ORKNEY IS WELL CATERED IN RESOURCES, SHOULD YOU WISH TO EXPLORE YOUR FAMILY TREE DURING YOUR STAY

Here are a few local and national resources to help you get started on your family history journey:

Orkney Family History Society

A must visit for anyone investigating their Orcadian ancestors, and probably the first place you should go.

An absolute treasure trove of information with an abundance of resources including records on births, marriages and deaths; censuses; emigration records; cemetery headstone inscriptions and family trees — available for people to help them discover their ancestry. The Orkney Family History Society has an office in the Orkney Library and Archive, and is usefully located next to the Archives. The office is staffed by volunteers, and visitors (whether members or not), are assured of a friendly welcome. More information can be found at www.orkneyfhs.co.uk.

Orkney Library and Archive

If you are tracing your Orcadian family roots, Orkney Library and Archive can provide access to records which may help you find out more about them. These include:

— Valuation rolls, electoral rolls and census schedules. — Old Parish registers and newspapers on microfilm. — School Records and photographs.

The archive holds a wide range of records which will aid research into almost any aspect of the history of Orkney and its people. Including The Orkney Room contains thousands of publications relating to these islands, plus Caithness and Shetland, dating from the 17th century onwards. The photographic archive contains a large collection of Orkney images from the 1860s onwards, and there is an extensive collection of oral history recordings and audio visual materials dating from the 1950s onwards. For more information see: orkneylibrary.org.uk/orkney-archive

Heritage Centres

There are a number of heritage centres dotted around Orkney, mostly on the smaller outer isles. These centres, often in renovated public buildings, tell the story of the islands’ history, containing hundreds of interesting items and artefacts. But these centres also hold extensive archives, including photographs, school rolls and documents on births, marriages and deaths, providing records of the inhabitants — an invaluable resource to those wanting to trace their family history, ancestry and genealogy.

Scotlandspeople

The Scotlandspeople website is the official Scottish Government site for searching government records and archives. It is used by hundreds of thousands of people each year to apply for copies of official certificates and to research family history, biography, local history and social history. In the site you have access to the statutory registers of births, marriages, deaths, and so on; census returns; church records; valuation rolls; and legal records from Scotland’s courts of law. See www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/