Trade and Street Directories can be found in libraries and record offices and in some cases online.
These will give you the names of occupiers, and sometimes their occupations
These will give you the names of occupiers, and sometimes their occupations
DIRECTORIES - TRADE AND STREET
Directories published by the Post Office, Kellys, Whites or the many others can be found in libraries and record offices and in some cases online. They provide information, along with phone books that may help you trace the occupiers and the presence of your house and record changes made to the street or area.
The level of information contained in local directories varies, but you should find sufficient details about a house to help you with your research.
Directories, on the whole, contain street-by-street lists of houses and their principal occupants.
Do take care though and remember that house numbers as well as roads sometimes change over the years, sometimes because of changes to the road – for instance some new buildings or the need to renumber when the postal system was introduced.
So keep an open mind when you are tracing what is 25 Accacia Street today. It may not have been that number in 1860 or indeed it may not have had a number at all
Directories, on the whole, contain street-by-street lists of houses and their principal occupants.
Do take care though and remember that house numbers as well as roads sometimes change over the years, sometimes because of changes to the road – for instance some new buildings or the need to renumber when the postal system was introduced.
So keep an open mind when you are tracing what is 25 Accacia Street today. It may not have been that number in 1860 or indeed it may not have had a number at all
For more information read this informative article by leading historian Gill Blanchard first published in Who Do You Think You Are magazine. Click here to view pdf
|
Record OfficesHistorical Directories is a digital library of local and trade directories for England and Wales, from 1750 to 1919.
The earliest directory is Samuel Lees 1677 list of London merchants which can be viewed on Internet Archive The Public Record Office of Northern Ireland has various street directories Find My Past has a collection of directories The Genealogist has a selection of and Trade Street Directories Ancestry.co.uk has City and County Directories, from 1600s to 1900s and various British Phone Books, 1880-1984 The National Library of Scotland has street directories Buckinghamshire Records Guildhall Library Society of Genealogists Record offices have good local collections of directories |
|