A rchivist ’s top tips

Scottish Borders archive manager Paul Brough says: “When researching your Border ancestors watch out for alternative spellings of names. When searching on online systems or printed sources remember to look for name variants particularly if the name is something like Elliot [note single ‘t’ in common local spelling].” of Northumberland for 1901. Plus it has census indexes for Berwickshire, Roxburghshire, Selkirkshire, Peebleshire, East Lothian and Haddington.

Religious records

Presbyterianism was very strong in North Northumberland because of its proximity to Scotland. So alongside Anglican parish registers from the 1600s to approximately 1900 (on microfilm), plus marriage and burial indexes and transcripts for Northumberland and Durham, the Record Office has baptism registers for several Presbyterian churches in the area, many of which have been transcribed. It also has Berwickupon-Tweed and Lowick Methodist Circuit material, Roman Catholic registers for St Cuthbert and Our Lady