This post is another in the series looking at Ireland genealogy and this time the focus is on Ulster; the six counties that make up today’s Northern Ireland. Ulster has a long tradition of immigration and emigration. Immigrants from the province started to arrive in North America in the early 1600s and there were several significant waves of emmigrants to the US and other countries up to the 20th century. Many of us have Northern Irish roots, so I thought it would be helpful to have a round up of the significant sources of online records available.
Historical Note: Northern Ireland was created in 1921 following the partition of the country. After the South gained independence in 1922, Northern Ireland, made up of the six counties of Antrim, Armagh, Down, Fermanagh, Londonderry (Derry) and Tyrone, remained in the United Kingdom.
GRONI
GRONI is the General Register Office Northern Ireland and you use it to access historic civil birth, marriage and death records. It works like Scotland’s People for Scotland where you buy credits then use the credits to pay for images of the records. At the time of writing, a credit costs GBP0.50 and to see an image you need 5 credits (GBP2.50). It also costs 1 credit to do a full search of the index, although it is free to do a basic name search.
Civil registration began in Ireland in 1845 (including the North) with non Catholic marriages and for all births, marriages and deaths from 1864, so civil records only exist from these dates. You can only access online birth records over 100 years old, marriage records over 75 years old and death records over 50 years old. For more recent records you will need to apply online for a copy of the certificate.
Important Note: You only need to use GRONI for records from 1922. You can access Ulster BMD records for free before this date from Irishgenealogy.ie . This website is owned by the Irish Ministry of Culture and is where you can access the historic records of births, marriages and deaths of their General Register Office.
PRONI
PRONI is the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland and is the official archive for the province. It holds records of the 6 counties that remained in the United Kingdom after the Republic of Ireland gained independence in 1922. The following online records are held:
- Freeholder records
- Londonderry Corporation Records
- Historical Maps
- Street Directories
- Ulster Covenant
- Valuation Revision Books
- Will calendars
It is worthwhile exploring these free records to see if they can help with your research. More information about these databases can be found here.
All other records held by PRONI have to be physically accessed in Belfast. You can view PRONI’s e-catalogue here to search their collection.
National Archives of Ireland Census Records
Most of the 19th century Irish census records were destroyed during the Irish civil war in 1922 with the fire at the Public Records Office in Dublin. Only a few fragments remain for Northern Ireland as follows:
- Antrim – 1851
- Belfast City – 1851 (1 ward)
- Fermanagh – 1821, 1841 and 1851
- Londonderry – 1831
Almost all of the 1901 and 1911 census returns for the whole of Ireland (including the North) survive and are available to search and download for free along with the 19th century fragments on the NAI site here.
National Library of Ireland Catholic Parish Registers
During the 1950s, the NLI microfilmed the surviving Roman Catholic Baptism and Marriage registers up to 1880 from most of the parishes in the Republic and Northern Ireland. These microfilms have now been digitized and are available to view free of charge here.
The registers have effectively been recreated using the microfilm images. The site is very easy to use with the interactive map on the page, as long as you know which parish to look for. The registers are not indexed by name, so you can only browse them. To search by name, you need to use FindMyPast (see below).
FindMyPast
You can also access the NLI Catholic Register database for free via FindMyPast and use their search function, so you can look for individual names as well as other fields.
FindMyPast has the largest collection of online Irish records (including the Northern counties) and it is well worth exploring what they do have. Records include electoral rolls, military records, land records etc. You do need a subscription to access these records, but you can sign up for a 14 day free trial here to see if they are of use to you before you commit to a full subscription.
Family Search
Family Search has two Irish (North and South) parish record collections
- Ireland Births and Baptisms, 1620-1881.
- Ireland Marriages, 1619-1898.
These are mostly transcriptions from Church of Ireland records with a few Catholic and some non-conformist records. Coverage is very patchy, so you need to check what records they have for the parish or County you are looking at before you search.
Family Search also have a few other Irish sets which are worth checking out here.
Roots Ireland
Roots Ireland is a pay site belonging to the Irish Family History Foundation. They have transcriptions from the registers of Catholic and other churches in most of the counties of Ireland (including the North). Before you commit to a subscription, you should check what records they have for your county and to make sure the records are not available for free elsewhere (see the other sources mentioned above).
For more Irish genealogy see:
- Find your Irish Ancestry
- 125 Free Irish Genealogy Online Resources
- Irish Genealogy Links
- Ireland genealogy blog
Good luck with your research!
For further reading, you may find these books useful:
There are more genealogy books in the Resources section.
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