1939 Register up and running

[phil56]

I have lined up 5 families, preparing to use my 25% discount, which I have not yet activated.  Three of the families cover my five great-grandparents still alive in 1939. The other two are my grandparents including my parents and siblings.  For these two records, households of 5 and 6 people each have 4 closed entries (more than I expected). 

How do I get these opened for the people I expect there (eg deceased parents and siblings less than 100) ? can I supply death entry index to FindMyPast ? or do I have to buy the death certs at £9.25 a time ? where are the instructructions from FindMyPast on this ?  where closed entries exceed what I expected, presumably I have no chance of ever finding out who these folks are until they are over 100 years old, whether living or deceased ?

Help !  all seems a bit of a difficult process for the folk under 100 when we are not quite sure who they are.

[dawnsh]

Using the TNA reference to Search

I don't have any credits but have managed to find out who was living with my great-grandparents

Do the search for the person you do know and make a note of the reference

eg RG101/0950E/009/*

you don't need the last digits represent by the *

then if you do a blank search (no names or places) just using the reference, you ignore the RG101, the piece number (in my eg) 0950E and the item number 009

If I do this search I get a long list of people but the family I want will have sequential numbers. You have to do a free preview of all the names but you can work out who is living with whom. Just hover over the free preview button and the full reference should be displayed at the bottom left of the screen.

The lady that was living with my great-grandparents was listed after them.

[avm228]

They've made a right hash of my great-grandparents' household, in which my grandparents and some great aunts and uncles were also living.  The two family members whose names appear in the transcription (who lived 1884-1958 and 1914-1944) have been redacted as "closed" in the original for no good reason. Those who appear unredacted in the original are "closed" in the transcription.

And they have charged me twice for viewing this same record, accessed by separate searches, the second of which I would not have carried out had the relevant names for non-closed people been visible in the original when I went to it the first time.

Not a happy customer!  Have sent an email so hope they can sort it out.

[ReadyDale]

Well I've finally found someone!
My paternal grandparents have just come out of hiding.
I found my grandfather alone, so guessed my grandmother along with my Dad and aunt must have been at their evacuation location, but they were being stubborn. Then I found a possible for my grandmother in the area to which I know they were sent. however she was transcribed with an incorrect middle initial.
Further searching, using the method DawnSh used, revealed my aunt in the sequence.
I know it's her as it includes her middle initial in brackets and her later married name, again in brackets. Strange thing is my Dad who was almost 7 at the time is hidden (fair enough) but my aunt is visible despite being less than 18 months old!!! Must be because they have her birth down as 1860 rather than 1938. When I saw her in February, she was looking good for 155 years old 

[LizzieL]

At last found my father's cousin, just tried name and day and month of birth, and there she was living where she still did in 1970. (Strange that I couldn't get her from the address). But her year of birth was transcribed as 1844 instead of 1914!
Then I wondered how many centenarians were on the register and searched with no name but just 1829 +/- 10 for birth year. And it came up with 168,418 results. Looking closer, the search includes many pages of people who have no birth year recorded (or maybe not transcribed).

Somehow the Guardian found there were only 111.

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2015/nov/02/the-1939-register-a-tale-of-a-country-ravaged-by-war

 

[Blue70]

Using the TNA reference to Search

I don't have any credits but have managed to find out who was living with my great-grandparents

Do the search for the person you do know and make a note of the reference

eg RG101/0950E/009/*

you don't need the last digits represent by the *

then if you do a blank search (no names or places) just using the reference, you ignore the RG101, the piece number (in my eg) 0950E and the item number 009

If I do this search I get a long list of people but the family I want will have sequential numbers. You have to do a free preview of all the names but you can work out who is living with whom. Just hover over the free preview button and the full reference should be displayed at the bottom left of the screen.

The lady that was living with my great-grandparents was listed after them.

Thanks Dawn. Good information.


Blue

[smudwhisk]

At last found my father's cousin, just tried name and day and month of birth, and there she was living where she still did in 1970. (Strange that I couldn't get her from the address). But her year of birth was transcribed as 1844 instead of 1914!
Then I wondered how many centenarians were on the register and searched with no name but just 1829 +/- 10 for birth year. And it came up with 168,418 results. Looking closer, the search includes many pages of people who have no birth year recorded (or maybe not transcribed).

Somehow the Guardian found there were only 111.

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2015/nov/02/the-1939-register-a-tale-of-a-country-ravaged-by-war

FindMyPast apparently provided the statistics to the Guardian according to the end of the article.   Obviously doesn't agree with their search engine results.

[LizzieL]

If I do this search I get a long list of people but the family I want will have sequential numbers. You have to do a free preview of all the names but you can work out who is living with whom. Just hover over the free preview button and the full reference should be displayed at the bottom left of the screen.

Didn't we do something similar on the 1901 when it first came out. Then I think something was done to stop too much information being had for free. I still have files of screen prints with the reference numbers written on by hand to work out which records were worth paying for.

[Aniseed]

what was the 'phony war'

The Phony War, in terms of the home front, occurred after war was declared on 3rd September 1939, when it was generally assumed that there would be imminent widespread bombing of the cities, so there was an evacuation plan put into place. In reality, there was very little bombing at all and so the evacuated children were called back home by their parents. In my grandmother's case they went back to London and then had to be evacuated again once the Blitz had started in earnest in 1940.