Monmouthshire

• Monmouthshire - Archives and Libraries - links and information.

• Hale Family History site - a Monmouthshire book list.
• Monmouthshire - Bibliography - Books of General Interest for Family Historians.
• See also the books on South Wales in the General section of the Glamorgan Book pages of GENUKI.
• Wiles, Eric. Publications of the Caerleon Antiquarian Association, later Monmouthshire and Caerleon Antiquarian Association, now Monmouthshire Antiquarian Association. Monmouthshire Antiquary 13 (1997), p.59-66.

• Hale Family History site - Gwent's famous people.

• Photos and transcriptions of notable church monuments, provided by the Church Monuments Society.
• Roll of Honour - Monmouthshire - War Memorial Selection.
• A List of Monumental Inscriptions extracted and indexed by David Woolven.

• Monmouthshire Census - links and information.
• Carry out initial searches on all censuses 1841-1911  on  LDS Family Search  - using basic data supplied by Find My Past (subscription site) and all follow up searches are directed there

• Use the Church in Wales website database to Find a Parish Church in Wales.
• Church Plans Online - the Lambeth Palace Library holds a database of the Incorporated Church Building Society's images of the plans of various churches (use the onsite search facility)
• Welsh Chapels & Churches

• A List of Monmouthshire Transcriptions extracted and indexed by David Woolven.
• England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index Marriages 1754 - 1837 on Tinstaafl Transcripts  - Work in progress
• The Society of Genealogists web site has a list of their holdings of Parish Register Copies for Monmouthshire.
• Family Search UK/Ireland - Historical Record Collections 
  IGI Batch Numbers - Hugh Wallis's site  and Archer Software's site  

• Brett Langston has provided details of the Monmouthshire Registration Districts 1837-1930. Certificates of birth, death and marriage can be obtained from the Superintendent Registrars at the following District Register Offices:

  • Blaeneau Gwent Register Office
  • Newport Register Office
  • Torfaen Register Office

  Note: Certificates of birth, death and marriage can be obtained locally only from the Register Office for the District in which they were issued - or if the District no longer exists, the Office to which its registers have been moved.

• The Prison Service Museum (closed) near Rugby housed HM Prison Service's historical collection of exhibits, illustrating the history of imprisonment from medieval times to the present day. Housed in a converted stable block, the museum contained reconstructions of Victorian prison architecture, and exhibits include the last set of Gibbet Irons used in England. Smaller items included bone carvings and paintings made by prisoners in their cells, and a nineteenth century sampler embroidered by a female prisoner from her own hair

• The Geograph British Isles project - "aims to collect geographically representative photographs and information for every square kilometre of the UK and the Republic of Ireland..."
• Monmouthshire - on wikipedia
• Monmouthshire & Brecon Canal

• Geograph
• Flickr

• Kelly's Directory of Monmouthshire1901 - a complete transcript.
• Kelly's Directory of Monmouthshire and South Wales 1920
• There are many directories published for a range of years, these below are a small selection;
  • Kelly's directory of Monmouthshire and principal towns and places in south Wales. London : Kelly, 1884.
  • Pigot & Co. Directory of Monmouthshire. 1844
  • Slater's (late Pigot & Co.) royal national and commercial directory and topography of the counties of Gloucestershire, Monmouthshire and North and South Wales, and a classified directory of the town of Liverpool. Manchester, London, 1858.
• Leicester University's Digital Library of Historical Directories for England and Wales.

• For help finding your ancestors onboard ship - The Ships List (site down 10/2024) - of particular interest are the large number of transcribed passenger lists, and records of some Marriages at Sea.

• The section of The National Gazetteer (1868) relating to the county of Monmouthshire - transcribed by Colin Hinson.
• The transcription of the section for Miscellaneous Places from the National Gazetteer (1868) provided by Colin Hinson. Included here are the descriptions of major topological features (rivers, hills &c.) and a descriptions of the county hundred divisions.
• Samuel Lewis's A Topographical Dictionary of England 1848   on the British  History Online site - including Monmouthshire (search by parish name)

• MonGenes  - County Records, Maps & Gazetteer, Parish History & Photos, Crime & Punishment, The Poor & The Workhouse, Epidemics & Sanitation etc
• The Monmouthshire section of 'Curious Fox' - "The village-by-village contact site for anybody researching family history, genealogy and local history in the UK and Ireland".
• Timeline of genealogically interesting dates by Gareth Hicks.
• John Ball's Welsh Family History Archive provides some very useful material and links for those with Welsh ancestry.
• Here are details of the Genealogy Mailing Lists serving the Welsh counties
• The Monmouthshire GenWeb 

• Geography of South Wales - part of the Coalfield Web Materials site.
• A Vision of Britain Through Time - information about your home area from the 2001 census, and from each British census back to 1801. Presented both as maps of the whole country and as graphs showing change over time.
• The Francis Frith Collection - a collection of over 700,000 photographs of the UK, Europe and the Middle East taken by the Victorian photographer Francis Frith.

