1939 Register up and running

[sunnylew]

The title says it all, the 1939 Register is open.

Edit:-

Just to follow up:

For those who have a discount code, you have to enter the code before you go through the purchase process. There's a box to the bottom right which - at least on my laptop - was below the 'fold' of the page, so I missed it at first.

Enter your code there, and the middle of the three options for packages (5 households) should change in price. There is also a 15 household package available, but my code only changed the 5 household package.

Another thing to watch out for -

I received my code for the Irish version of the site (I often log in to different versions so that defaults make life easier for me). I tried using the code on the .uk site and it said the code had expired. Once I'd gone to .ie, it worked without a problem.

The image is of the whole page, though names that haven't been cleared are redacted. This bodes well for people researching streets of villages with some careful name selection.

Aside from the expected information, the image shows one column of the second page of the spread. There are notes here that appear to all be regarding later war service. On my page I have, an ARP member, a WAAF, a member of the Royal Observer corps, and a member of the Merchant Navy Reserve.

Where someone has married afterwards, maiden names are crossed out and the new name written above.

I'm yet to explore the other features, but will update so it's laid out for you all when you wake up.

[barryd]

Tried the 1939 Register for the first time. It is still Sunday in USA. Did a lot of homework in anticipation of getting onto the site. Despite my concerns that the site may be overloaded everything went very well. As predicted there is both father and son both Medical Doctors, both Rolf Creasy, one  living in Rustington (Worthing) Sussex and the other in the Totnes area of Devon. From Electoral Registers I knew that the one I wanted was the father living in the Worthing area so selected him.
Put my credit card details in and it took a few seconds to get me my image. So now I have his birth day. For a person born in Colombo, Ceylon and no traceable records in Ceylon, and who died in 1948 prior to birth dates on Death Certificates I had previously given up hope. Received his second wife’s birth date too as well as their servant’s. 

[vivdunstan]

The site is very flaky, even launching in the middle of the night UK time. I'm getting an awful lot of error messages, at various points e.g. initial search results, trying to preview an entry, trying to buy credits/unlock an entry, trying to view an image. Usually reloading one or more times sorts it out though. And I don't seem to have inadvertently spent my credits twice.

I'm quite surprised by how much useful information I've got in this. Examples include:

• Finding my g-grandfather in Leeds, getting valuable info on him - he was estranged from my granddad so we didn't really know anything about him circa 1939, even if he was still alive
  
• Learning that my husband's g-grandparents on a farm had 2 land girls staying with them
  
• Discovering that my husband's Norfolk grandfather was in the local fire service in 1939, just like my granddad in southern Scotland
  
• Finding my other Yorkshire g-grandfather with what looks like wife #3, and then using that info to finally trace his/her marriage record in FreeBMD
  

I was also impressed by how full the pages are. Even with lots of entries closed (like my Dad's, aunt's, and my husband's uncle - all still living, in their 80s) you get names of lots of neighbours at the time. Which is really nice. I emailed the relevant pages to my octogenarian relatives, so they can see some names that might bring back memories for them.

On the downside I still can't find my husband's paternal grandparents in the 1939 Register. Goodness only knows quite how they've been recorded and/or transcribed! I think his granddad was also active in the war locally in some capacity, maybe an ambulanceman. Would like to see! Maybe I'll find them in future though.

But yes, pleased with what I found. Far more useful than I thought it would be - I didn't honestly expect it to tell me anything new or terribly interesting. Shame the site is struggling so much though. Goodness only knows what it will be like come UK daytime.

[sunnylew]

I've tried searching for 4 different family members now that would have been less than 100 years old.

Unfortunately none of them show up in searches at all. I was under the impression that a preview would at least show that we'd found the correct person.

I'm not really sure how we can go about unredacting records, if we can't find them in the first place.

I've sent off an email that will hopefully shed some light on this.

[kerryb]

Sleepless night so thought I would take the opportunity to search for grandparents and great grandparents. 

Impressed by the information that is available, the maps and original transcripts.

However a word of warning: there are a lot of errors in transcriptions.  My grandfather's name was completely different despite on the original I was able to read as it should do. 

Kerryb

[Jane Masri]

Just accessed the index, not impressed with the many name transcriptions that are incomplete.  Still searching for grandparents with no luck 

Jane

[StevieSteve]

What not to do #1: looked for my Dad. Forgot he (only) died in 1997 so is redacted and therefore doesn't show up in the search results


Place names seem to be based on parliamentary consistencies or something like boroughs s e.g Hounslow comes under Heston & Isleworth MB, Hanwell comes under Ealing MB

[Guy Etchells]

The on line 1939 National Register exceeds my expectations in some ways and disappoints in others..
Very quick and easy to search.
The “0riginal image for a household gives not only 1 household but for the address I looked at 60 Holly Walk, Leamington Spa all the households on the page from 54 to 62,
Handy for those who are interested in a village or area of a town.
Some women have their surnames annotated with an additional name in green ink (perhaps a maiden name or a later marriage I haven’t checked that.)

You can also check by address but this is rather odd not all the numbers follow sequentially.
In the main they run odd number first then even numbers, but they seem to have some additional odd numbers between the run of odds and evens and extra even numbers at the end of the evens (possibly late returns).

In my entry of interest there are three redacted people are they family or other people visiting at the time or servants.
An interest entry comes between who I know is the householder and his wife.
From looking carefully at the redaction I suspect it could be their son who was a possibly cadet in 1939.
The second redaction is possibly Nellie Hitcox who according to my FoI request is deceased.
Leaving one other mystery person at the house.
All the children of the family are now deceased, their son JPH Guy was killed in the war and the three daughters died in 1966,1998 and 2004 respectively.
Looks like I will have to send some scans of death certs to FindMyPast.
Cheers
Guy

[Guy Etchells]

It seems that married women are indexed under their married name rather than their maiden name
Cheers
Guy