Finding the location of a marriage using GMI, FreeBMD and other sources Andrew Millard

Marriage entry of interest

First download all entries from the district and quarter from FreeBMD

Copy the tab-delimited text file and paste into Excel Use text-to-columns if needed

Sort the entries by page number

Add a formula to count the number of entries with the same page number And another to calculate the difference between page numbers, and fill down

Use conditional formatting to highlight incomplete pages with less than eight names …

… and where the page numbers change by more than one

Easy to see the probable page numbers where the marriages from each church end

Search the GMI for that quarter and volume Only two entries – not very hopeful!

Enter those churches against the page numbers Ann SINFIELD seems to be only a couple of churches away

Go to the GENUKI list for that RD 17 Civil Parishes in 1850 (which probably match Ecclesiastical parishes in this rural area)

Identify potential churches (but don’t know exact method of alphabetical sort in GRO index) Some are on IGI, so… Flitton Flitwick Haynes Higham Gobion Houghton Conquest Lidlington Lower Gravenhurst Marston Moretaine

… use Hugh Wallis IGI batch number site Check out Marston Moretaine and Lower Gravenhurst for that year

Enter that church against the page number Most likely Houghton Conquest or Lidlington Flitton Flitwick Haynes Higham Gobion Houghton Conquest Lidlington Lower Gravenhurst Marston Moretaine

Actually this marriage is on the IGI too A shortlist of two parishes from an original 17 – pretty good for a few minutes work Not always as good as this – sometimes order of churches is difficult to establish Actually this marriage is on the IGI too And the order of churches is unexpected: the church between Flitton and Haynes is not Flitwick but Upper Gravenhurst