Cumbria Online
BEST WEBSITES TO AID YOUR RESEARCH
The ‘Catalogues and Guides’ section of Cumbria Archives’ website is a good place to start: cumbria.gov. uk/archives/online_ catalogues. You can browse catalogues of most major holdings divided by category, each linked to CASCAT. For example, ‘Family history indexes’ contains indexes to various cemeteries, admissions to Garlands Mental Hospital, the Cumberland Militia and more.
CASCAT itself is a huge treasure trove of information, containing more than 800,000 catalogue descriptions, including lists of individual wills for the diocese of Carlisle (pre-1858) and for the probate registry of Carlisle (1858–1941). You can also browse the catalogue of an individual school, church or major estate, for example, and with the reference use the digitisation service to request a copy of the record.
The ‘Guide to Church Records’ page provides details of register coverage by place, type and date for both Anglican and non-Anglican churches and chapels ( bit.ly/cumbria-churches). And you can keep in touch with the archives by following @CumbriaArchives on Twitter and @conservation.unit on Instagram.
Online information is often organised by the historic county definitions. The FamilySearch wiki for Cumberland, for example, is at family search.org/wiki/ en/Cumberland,_ England_Genealogy, while the Westmorland GENUKI section can be found at genuki.org.uk/big/eng/wes.
Cumbria Libraries Local Studies ( cumbria. gov.uk/libraries/localstudies/default.asp) has various downloadable spreadsheets, including First World War newspaper databases containing soldiers’ name, rank, age where known, regiment, number, address and reason for inclusion.
Other sites worth investigating include the Cumbria County History Trust ( cumbriacounty history.org.uk), a volunteer drive to create an online Victoria County History of Cumbria; the Industrial History of Cumbria ( cumbriaindustries.org.uk), which has an A–Z of local industries; the Cumbria Local History Federation ( clhf.org.uk); and the Cumbria Family History Society site ( cumbriafhs.com) including news, publications, parish information and links.