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Society of Genealogists
The Society of Genealogists (SoG) is a UK-based educational charity, founded in 1911 to "promote, encourage and foster the study, science and knowledge of genealogy". The Society's Library is the largest specialist genealogical library outside North America. Membership is open to any adult who agrees to abide by the Society's rules and who pays the annual subscription. At the end of 2023, it had 6,654 members.
The society was founded in 1911 by George Sherwood, Charles Bernau, Gerald Fothergill, Edgar Francis Briggs and Dr William Bradbrook.
It was the Hertfordshire antiquary, William Blyth Gerish, who suggested the foundation of the Society and his proposal, made in a letter to Notes & Queries, was taken up by Charles Bernau, the author of The Genealogy of the Submerged, a meeting was held, further invitations were sent out, and fifty interested people provided a fund to incorporate the Society. The document is dated 8 May 1911.
The object of the early members, who met in Sherwood's office at 227 The Strand, was to transcribe and index original material and to make it readily available in one place. The group's committees intended to form pressure groups to obtain easier access to records of alll kinds.
An early rapid growth in the collections, amongst them 43 volumes compiled by Mrs Vernona Smith on the West Indies, and 51 volumes of Berkshire material bequeathed by Frederick Simon Snell, necessitated the first move to larger premises from The Strand to the first floor or 5 Bloomsbury Square, in 1914.
In October 1911 a committee, chaired by Fothergill, had been appointed to communicate with the Registrar General and others with a view to gaining access to the Census Returns of 1841 and 1851 but although the Registrar General replied in January 1912 that 'administrative difficulties prevent their being thrown open as desired', the Public Record Office (now The National Archives) wrote on 6 June 1912 to say that the Secretary of State had authorised the production of the records at the Record Office of the Enumeration Schedules of both censuses 'on payment of the fees fixed by the Master of the Rolls, viz. 1s. for one piece, and 2s.6d. for each set of 10 pieces' and in 1952 the PRO was responsible for getting the Home Office and the Treasury to agree to the abolition of the fees for the inspections of both returns.
In 1916 the first monthly lecture was held and in 1919, whilst Lord Raglan was President, Queen Mary accepted patronage of the Society. In 1922 under the long Presidency of Lord Farrer work started on the transcription and indexing of the Apprentices of Great Britain (1710-1774), which Fothergill had recently discovered at Somerset House, and the society received from W.H. Welply eighteen volumes of abstracts of Irish wills and pleadings, following the destruction of the Irish Record Office that year. Three years later, following the demise of the periodical The Genealogist, the Society began its own quarterly journal The Genealogists' Magazine, and Percival Boyd started work on the Marriage Index which bears his name. By the time of his death in 1955 he had indexed the marriages in most transcribed parish registers and the index contained over six million entries. The long secretaryship, 1930-50, of Mrs Kathleen Blomfield gave stability to the Society. In 1932 a debate on the 'Companions of the Conqueror' was held, with contributions by the Librarian Dr T.R. Thomson, Geoffrey White and others, the former having poduced the fist edition of his A Catalogue of British Family Histories in 1928.
In 1933 the second move took place, this time to a large room at Chaucer House, Malet Place, leased from the Library Association. In 1934 the Corporation of Trinity House gave the Society its large collection of petitions from the wives and children of distressed seamen, 1780-1854, and in 1935 Kathleen Blomfield organised the publication of the first edition of The Genealogist's Handbook. An important Silver Jubilee Exhibition was arranged for 1936 though, owing to the death of the King, it was delayed until 29 June-2 July 1937 and Queen Mary was unable to attend. An attractive Exhibition Catalogue, the cover designed by Claire G.M. Evans, and to which many experts contributed, listed some 273 exhibits and records and gave detailed explanations of their uses. One major section of exhibits was provided by The Eugenics Society.
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Society of Genealogists
The Society of Genealogists (SoG) is a UK-based educational charity, founded in 1911 to "promote, encourage and foster the study, science and knowledge of genealogy". The Society's Library is the largest specialist genealogical library outside North America. Membership is open to any adult who agrees to abide by the Society's rules and who pays the annual subscription. At the end of 2023, it had 6,654 members.
The society was founded in 1911 by George Sherwood, Charles Bernau, Gerald Fothergill, Edgar Francis Briggs and Dr William Bradbrook.
It was the Hertfordshire antiquary, William Blyth Gerish, who suggested the foundation of the Society and his proposal, made in a letter to Notes & Queries, was taken up by Charles Bernau, the author of The Genealogy of the Submerged, a meeting was held, further invitations were sent out, and fifty interested people provided a fund to incorporate the Society. The document is dated 8 May 1911.
The object of the early members, who met in Sherwood's office at 227 The Strand, was to transcribe and index original material and to make it readily available in one place. The group's committees intended to form pressure groups to obtain easier access to records of alll kinds.
An early rapid growth in the collections, amongst them 43 volumes compiled by Mrs Vernona Smith on the West Indies, and 51 volumes of Berkshire material bequeathed by Frederick Simon Snell, necessitated the first move to larger premises from The Strand to the first floor or 5 Bloomsbury Square, in 1914.
In October 1911 a committee, chaired by Fothergill, had been appointed to communicate with the Registrar General and others with a view to gaining access to the Census Returns of 1841 and 1851 but although the Registrar General replied in January 1912 that 'administrative difficulties prevent their being thrown open as desired', the Public Record Office (now The National Archives) wrote on 6 June 1912 to say that the Secretary of State had authorised the production of the records at the Record Office of the Enumeration Schedules of both censuses 'on payment of the fees fixed by the Master of the Rolls, viz. 1s. for one piece, and 2s.6d. for each set of 10 pieces' and in 1952 the PRO was responsible for getting the Home Office and the Treasury to agree to the abolition of the fees for the inspections of both returns.
In 1916 the first monthly lecture was held and in 1919, whilst Lord Raglan was President, Queen Mary accepted patronage of the Society. In 1922 under the long Presidency of Lord Farrer work started on the transcription and indexing of the Apprentices of Great Britain (1710-1774), which Fothergill had recently discovered at Somerset House, and the society received from W.H. Welply eighteen volumes of abstracts of Irish wills and pleadings, following the destruction of the Irish Record Office that year. Three years later, following the demise of the periodical The Genealogist, the Society began its own quarterly journal The Genealogists' Magazine, and Percival Boyd started work on the Marriage Index which bears his name. By the time of his death in 1955 he had indexed the marriages in most transcribed parish registers and the index contained over six million entries. The long secretaryship, 1930-50, of Mrs Kathleen Blomfield gave stability to the Society. In 1932 a debate on the 'Companions of the Conqueror' was held, with contributions by the Librarian Dr T.R. Thomson, Geoffrey White and others, the former having poduced the fist edition of his A Catalogue of British Family Histories in 1928.
In 1933 the second move took place, this time to a large room at Chaucer House, Malet Place, leased from the Library Association. In 1934 the Corporation of Trinity House gave the Society its large collection of petitions from the wives and children of distressed seamen, 1780-1854, and in 1935 Kathleen Blomfield organised the publication of the first edition of The Genealogist's Handbook. An important Silver Jubilee Exhibition was arranged for 1936 though, owing to the death of the King, it was delayed until 29 June-2 July 1937 and Queen Mary was unable to attend. An attractive Exhibition Catalogue, the cover designed by Claire G.M. Evans, and to which many experts contributed, listed some 273 exhibits and records and gave detailed explanations of their uses. One major section of exhibits was provided by The Eugenics Society.