• Website for Welsh Heritage and Culture - People's Collection Wales .
• A digital library of medieval and modern sources of the history of the British Isles - British History Online. Notable souces include Journals of the House of Commons and House of Lords, Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae, and the Victoria County History.
• An Encyclopaedia of British History: 1700-1950 - useful for seeing local events against a national perspective. Scroll down the introductory page on this site to see topics - Monarchy, Child Labour, The Railways, &c.
• The Domesday Book site - "to enable visitors to find out the history of the Domesday Book and to give an insight into life at the time of its compilation". Note this site does not provide the original text, but does include a list settlements existing in 1086. Listed with Gloucestershire are Caerleon, Caerwent, Caldicot, Chepstow, Llanvair-Discoed and Portskewett.
• Hale Family History site - a short history.
• Hale Family History site - links to ancient Gwent history sites.
• Nelson, Lynn H - The Normans in South Wales, 1070-1171. Austin and London: University of Texas Press, 1966.
• Industrial Wales' & 'Brickworks of Wales'  " Potted histories, potted maps, potted notes and potted memories on all the places that I and others have visited and remember, along with Grid References so that you can visit them too. "(Phil Jenkins)

• Mike Durtnall is providing a country-wide collection of Historical Manuscripts Pages recording details of deeds that have been offered for sale on eBay and in auction catalogues. In most cases whereabouts of the documents will be unknown, but sufficient details of the property involved and of buyers, sellers, mortages, &c. is provided to make them a useful research tool.

• Sounds of Wales - John Ball provides a selection of pronunciations of Welsh Place Names as part of his Welsh Family History Archive website.
• The BBC's Learn Welsh course is highly recommended.

• Family Search have an interactive map called "England and Wales Jurisdictions 1851" showing parish (and other) boundaries with optional background maps such as Ordnance Survey. There is also a Search facility, do read the guidance notes to get maximum benefit from this useful resource. See here for further background information to assist in the interpretation of this data
• Kain, R.J.P., Oliver, R.R., Historic Parishes of England and Wales: an Electronic Map of Boundaries before 1850 with a Gazetteer and Metadata [computer file]. Colchester, Essex: History Data Service, UK Data Archive [distributor], 17 May 2001. SN: 4348. Here is a gazetteer/finding aid plus a set of overview maps to accurately identify the position of parishes within the county
• Access to various satellite map sites (Google, MS Live, &c.) via the convenient front end of Flash Earth.
• The London Ancestor site has maps from the 1885 Boundary Commissioners report for all parts of the British Isles, including Monmouthshire (Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1885)
• The Genmaps site contains a fine collection of Old Maps of the British Isles for Genealogists and Historians. In particular, see Old Maps of Monmouthshire.
• The above Genmaps Links pages lists Great Britain - Medieval Maps, which in turn provides several maps including an intriguing Ecclesiastical Map of the British Isles in the Middle Ages, which shows the principal Monasteries, demonstrating some of the earliest centres of habitation and influence.
• Detailed Maps of the area you may be interested in Monmouthshire are viewable at the UK Street Map Page. The site provides a most useful service, with superb address searching and street map facilities for anywhere in mainland Great Britain.
• Hale Family History site - 1907 map of Monmouthshire.
• Welsh county maps on the UK Genealogy Archives site
• John Speed map of Monmouth(shire). John Speeds County maps of Wales for first published in The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britain by George Humble  - on the People's Collection Wales site 

• Welsh Mariners by Dr Reg Davies - includes a searchable database of over 17,000 Welsh born (or Wales resident) Master mariners, mates and engineers who held certificates of competency or service; in practice it is an index of men active from 1850 to 1945 in the merchant navy.
• Lighthouse Personnel in England and Wales and the Channel Islands 1841-1910. Includes:- Table of Keepers; Table of Stations by county; Location map of the lighthouse sites.
• Maritime History. Although not particularly Monmouthshire related here are a large number of links to websites dealing with maritime history. By Bob Sanders.

