* 1939 Register custom query help

[jmurphy]

How can I make use of Family Historian to set up searches in the 1939 Census?

Here's what I'd like to do. I already understand how to use the standard "Estimated Alive At" query. I can plug in the date that the enumeration was taken and get a search result.

I see that I can save it to a file, so from there I can get the data into a spreadsheet, which I can mark up with notes and links to search results on FMP.

What I would like to do is to customize the query, and add the relationship to root and/or the pool numbers included in the results set. That way I can work outwards and search the nearest relations first and the associated people last.

It would also be useful to save the result set to a Named List, but I don't remember how.

I don't need to have the query exclude people who were living in the USA in the 1940 Census -- there are not many individuals, and if I put the result set in a Named List or spreadsheet, it's easy to remove them by hand.

[tatewise]

Just wait a few more days and I will have updated my Lookup Missing Census Facts Plugin to include the 1939 Register census. That Plugin allows you to choose the Individuals &/or relatives to include, and only if they are alive at the Census and have no associated Census Event will the FMP search be offered. Give the Plugin a try and see how it works. It will tell you when the update is available.

[tatewise]

Please see Lookup Missing Census Facts for 1939 Register (13030).

[jmurphy]

Please see Lookup Missing Census Facts for 1939 Register (13030).

Mike -- thanks very much! I would like to have results that were only the 1939 Register, but this is easily solved by sorting the results by record set and changing the sort to descending so that the 1939 Register is shown at the top.

I was pondering the most efficient way to save the results of the plugin to a spreadsheet so I could mark off the households I found as I went along -- then I realized I could use the save-to-file feature in FamilyHistorian itself.

Since I don't yet have a dummy 1939 residence fact for the people who always lived in the USA, I'll still have to weed some people out by hand.

(One annoying hiccup which is not at all your fault -- the query picks up all the people who are missing CENSUS information. For this particular trial, I am using it on a GEDCOM which I downloaded from one of my online Ancestry trees -- and Ancestry (in their infinite wisdom) saves all Census data to one's online tree as a Residence fact. So it is reporting missing census facts for a lot of people for whom I do indeed already have the census. Once I remembered this, I felt much less alarmed at the size of the reported "missing" facts.)

I greatly appreciate the way the plugin displays the results for married women with their married name, with the family information showing in a different column.

[tatewise]

I hope you realise that clicking the web search page column headings performs a sort, and clicking again performs a reverse sort.
So click twice on the FindMyPast heading to sort the 1939 Register entries together at the top.

To convert the Residence facts from Ancestry into Census events use the Change Any Fact Tag Plugin.

The Lookup Missing Census Facts Plugin has the option to choose Anyone via the Select Records dialogue and that allows Add/Remove using Query and that offers Named List Members. So if you have a Named List of people in USA in 1939 then you could for instance select a key person, use Add Relatives > Ancestors, then Remove using Query > Named List Members > USA 1939.

[jmurphy]

I hope you realise that clicking the web search page column headings performs a sort, and clicking again performs a reverse sort.
So click twice on the FindMyPast heading to sort the 1939 Register entries together at the top.

Yes, that's exactly what I did. A very nice feature!

To convert the Residence facts from Ancestry into Census events use the Change Any Fact Tag Plugin.

The Lookup Missing Census Facts Plugin has the option to choose Anyone via the Select Records dialogue and that allows Add/Remove using Query and that offers Named List Members. So if you have a Named List of people in USA in 1939 then you could for instance select a key person, use Add Relatives > Ancestors, then Remove using Query > Named List Members > USA 1939.

I haven't yet used the Change Any Fact Tag Plugin. It's a pretty sure bet that the offending Residence tags are NOT dated properly, so I won't (yet) be able to filter them out by their proper census day. So I'll have to figure out how not to change any US residence tags from City Directories that are in the UK Census years. If I can restrict the facts that get changed to England only, that should cover everything.

Thanks for the suggestion to filter with a Named List for the family members who have never been in the UK, or who had moved permanently to the US by 1939.

[tatewise]

The Change Any Fact Tag Plugin has a Filter for both Date and Place for exactly the purpose you describe.

I suspect the Ancestry Residence facts do have correct Dates, because if I recall correctly they are derived from the Ancestry Census records. If not, then the Search and Replace Plugin should be able to correct them.

I had perhaps incorrectly assumed that the Ancestry imported GEDCOM would NOT have "any US residence tags from City Directories". It is important with imported data to clean and correct the GEDCOM is isolation before merging with an established Project.