FamilySearch IGI Batch Numbers

Introduction

This website lists the Extracted batches for the British Isles that previously formed part of the IGI (International Genealogical Index), the on-line database created by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) and available at familysearch.org.

The original FamilySearch website has now been replaced by New FamilySearch, where data from the old IGI has been reassigned to a number of Historical Record Collections (HRCs). These only have the extracted entries from the IGI. The entries that were submitted by individuals are also available on FamilySearch, but not as part of the Historical Record Collections.

This website lists only the extracted batches, and represents a complete trawl through the data as it existed on the old FamilySearch in 2009-10. Despite the data being reorganised into HRC's, the old batch numbers still exist and can be searched as before. The listings on this website also tell you whether the information appears on the well-known Hugh Wallis website (see below).

The LDS have added further data to FamilySearch since 2009-10, most of this isn't so far included on this website.

Using this Website

To search for a particular parish or church, click on the a Country link at left (e.g. 'England'), then on a County name. This displays an index of places (mostly parishes), from which you can either go on to list the data in batch number sequence, or click through to the FamilySearch website.

For a detailed analysis of numbers, see the Statistical Tables.

If using some older versions of Internet Explorer to view this site you may find that some of the county pages are very slow to load. A workaround is to select Tools > Compatibility View from the Menu bar at the top of the Explorer screen. Firefox and Google Chrome are much faster and seem to have no problem loading the pages. Please email if you have a problem.

Historical Record Collections

Based on an examination of the available collections, the extracted IGI data seems to be allocated as follows (click on a link to go straight to the relevant search page on FamilySearch):

New Historical Record Collections

The IGI-derived material has been joined on New FamilySearch by a number of other collections such as 'England Deaths and Burials, 1538-1991', which didn't form part of the IGI. These are not currently listed on this website. There also some new county collections of parish-register derived data (as well as collections of images that haven't been transcribed).

Exporting Data

For a long time the old and new FamilySearch websites ran in parallel and you could still download data in Gedcom format from old FamilySearch. But this was finally switched off in June 2012 despite numerous complaints from users. Then in July 2013 a new export facility was added to New FamilySearch. Read the Blog entry that introduced the new facility (scroll down to the Export Search Results topic). To use this you need to set up a free FamilySearch account and be logged in. Then, after doing a search you should find an Export button appearing at top right of the results screen. The exported data opens in Microsoft Excel assuming you have that installed, though you can choose another application. You can also save the .xls file. The number of exported records is currently limited to 100 (edit the browser address bar to increase the limit from 75).

Differences from Hugh Wallis' website

Though this site doesn't offer all the information provided by the excellent IGI Batch Numbers website created by Hugh Wallis in 2002 and now hosted by Rootsweb, it updates and amplifies much of that information. These are the main differences:

This website includes the British batches added since 2002, especially the "I" batches.
It doesn't list North American batch numbers.
It contains a detailed analysis of "Mixed" batches - those containing data from more than one place.
Places are assigned to historic counties as at the mid-19th century, e.g. entries for 'London' are assigned to the City of London, Middlesex, Surrey or Kent.
Listings have been substantially cleaned, and incorporate many corrections to placename syntax.
Listings include the number of entries (events) in each batch and the covering dates, both derived from the actual data.
Some summary statistics are provided.

The direct link from the Hugh Wallis website to FamilySearch was broken in summer 2011 and was restored in October 2011 by John Steel. However, since then there have been further changes at FamilySearch and the direct link is again broken.

A Bit of History

The International Genealogical Index (IGI) was first created in 1969 by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) and was originally known as the 'Computer File Index'. In the case of the British Isles, the index comprised mainly baptism and marriage records derived from Parish Registers or Bishops Transcripts. Available on microfiche since 1973, it was renamed the IGI with the 4th edition (1981). It was launched as an MS-Dos based CD-Rom product in the early 1990's, then the data was placed on the LDS's FamilySearch website when it was launched in May 1999.

The microfiche version included the Parish & Vital Records List which catalogued its coverage, parish by parish, with covering dates of extracted records. But this useful finding aid was dropped from the CD and web-based IGI, so there are now no official published listings. Hence the various websites that have been created over the years to fulfil this need, usually for a specific country.

Disclaimer

This is an unofficial analysis of the former IGI batches for the British Isles. The batch numbers on this site were created by and belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I have no connection with the LDS Church.

This site is still incomplete in that index pages for some Irish counties remain to be added. To give feedback on errors etc. please contact

Steve Archer
Archer Software