London lives

[AnnR]

Was catching up on the weekend papers earlier and came across an article in Sunday's Observer

Quote London Lives, an online archive containing 240,000 manuscripts and printed pages, published between 1690 and 1800, goes public, providing an invaluable insight into the lives of millions of ordinary people during a momentous century that saw revolution in France, the development of the steam engine and American independence from Britain.

The five-year project, which has involved the digitising of eight London archives, features a rich variety of documents previously all but inaccessible to the public. Among them are workhouse records, criminal registers, coroners' reports, court orders and papers governing the dispensation of poor relief.

Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, and produced by the universities of Sheffield and Hertfordshire, the site allows both amateur and professional historians to search the archives for individuals. Unquote

It went live yesterday and looks like a really useful source for anyone with London ancestors or maybe even if your ancestors were just passing through London. Have had a very quick look and it seems remarkaby simple to use.

https://www.londonlives.org/

ps from the site itself - A fully searchable edition of 240,000 manuscripts from eight archives and fifteen datasets, giving access to 3.35 million names.

[v.wells]

Bonus points AnnR!! I think many people will make use of this archive site. Thanks for the link! I hope I will finally be able to find something about my lot.

[AnnR]

Thanks for the link! I hope I will finally be able to find something about my lot.

Enjoy!

[annmarie44]

Hi Ann,

London Lives is a wondeerful site; what a boon for folks with London ancestors. Sure hope we see more sites like it.

[birdlip]

Fantastic, so interesting, thanks very much for this. I've bookmarked it.

[susan-y]

A great find, Ann! Don't know if any of my relatives were in London in that early time period ( too bad it didn't do all of the 1800's!) but I have bookmarked it just in case.

Thanks.

Sue

[Penelopepitstop]

Oh, this is wonderful! Thank-you so much

I have had a brief look around and have bookmarked the site. 2 lines of my family come from Westminster so I am sure I will be able to find some really interesting documents.



Penny

[hepzibah]

i dont have any london ancestors that i know of, but i will definately be looking at the site. thanks very much for telling us about it.

[hepzibah]

i just had a peep at the london lives site, and, although no known ansestors in london, i popped in one of the family surnames, which branch, as far as i know, lived in a small village in north wiltshire for getting on for 200 years. what should appear half way down the first page of results, but one of "my lot" in 1796, living in said small village in north wilts. he had taken out a fire insurance policy with a london firm!! absolutely amazing result!!

[Jane Elderfield]

Thanks very much for this site and link to it. I tried entering an ancestor's name and up came the report of a trial. He'd had a ham stolen from his shop window, and the constable produced the ham as evidence.... Great stuff!

--Jane E