Wales Research Tips and Strategies

Intermediate & Advanced Research Strategies
Research strategy pages to help you locate your Welsh ancestors.

Emigrant Record Selection Guide Census Records

Wales Research Tips

 * Due to the many common names be careful not to accept the first possible match for your ancestor. Watch for additional identifying details such as residence and occupation.
 * Look in all censuses: Always look for your ancestor in every possible census. There are clues regarding immigration, naturalization, and occupation that can lead to other records. Sometimes parents can be found living with their children later in life. Search Wales Censuses.
 * If a record collection does not include your ancestor, consider the possibility that the database is incomplete. Parish registers are very incomplete on both FamilySearch and Findmypast. A list of parish registers not published online is being created.
 * Cemetery records (including burial records, monumental or memorial inscriptions), sometimes provide birth, marriage, death, and occupational information. They sometimes give clues to military service, residence, and cause of death. Cemetery Records.
 * If you can't find a christening record for a child, especially before 1813, assume that the family used patronymic names. Do the search again using a given name search. Leave the surname field blank.
 * Burials are more likely to include a higher percentage of the population. Search the parish church burials and local chapel burials. Many nonconformist chapels did not have their own burial ground for many years after the start of the congregation.

Evaluation and Analysis

 * 1) Read the record carefully
 * 2) Interpret what the information says
 * 3) Analyze what you already know and compare it with what you learned from the new record. Always ask yourself:
 * 4) *Is the information in the record consistent with what you already know?
 * 5) *Does the information conflict with any information you have?
 * 6) *Is there new information provided in the record?
 * 7) Draw conclusions from that analysis
 * 8) *Use all the information you have collected and ask yourself, "What can I now conclude about this person or family?"