• A comprehensive site featuring Castles and Fortifications - CastleUK.net
• The Regimental Archive of the Royal Monmouthshire Royal Engineers (Militia)
• Information about Castles in Monmouthshire may also be found on the Castle Wales website.
• The Age of Nelson - a website providing general information about the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars 1793-1815, and specifically searchable databases of those present at Trafalgar (and more) and of all Commissioned Naval Officers 1787-1822.
• Names from Musters of the Monmouthshire Militia 1781-82 are available for purchase on floppy disk or microfiche through Family History Indexes (the link to Militia Musters is part way down the page).
• The Royal Regiment of Wales was formed in 1969 by the amalgamation of two of Wales' most famous and distinguished regiments, namely The South Wales Borderers (24th Foot) and The Welch Regiment (41st/69th Foot).
• Royal Monmouthshire Regiment - on the People's Collection Wales site

• John Ball is providing a Glossary of Welsh Place-Name Elements as part of his Welsh Family History Archive website.
• Hale Family History site - Monmouthshire place names and their meanings

• The Cambrian Index online. The Cambrian was the first English-language newspaper published in Wales and editions cover 1804-1930. Swansea Library provide a searchable index to articles. Added 24 Oct 2005.

• South Wales Argus.

  Links to Newspapers' sites are provided not only for the Newspaper content, but also because they may contain links to other items or sites of local interest.

• The Worshipful Company of Curriers - information about the history of this trade.
• The Virtual Waterways Archive - "Hundreds of years of British waterway history brought together in one online catalogue".
• Victorian Professional Photographers in Wales 1850-1925 - compiled by Mari Alderman; includes sources and a bibliography.
• Coalfield Web Materials. University of Wales, Swansea. ".......... aims to improve lifelong learning opportunities by stimulating in the local history and cultural heritage of South Wales. It offers digital versions of original documentary and audiovisual material relating to the history and development of the South Wales Coalfield......" Here are direct links to sections of the site;
  • Pay and Living
  • Life Underground
  • Migration to the South Wales Coalfield
  • Coal owners
  • Economy/Development of the Coal Industry
  • Miners' Strikes, 1972 & 1974
  • Miners' Strikes, 1984-5
  • The South Wales Miners' Federation
  • The National Union of Mineworkers
  • Hunger Marches (1927- 1936)
  • Background to the 1926 General Strike
  • Women in the Mines
  • Coalfield People
• Welsh Coal Mines.
• Railway companies which operated in Carmarthenshire, Glamorgan & Monmouthshire plus some in adjoining areas which ran into the former counties. By Bob Sanders..
• Infomation about the South Wales Coalfield Collection can be found at the S.W.C.C website.
• Monmouthshire Brecon and Abergavenny Canal Trust.

• Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council.
• Monmouthshire County Council.
• Newport City Council.
• Torfaen County Borough Council.

• The Workhouse  - on Peter Higginbotham's site

• Monmouthshire wills : proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury 1560-1601. Cardiff : South Wales Record Society, 1997. 256p.

• Mother Bedford - "a website devoted primarily to the history of Old-Bedford County, Pennsylvania during the American Revolutionary War period" - a fascinating site including items of general historical interest eg:
  1. Apposite to the time of adding: The Celebration of Christmas.
  2. Examples of music our ancestors may have enjoyed: The Music of the 1770s: a Directory.
• Gazetteer of Markets and Fairs in England and Wales to 1516. The Gazetteer, compiled by Dr Samantha Letters is a catalogue of Markets and Fairs in Medieval England and Wales. First comprehensive National Survey, with detailed information about grants of Charters to all Market Towns.
• Victorian Social History: An Overview - Public Health, Education, Conditions of Life and Labour.

Gwent FHS

The Monmouthshire Association  "is a branch of the Association of British Counties, a society dedicated to promoting awareness of the continuing importance of the 86 ancient counties of Great Britain."

South Wales Record Society - "The society was set up in 1982 with the aim of publishing a regular series of books and other works on the history of South Wales and particularly Glamorgan and Gwent."

Gwent Local History Council. Publishes a twice-yearly English-language local history journal containing articles on historical topics, with references, book reviews, notes and news. Its issues are numbered to run on from its predecessor, Presenting Monmouthshire, starting at no. 41. On Welsh Journals Online

• The E 179 Database (on the National Archives website) contains detailed information about over 26,000 documents relating to the taxation of lay people in England and Wales between c.1200 and c.1700. These documents are likely to contain many names.