IGI continued

Taking up where I left off last time – Hugh Wallis has made an exhaustive search of the likely ranges of IGI batch numbers and created a database of those numbers and the source records that they apply to. For each batch he has extracted the church or chapel (if specified), town, county and country names and then organised them by country and county and created this freepages website . He has also included a hotlink from each batch number to the actual search engine provided at http://www.familysearch.org/, including the ability to enter the surname you are looking for. This makes it very easy to search all the batches for a particular geographic location using just the last name you are searching for - something that is not possible directly from the LDS site without doing a lot of typing.
Hugh has found over 50,000 different batch numbers, which shows the enormity of the task that has been undertaken by the LDS and for which we as genealogists should be immensely grateful.
There are a few issues that researchers should take into account when using the IGI.
1. The International Genealogy Index (IGI) does not cover all parish records and you need to ascertain the coverage.
2. Some material on the IGI is the result of private researchers whose veracity is not known and is unsourced.
3. There are problems with Welsh records due to misunderstandings about the English surname / patronymic name mix.
4. The IGI has converted all dates to the Gregorian System which came into effect in 1752 in the British Empire.
These are not problems unique to the LDS Church Family History Centres and indeed all good researchers will always try to verify material they locate by accessing original material.

IGI

I had a strange request the other day about IGI records. Someone assumed the Library had them all on fiche. It appears there was some confusion as to what the IGI numbers actually were.
IGI stands for the International Genealogical Index, which is a partial index to vital records from around the world. It is one of the world’s largest collection of genealogical records. Information comes from individual research and original records. The majority of the names are from records of people who lived between 1500 and 1885. The index contains:
The names of millions of deceased persons from throughout the world.
Dates and places of births, christenings, marriages, and other events.
Latter-day Saint ordinance information.
Some of the information may have come from microfilm copies of the original records. Because the original records may have been updated by the record custodians, you may find additional, more accurate information in the original records. You may also be able to obtain official copies of the original records by contacting the appropriate record custodian.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (often referred to as the LDS) has made the International Genealogical Index (the "IGI") available on the internet at http://www.familysearch.org/ and provided a very effective searching capability. However, it is not always easy to locate your ancestors (even if they are there in the IGI) using the search mechanisms provided at that site. This is because a search by last name only is not permitted unless you search within a single batch of records at a time or, at minimum, across the entire country (not even a single county let alone a town). If you have a rare name this might be OK but what if you are looking for Smith or Jones?
There are the standard warnings about relying on the IGI - as with any secondary source it should only be used as a finding aid and the primary source material should be referred to for definitive information. There ARE mistakes but, nevertheless, used properly it is indispensible.
The LDS has organised the records in the IGI into 'batches'. These batches relate to how and when the information was extracted from source material. This is where Hugh Wallis comes to the rescue at his site http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~hughwallis/IGIBatchNumbers.htm , but more of that another time.