Welcome to a simple guide as to how to get best out of the Church of Jesus Christ Latter Day Saints Familysearch site

In terms of Genealogy, The Church of Jesus Christ Latter Day Saints based in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, has done more than most to popularise recording of Family History;(www.familysearch.org is their search engine)
You may like to try later their new "Pilot" Search Facility which is being developed.
Try the new pilot search facility now
Knowledge of their ancestors was an important part of the Church's belief.
They sent out teams to many countries, not only to spread their Christian beliefs, but to transcribe baptisms and marriage records from local sources.
In the U.K. these were extracted from Parish records.
Although from Sept 1837 (B)irth(M)arriages(D)eath records were taken over by the state and can be viewed at a number of sites for free, the
(I)nternaional (G)enealogical (I)ndex I.G.I continued their cover beyond that date.

Try  Free BMD Records  or  Ancestry Free BMD

International Genealogical Index is the name given to the extracted records.
In some Counties coverage is not complete, and this will always give rise to missing records possibly being one of your ancestors.
Look at this section of the Familysearch.org were the Assistant will help you.

For example when the parish records were extracted each parish was given a batch no. for baptisms-marriages.
When covering the next parish they tended to use the next number. You can see if you add or subtract a number from a parish batch no., if it is an adjoining parish.
Visiting one of the Church's Family History Centres near you, can help you greatly.
You can order in advance of your visit, microfilm covering parishes you wish to peruse.
These quite often cover the whole of the parish, and may not have been fully transcribed onto the I.G.I.
Find your local Family History Centre

If you use the links shown across, these will take you to different parts of the www.familysearch.com site without having to spend a lot of time searching.
One word of caution, always cross check information wherever possible, for transcribing error.
Whilst not common, can cause considerable delay and confusion.



Date last updated 20th March 2010