Almost 16 million records chronicling the lives – and deaths – of Yorkshire people across nearly seven centuries have been made freely searchable online for the first time.
The collection, which spans the years 1389 to 1858, has been released through a partnership between the University of York and Ancestry, and includes some remarkable glimpses into the lives of ordinary people from across the region.
In one entry from 1736, a compiler from Bossall in North Yorkshire noted there was “no love amongst us” – after an entire year passed without a single wedding in the village.
Death and loss are never far away. The 1604 registers for Hornsea record a community ravaged by “plage tyme”, while a 1756 entry from Kilnsea details the shipwreck of the Charles from London, noting the burial of Captain William Burwood and nine of his crew.
The collection includes the wills of famous figures such as Charlotte Brontë (listed under her married name as Charlotte Nicholls) and the diarist Anne Lister. However, it’s the accounts of ordinary people that often prove most poignant.
Researchers can now access the 1613 will of Ann Stackhouse, who gave her final wishes orally to her midwife while dying in childbirth. The archives also reveal the philanthropy of John de Gysburn, who in 1385 left money to support four “houses of lepers” in the York suburbs.
Gary Brannan, Keeper of Archives and Research Collections at the Borthwick Institute for Archives, said: “People have a huge desire to trace their roots, and the discoveries they make can be intensely personal and profoundly moving.
“Individuals living around the world are always rightly proud to discover they have roots in Yorkshire.
“These records are quite unique as they are incredibly well kept and cover a long time span in a community that is always growing and changing.
“We currently have around 30,000 people from more than 140 countries accessing our catalogue each year. Because the vast majority cannot travel to York in person, this partnership makes these vital documents globally available.”
Created as annual copies of parish registers for the Archbishop, the Bishops’ Transcripts will fill gaps where original records were lost or damaged. Experts estimate that the transcripts contain more than 20,000 entries that do not exist anywhere else.
The records will be free to discover onsite at the Borthwick Institute for Archives, or can be accessed remotely via a subscription to Ancestry.co.uk.
Income generated by the partnership will be used to develop and support the Borthwick’s activities, enabling the university to preserve the region’s history and make more records accessible through new access projects, additional staffing and updated equipment.
