This is just a taste of what is out there and this page will be ever-changing. If you find a broken link, please let me know. I find that many of the British Isles sites change often.

General Free Websites

Family Search: http://www.familysearch.org/
From the Home page click on the “Search” link. From there you will have options to look “records”, “Family Trees”, “Genealogies”, “Catalog”, “Books”, and “Research Wiki”. Shy away from the Family Trees and Genealogies unless they are well sourced. There should be documents or links to the sources. So and so’s tree is not a good source! I’m not saying completely ignore the information, just proceed with caution and use it as a jumping off point. There are records constantly being added and digitized. Run your cursor over the world map to the right and click on an area to see what is available. A lot of great info on this site and it’s free!

Family Search Wiki http://www.familysearch.org/wiki
Have a question about a topic, place or “you name it”? They probably have the answer for you. “A free, online genealogy and family history guide that lists websites, provides research strategies, and suggests records and resources to help you find ancestors from all over the world. “

Cyndislist cyndislist.com
A great starting place. “A comprehensive, categorized & cross-referenced list of links that point you to genealogical research sites online.”

Find A Grave findagrave.com
The last time I checked, this site said it had cemeteries list for over 240 countries! Not everything is on there but they are always looking for volunteers to help. A name listed but no photos of the grave? There just might be a volunteer that will take one for you! I’ve had good luck with this.

Rootsweb: http://www.rootsweb.com
Another all around great site to explore.

The U.S. GenWeb Project: http://www.usgenweb.com
Started in 1996 by a group of genealogical volunteers. Their goal is to provide FREE help and information for every U.S. state and county. Areas are “adopted” by gracious volunteers to keep the information flowing.

The World GenWeb Project: www.worldgenweb.org
Same concept as the U.S. GenWeb project just on a bigger scale. “The WorldGenWeb Project is a non-profit, volunteer-based organization dedicated to providing genealogical and historical records and resources for world-wide access!”

Black Sheep Ancestors: http://www.blacksheepancestors.com/index.shtml “Search for your Blacksheep Ancestors in Free Genealogical Prison and Convict Records, Historical Court Records, Executions, Insane Asylum Records and Biographies of Famous Outlaws, Criminals & Pirates in the United States, United Kingdom and Canada”

Olive Tree Genealogy: https://www.olivetreegenealogy.com/index.shtml Tons of free genealogy information including ship’s passenger lists.

Castle Garden http://www.castlegarden.org/ Located in New York, Castle Garden was the first immigration center. Records range from 1820 – 1892.

British Isles Specific

FreeBMD http://www.freebmd.org.uk/  
FreeBMD is an ongoing project, the aim of which is to transcribe the Civil Registration index of births, marriages and deaths for England and Wales, and to provide free Internet access to the transcribed records. They are also looking for volunteers to help with this project.

FreeCEN http://www.freecen.org.uk
The aim of this is an ongoing project is to provide a “free-to-view” online searchable database of the 1841-1891 UK census returns. They are always looking for volunteers.

FreeREG http://www.freereg.org.uk/
The objective is to provide free internet searches of baptism, marriage, and burial records, that have been transcribed from parish and non-conformist registers of the U.K.

National Archives: “Access to the Archives” nationalarchives.gov.uk/
A2A is part of the UK archives network. This database contains catalogs describing archives held parts of England and Wales dating from the eighth century. They do have a few things digitized. My 5th great grandfather’s will is listed there!

Special Collection Online (Directories)
specialcollections.le.ac.uk/cdm/landingpage/collection/p16445coll4
This is a searchable digital library project put on by Leicester University. This is a collection of local and trade directories in England and Wales from 1750-1919.  It is searchable by location, decade or keyword.

GENUKI http://www.genuki.org.uk
This is a jump off page to the different regions that make up the UK and Ireland.

The Ships List http://www.theshipslist.com
A source for ships’ passenger lists. They have immigration reports, newspaper records, shipwreck information, ship pictures, ship descriptions, shipping-line fleet lists and more; as well as hundreds of passenger lists to Canada, USA, Australia and even some for South Africa. They have over 3,000 totally free access web-pages with new databases added regularly.

Lost Cousins http://www.lostcousins.com
Lost Cousins helps match you with cousins researching the same ancestors.

Surnames of England and Wales – the ONS list
http://www.taliesin-arlein.net/names/search.php
How Common is your Surname in the British Isles?

Irish Genealogy: https://www.irishgenealogy.ie/en/
“Tthe website dedicated to helping you search for family history records for past generations. The website is now home to the historic records of Births, Marriages and Deaths of the General Register Office. These records join the Indexes to the historic records of Births, Marriages and Deaths that were already available on the website.”

Electric Scotland https://www.electricscotland.com/
“The largest and most comprehensive site on the history and culture of Scotland and the Scots at home and abroad. ”

Statistical Accounts of Scotland http://stataccscot.edina.ac.uk/static/statacc/dist/home
*Note that you can search within our website and view parish reports without a subscription. A subscription fee is needed to access additional features.

Scottish Emigration Databases
https://www.abdn.ac.uk/emigration/search.html
A project of the University of Aberdeen “The database seeks to identify patterns of movement from Scottish ports between 1890 and 1960 using information transferred digitally from the passenger manifests of the Board of Trade’s Statistical Department (BT 27) held at The National Archives in Kew, London. “

The Scottish register of Tartans
https://www.tartanregister.gov.uk/index
Tartans of every kind on this site.

The Scottish Onomastic Child-Naming Pattern

https://scottishkin.com/the-traditional-scottish-naming-system