A record of Charles Dickens' marriage in Chelsea in 1836, William Blake's burial in 1827 at Bunhill Fields, and the baptism of Jane Randolph (the mother of American President Thomas Jefferson) in Shadwell, East London in 1721, are among the one million new London parish records available online at Findmypast.co.uk as part of their new 'London Collection,' launched this past week. The collection includes:
- City of London Burial Index - records from all the churches in the City of London from 1813 to 1890
- West Middlesex Marriage Index - detailing 84,863 marriages in 61 parishes from 1538 to 1837
- London Docklands Baptisms - comprising 407,558 baptisms for London's docklands areas 1712 to 1933
- London and West Kent Probate Indexes - mainly detailing wills and administrations from 1750 - 1858
- The Matchworkers' Strike - listing participants of the strike of over 700 men, women and teenage boys and girls working at the Bryant and May factory in East London in 1888, the same year as the Jack the Ripper murders
If you aren't familiar with Findmypast.co.uk, it is a subscription-based site with over 24 million English baptisms, marriages and burials dating from 1538, in addition the the England & Wales Civil Registration Index, all available British census records, and a wealth of other online records and resources for tracing British ancestors. General searches are free, but results in the form of transcriptions and/or images, are available through pay-per-view and subscription options.