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Online Information About 630 Burial Grounds in Norfolk and Bedfordshire (UK) Published: 24 August 2009 By: Rick Roberts, Biography & Archived Articles We recently visited a website which might prove a valuable source of information to family historians who have links to Norfolk and Bedfordshire in England. It comprises a searchable database of memorial inscriptions from English counties which UK-based National Archive of Memorial Inscriptions (NAOMI) have been developing since 2005. They now have over 182,000 names from 630 burial grounds in Bedfordshire and Norfolk, and are adding to the database on a regular basis. The site provides both free and commercial services. Published transcriptions of memorial inscriptions can be difficult for UK-based family historians to find. However, the task is even more difficult for genealogists outside of the UK. This site enables anybody to search the burial database and obtain important information free of charge. The free data includes the surname and given name/s, year of death, age at death, county of burial, and the name of the burial ground where the person is interred. The detail screen provides more information including exact date of death, if others are named in the transcription. Provision of this free information is vital so that site visitors can decide if a specific record is for the person that they seek, before paying for additional information about the burial. SEARCH EXAMPLE I searched for a "William Smith" to see how the site works. As it turns out, there are a lot of William Smiths buried in Bedfordshire and Norfolk. However the site provides enough information for a researcher to zero in on the person that they are interested in. Search Screen (free):  As you can see above, I chose to search for "William Smith" in "Norfolk". I could have restricted my search by including dates and the specific place where he lived. Result of search (free):  The search resulted in 168 instances of burials of "William Smith"s. The site enables you to distinguish between people based on name, year of death, age at death, county of burial, and cemetery. I then clicked on the VIEW link for the William Smith who died in 1807 (4th William Smith from the bottom). Result of clicking on VIEW (free):  I was surprised that after clicking on VIEW, there was additional free information. Specifically, the exact day, month, and year of death -- and a notatation to let the researcher know if there are other names mentioned in the inscription (I checked other persons and found that some records listed the name of the other person who appears on the stone). I suspect that this William Smith may have had more than one other person mentioned, as the screen only tells us "Yes", there are others mentioned. The commercial part: If you find a relevant entry of a person of interest, you can separately purchase the inscription for £4 with possible extra information, in the form of a photograph, and a plan of the churchyard. Additonal historical text about the church can be purchased for an extra £1 if required. Seems like a pretty good deal to me. Try a search now. Rick Roberts GlobalGenealogy.com Canadian Genealogy & History Resources from Global Genealogy:
Shopping Cart & Order Desk Global Genealogy & History Shoppe 1-800-361-5168 ( 9-5 Monday to Friday )
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