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Genealogy
In genealogical terms Rosalyn has been involved in genealogical work since 1993. She specialises in Jewish Genealogy using sources available in Manchester and she deals with queries from all over the world. She is a research agent for the Greater Manchester Record Office, for the Bolton, Bury and Manchester libraries and she is referred queries from the Manchester Jewish Museum, the local Synagogues, the Jewish Studies Unit at Manchester University, the Genealogical Society of Great Britain, and contributors from Jewishgen. She is not only able to help families whose ancestors passed through Manchester but she also has access to the following sources which can help families whose ancestors passed through England.
National Naturalisation Index up to 1914
National Probate Index of Jewish names
St Catherine’s House National Index of births, marriages and deaths.
1881 Census
Sources
Manchester attracts Jewish genealogical queries from all over the world, which at first glance might seem strange. Why should people living in America, Canada, Australia etc be writing to Manchester for help with their family trees? The answer lies in the position of Manchester on the route of transmigration from Eastern Europe to America. Immigrants travelling westward from Eastern Europe would often land in Hull or Grimsby and then crossed the country to Liverpool. After 1845 the railway provided a route linking Hull, Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool and turned Liverpool into the major port of emigration. Great numbers of immigrants travelled this route, which was often done in stages due to the lack of money or family considerations. As a result many stayed in Manchester, even if only temporarily, since there was a Jewish community there from the 1790s with established facilities. As the foreign immigrant community increased in size in the 1850s and 60s they established their own chevras, and this then attracted other immigrants to join landsleit for a while on their journey westward. Inevitably some stayed permanently and so the immigrant community continued to grow up to the First World War, when the Jewish community numbered 35,000.
Burial Registers and Gravestones Gravestones enable a family to discover the previous male generation, who may have been left behind in Eastern Europe and this information makes a search of Eastern European records possible. In Manchester there is no central source of burial information. Each synagogue had its own burial society and buried in their own or jointly run cemeteries. There was also a communal Burial Board, a Chevra Kadisha and a Manchester Burial Society of Polish Jews. Many burial records are still held by the individual synagogues, although some can be found in the Central Reference Library (CRL) Archives in St Peters Square. (These include the records of the earliest cemeteries in Pendleton from 1798, Miles Platting, from 1841 and Prestwich from 1873….) The Manchester Jewish Museum (MJM) holds indices to Reform burials at the Southern and Whitefield Cemeteries. Most of the registers have a name index except for Prestwich, Failsworth, South Manchester and Crumpsall Cemetery (before 1929). A list of Jewish cemeteries and the congregations who run them is available in the Manchester Jewish Representative Council Year Book.Probate Records The Manchester Jewish Museum has access to a national Jewish name index to the probate records from 1858-1920, via Ros Livshin. The index gives the name, date of death, date and place of probate, occupation, address, executors and amount of the estate. The date makes it possible to apply for the will from the probate registry.Census In Manchester the Censuses from 1841-1881 have been searched for Jewish names and information and these details are available via Ros Livshin and the Jewish Museum. Around 4000 Jewish names have also been lifted out of the 1891 Census. The Censuses themselves are available on microfilm and microfiche at the CRL. A name index for the 1881 Census is now also available in most libraries on CD Rom, compiled by the Church of the Latter Day Saints. The name indices enable people to locate relatives in the Census, which is organised street by street. Where no name index exists eg for most of the 1891 and next year for 1901, it is necessary to know the address at which the family was living at the time of the Census. Two sources are most useful for this, the Manchester Street Directories and the School Admission Registers.City Directories The MJM holds details of all identifiable Jewish names extracted from the local directories up to 1850. The Manchester and Salford Directories of streets, names and trades are available on microfilm at the CRL or in book form at the Salford Local History Library. Not all streets or people appear in the directories and the absence of a family does not mean that they were not in Manchester at that time.School Admission Registers These are a valuable source of information. Not only do they give an address, which may not appear in the directories, but also child’s date of birth, father’s name, date of entry into school, previous school attended, date of withdrawal and sometimes reasons for withdrawal. From these registers it is possible to build up a picture of whole families and their movements and to identify other families with the same name. Where the record states ‘previous school none or Russia’ and the child entering is over school age, it is apparent the family cannot have lived long in the country. This helps to identify the year of arrival. Information given on the reason for withdrawal can also show a family emigrating to America or leaving for another town.The school admission registers exists for the Jews School from the 1874-1940s, Southall Street School 1896-1930 and Waterloo Road School, 1913-55. These were all schools in the densely populated Jewish areas of Cheetham and Strangeways. Admission Registers also exist for schools on the outskirts of these areas. The registers are held at the Archives Dept of CRL and one Jews School Infants Register, 1891-1901, is held at the MJM. Newspapers Local newspapers have proved useful when trying to discover information of a specific event that may have a happened to a person, for example death by accident or an obituary if the person was well known. It is necessary to know the date of the incident since most newspapers are not indexed. However a Jewish name index has been compiled for the Manchester City News from 1875-1923 and this is available at the MJM. The paper itself is on microfilm at the CRL as are the other local newspapers such as the Manchester Evening Chronicle, the Manchester Evening News and the Manchester Guardian. The Guardian does have a yearly index from 1842-1945 but this is difficult to use. Jewish newspapers did not begin in the city until 1950 (Jewish Telegraph) and 1961 (Jewish Gazette). CRL holds an