Читать книгу Collins Tracing Your Irish Family History - Ryan Tubridy, Anthony Adolph - Страница 21

Many Catholic registers remain with the church where they were created. To see them, telephone or write (enclosing a prepaid envelope or international reply coupon) and ask for a search, or for permission to do so yourself. Be extremely clear and courteous – most priests’ spiritual duties are more pressing to them than tracing your ancestry – but if you meet real obstacles you can always try enlisting the local bishop’s help instead.

3. You can hire genealogists or record agents. Genealogists like myself charge higher fees and organise and implement all aspects of genealogical research. Record agents charge less and work to their clients’ specific instructions – ‘please search the parish registers of X for the period 1730 to 1790 for baptisms of any Fitzgeralds’, for example. Most archives have a search service, or a list of local researchers. Many advertise in genealogy magazines or at www.genealogypro.com, www.expertgenealogy.com and www.cyndislist.org. Most are trustworthy, and many offer excellent services, though ability varies enormously. Generally, the more prompt and professional their response, and neater their results, the more likely they are to be any good. Hiring help is not ‘cheating’: if you only want one record examined but are not sure it will contain your ancestor, it makes no sense to undertake a long journey when you can pay someone a small fee for checking for you, and a local searcher’s expertise may then point you in the right direction anyway.