Whar dis thoo think thoo ar? (Westray)

It's Who Do You Think You Are? Live this month on the 23rd -24th February. http://www.whodoyouthinkyouarelive.com/

Whar dae you think you aar? (Sanday)

So we thought we'd help our customers by creating a display which suggests alternative sources of information for family history research.

Whar dae ye think ye er? (Harray)

We show examples of usual sources such as IGI, census, graveyard surveys, parish registers, etc. and also show more unusual sources such as 18th century muster rolls, a 19th century customs & excise book of ships' crews discharged, a commonty map showing tenants names, a school admission register showing pupils names from 1897.

Wha deu you tink you urr? (North Ronaldsay)

We hope to encourage our genealogy customers to dig a little deeper into our archive collections and discover some information treasure of their own. if you know of any other unusual sources, please let us know.

Do You Like Boats?

TK1561 - Stromness Harbour

 We have a new item on the Archive page of the Orkney Library & Archive website. Thanks to the work of our wonderful volunteers, we can now offer you an index to the Orkney Customs & Excise Fishing Boat Registers. You can see it here

TK1563 - Stromness Fishing Fleet

 After months of indexing work, our lovely volunteers have completed this fine list. We have ordered it alphabetically according to the name of the vessel, but you can also search the whole document for other information.

TK1569 - Kirkwall Fishing Fleet

 So, if your ancestor had a boat with the number K212, which is tucked in on the left of the picture above, then you could use the index to find out that the name of the boat was Bonnie Lassie from Sanday.



TK1566

And in the picture above, if you can ignore the man at the front (who looks like he has thrown the lid of that box in the water) and find 1318K, you can discover in the index that its name was Laju and it was owned and skippered by Samuel Jones in 1893 and James Walls in 1906.

The Guide to Records in the Nation Archives of Scotland webpage states that:

"Ships and fishing boats must be registered in a port of registry before they can be navigated. Local customs officers frequently maintained shipping registers and sea fishing boat registers on behalf of the Registrar-General of Seamen from 1786, and surviving registers of these ports are included among the Customs and Excise records. Though the information contained in shipping registers can vary, they usually record the names of ships, their owners and changes in ownership, the ship's master and a basic description of the vessel, including the year it was built and its size and tonnage."

We have not included the extra information in the index, but if you are curious to know more about the fishing boat, then you can visit us to see the original book or ask us to look it up for you.