incomplete series of each of these. MJM holds some yearly bound volumes of the Jewish Gazette, which ceased production. There is no index to either paper, which makes them difficult to use if no date is known. A complete series of the Jewish Chronicle from 1841 is available on microfilm at CRL and the local news section relating to Manchester is useful if dates are known. Indices to the JC are available elsewhere.Often families from abroad are keen to trace the living descendants of branches who stayed in Manchester. The Jewish Telegraph runs a roots directory, publishing requests and this has proved very helpful. The directory can be contacted by e-mail at roots@jewishtelegraph.com. Watch Committee Papers Bill Williams has compiled an index of Jewish names extracted from the Watch Committee Papers 1894-1920.. The index is available at the MJM but for further information on a name, it would be necessary to contact Bill Williams for a reference. The Watch Committee Papers themselves are housed at the Manchester Police Museum.Marriage Records Besides the St Catherine’s House marriage index available at the Greater Manchester County Record Office, Marshall St, the MJM holds an index to all Jewish marriages in the city of Manchester 1900-1950. This was a list compiled by the Manchester Register Office and it refers to the register and entry numbers of the marriage held by that office. Each synagogue holds its own marriage registers but unless a rough date is known synagogue secretaries do not have the time to do searches. CRL houses a number of marriage records including those of North Manchester Synagogue, 1895-1915, Great Synagogue counterfoils 1854-1911 and the New Synagogue 1924-27. The MJM holds the marriage register of the New Kahal Chassidim, Waterloo Rd, 1929-52 and has a list of Ketubot in its possession, which are housed off the premises.Birth Records Most useful is the St Catherine’s House index available at the County Record Office. The information from this enables one to apply to the Registry Office for the birth certificate. There are some Jewish sources of information for births but these do not give as much information as the birth certificate. The MJM houses the birth registers of the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue, 1874-1929 and the birth register of midwife Dora Black, 1913-1934 and the CRL contains the counterfoils of birth certificates 1859-72 and the Circumcision registers of Prosper Mesod Zicree 1873-1912.Electoral Registers In the search for descendants these records are useful since they indicate the British born children or naturalised persons of voting age living at a given address. Once names are known it is possible to go on to other sources to trace them. The Manchester electoral registers start from 1839 and are mainly on microfilm in the CRL. The Salford ones are in book form in the Salford Local History Library.Oral and Photographic Records The MJM houses a large oral history and photographic collection. The oral history collection covers interviews with the children of immigrant Jews who settled in Manchester at the turn of the century, and with refugees and survivors who came before and after the Second World War. There are summaries for each interview and occasional transcripts. There is a name index to the photographic collection, listing name of donor and names of people appearing on the photographs. The collection is stored in the form of contact prints and negatives and there are information sheets accompanying each deposit. Most photographs are from Manchester families but there are some from other towns.Many people were born abroad and one frequently asked question is to locate the family’s place of origin in Eastern Europe. There are a number of records of help for this. Salford Aliens Register The Aliens Registers were kept by the police from 1916 until the 1960s. They recorded the details of any non-naturalised subject, whether from friendly or enemy countries, as determined by the first world war. The Registers give information on the person’s place of birth, date of birth, date of arrival in the district and previous place of residence, address and occupation. The Manchester registers have not survived but the Salford ones cover areas inhabited by Jews, such as Lower and Higher Broughton and parts of Bury New Rd. Not all of these registers have survived. The registers are housed at the Manchester Police Museum in Newton St and there is an index at the MJM. There is a public restriction on the registers of 75 years due to their sensitive nature but requests can be made to the Police Museum or to the MJM, via Ros Livshin for information pertaining to an individual’s family.Naturalisation Records The MJM has access to a naturalisation index of Jewish names for the whole country from 1790 to 1914 via Ros Livshin. This gives the name, address, country of origin and date of naturalisation. The naturalisation certificate would then have to be requested from the Public Record Office in London either in person or through a research agent. The naturalisation certificate gives place and date of birth, names of the person’s parents and of his children under 18 living at home. It is often possible to receive the whole naturalisation file, which includes testimonials, memorials and police reports which were sent to support the application for naturalisation. The CRL has a copy of the Manchester Naturalisation Society Cash Book 1896-1909 but this only gives names and addresses and payments.Relief Books The Account Book of the Board of relief of the Great Synagogue 1848-1852, housed at the MJM, gives details of name and place of origin.Other relief books do not give place of origin. The records of the Benevolent Relief Fund, 1864-69 and the Passover Relief find 1860-67, housed at CRL give name, address, family and length of residence in Manchester of some of the recipients. Miscellaneous The MJM holds The Register of the Workers Circle 1912-39. This gives details of name, address, age, occupation and dates of admission and departure and shows some people returning to Russia. A list of Independent Labour Party Members in Manchester 1902-14 A photocopy of the Manchester section of the commercial Directory of Jews in the United Kingdom by Eugene Harfield, 1893. A small amount of biographical material indexed alphabetically by name or place. This material includes many synagogue membership lists mainly from the 1930s.The CRL holds numerous minute books, letter books, ledgers, accounts, annual reports, and printed histories of synagogues and other communal organisations, which give information on committee members, ministers etc. An almost complete run of the Jewish Yearbook from 1896 and the Manchester section of this lists synagogues, societies and their officiants. An Aliyoh book of the Great synagogue with English and Hebrew names from c1880-1920. The English and Hebrew names of seatholders of the Great Synagogue, 1895-1921. |