, there may well be in the future.
After you have got details from these sources you can then use the wealth of online help at various Forums to help confirm details further. I would strongly recommend the sites detailed in my links page, they have helped so much in my own research, please if you do use them consider a small donation to assist in the running of them. See my links page to see other sites that I have used, these by no means are the be all and end all, researching is all about personal quests so get searching and good luck.