BERKSHIRE-L Archives

From: "Philip Wood" <>
Subject: Re: CD
Date: Wed, 4 Jul 2001 15:30:30 +0100
References: <000c01c103bd$642604c0$13b630d5@t>

The CD you refer to is the National Burial Index (NBI). But you are very
unlikely to get information which will enable you to get a death
certificate.

A few bits of background:

1 The NBI has only a small percentage of the burials in its database.
see http://www.ffhs.org.uk/General/Projects/NBI.htm This shows that some
5.5 million burials are there - if you then consider an average population
cover the period covered of, say 30 million, and a coverage of 300+
years............

2 The transcriptions concentrate on the 1813-1837 period (before
death certificates were established)

3 If the deaths you seek in Berks then more detailed coverage
information is available (including parishes & dates)
http://www.berksfhs.org.uk/berkshire/BerkshireBurialIndex.htm

4 Death registration and certification started in 1837 - since then
it has been a requirement to register all deaths. However, this was not
made legal requirement until the 1850s - so the early records do not show
all events. The registered deaths are all in the General Register Office
(GRO) Index (sometimes called the St Catherine's Index after a building that
housed it for a few years). This index is available in many places (on
fiche) - notably the Berkshire County Record Office in Reading. Find the
death in this and you can order a duplicate certificate using the index
data. Before you go to the CRO you might like to try FreeBMD
freebmd.rootsweb.com where they have the beginnings of an online version of
the GRO Index - not many deaths in there yet but you might hit lucky.

If the areas you are interested in are covered by the NBI then is can be a
very useful tool - for Berkshire you have much better than normal
information to help you decide whether to buy, or not.

Finally - if you do decide to buy then support the FHS and look no further
than our own bookshop. www.berksfhs.org.uk/pubs/nbicd.htm

Phil




----- Original Message -----
From: "Theresa Howard" <>
To: <>
Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2001 1:40 PM
Subject: CD


> Hi can somone advise me please I have read somewhere about a cd you can
purchase which lists burials. I wonder if the information on this would be
enough for someone to obtain death certs for an individual.
>
>
> many thanks
>
> Theresa
>
> ______________________________

This thread:

• CD by "Theresa Howard" <>
  • RE: CD by "Patrick Barrass" <>

  • Re: CD by "Philip Wood" <>