Learn the basics you'll need to get started on your own research, from drawing up your family tree to exploring the archives.
Family History: Get Started
Overview
Family History: Getting Started
If you're tackling archives for the first time in a search for your family's past, this guide will help you get organised, and direct you towards further help and the incredible resources available on the internet.
Basics
What's In a Name? Your Link to the Past
Surnames can reveal much about your family history, but they can also be a minefield of misinformation. By Paul Blake.
- Before you start your family tree - A quick guide
- Getting started on your family tree - A quick guide
- Construct your family tree: How to use birth, marriage and census records - A quick guide
- To Pay or Not To Pay? A guide to choosing genealogy sites on the internet - Is it worth paying for your family history research?
- Record Sheets
- Working in Archives by Dr Nick Barratt
- Researching Military Records by Peter Francis
Case Studies
Family History Digital Gallery
Twenty members of the public describe what spurred them on to discover more about their family history.
- Case Study: Rosslyn Park's Unknown Soldiers by Richard Cable
- Case Study: Caribbean Family History by Kathy Chater
- Case Study: The Earls Colne Project by Alan Macfarlane
- Using Written Archives to Discover the History of your House by Dr Nick Barratt
- Boesinghe: The Forgotten Battlefield by Paul Reed
Family History
Programmes
BBC iD
BBC iDBBC navigation
BBC links
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