From the 1300's apprenticeship was the system by which a man learned his trade. These trades were controlled by a guild. An act of 1562/63 decreed that an apprentice must serve a term of at least seven years before he earned the right to practice his craft. Heavy fines were levied on men who practised their craft without first serving an apprenticeship.

Documents, known as Indentures, set out the terms of an apprenticeship. One copy was signed by the master and another by the apprentices parents or guardian. A master would promise not only to teach the apprentice a trade but would also be responsible for housing, clothing and feeding him.

Other documents relating to apprentices and their masters sometime survive in the records of the guilds and livery companies themselves.

Army records come in many guises from personal service records to regimental diaries and from medal card indexes to Commonwealth War Grave inscriptions. Others include discharge papers, pension records, court martials and casualty lists.

Soldiers' names first appear in English Civil War records as before that time, England and Wales had no regular army and troops were raised as required for particular wars. Few documents survive from this period and it is only from the early 18th century that substantial records still exist.

Founded in 1826 by John Burke, Burke's Peerage is an in-depth historical guide to titled families. Each pedigree has been meticulously researched to ensure that the information is as accurate, reliable and up-to-date as possible.

By the early 19th century many churchyards, especially in towns, were already full, so private companies were formed to set up and operate urban cemeteries. Municipal authorities also opened cemeteries, usually on the outskirts of towns where land was cheap.

As there is no national list of cemeteries, the first step is to ascertain in which cemetery an ancestor may have been buried. This was usually near the place of death.

Cemetery records can be found in a number of places including County Record Offices, local libraries and at the cemeteries themselves if they are still operating. Family History Society members have often compiled lists of monumental inscriptions and grave locations which can also prove useful to the genealogist. 

A Churchwardens duties were many and varied. They included seeing that parishioners not only came to church but behaved themselves whilst they were there, assigning the church pews, see to the repairs of the church and even ensuring that the parish was ready to fight fires.

The accounts records that they kept often list the names of craftsmen that they used as well as local ratepayers. It is also quite possible that your ancestor was a Churchwarden himself.

If your ancestor fell foul of the law, there are various sources to check which may hold clues not only to the crime they committed but also personal details.

Assizes were generally held two or three times a year in county towns and because the number of cases could be substantial (up to 50 a day), trials were usually very short. Even if the accused faced the death penalty, the trial might only last half an hour. Convictions at assizes could be appealed against in special appeal courts and some documents detailing these still survive.

Justice's records might also contain important information on your ancestors such as jury lists, lists of prisoners, order books (formal records of verdicts and sentences) and indictments.

Many people served time in a debtors prison and the criminally insane had special asylums built to house them. Records of these prisoners may be found at The National Archives as well as in County Record Offices.

There are even records of people yet to be tried known as Calendars of Prisoners.

Finally, your ancestor may have been transported to America, the West Indies or Australia. If a transportation record exists, it is usually possible to work backwards to find the court in which they were convicted and locate the trial records.

Electoral Registers have been compiled every year since 1832 (with a few exceptions) and entitlement to vote depended on your name being on the register.

In the early days, entitlement to vote also depended on the value of  any property owned. This was later extended to tenants paying rent over a certain amount each year.

Women could not vote in national elections until 1918 and even then it was limited to those over 30 who owned their own house or were the wives of householders. In 1928, all women over the age of 21 were given the vote.

Because of the small number of electors during the 19th century, registers would list the names of those eligible in alphabetical order together with their addresses and qualification to vote. When entitlement to vote was extended to all men resident in a particular constituency and qualifying property was no longer an issue, the registers became so large that voters were listed under their electoral wards. This of course means that to avoid a prolonged search for your ancestor in a register, it is almost essential to know their address in order to find them.

Electoral Registers are particularly useful to trace people in the last 100 years because of the 100 year census closure rule. The fact that they can be traced year by year means you will know when they moved from a particular address even though you won't know where they moved to.

In order to value their property or perhaps to establish rents, many landowners commissioned surveys and maps to be drawn up of their estates. Estate maps were very detailed often showing each individual field. Many included the names of the landowners or tenants themselves. Used in conjunction with tithe or enclosure maps, they are an invaluable source for genealogists particularly for the period before parish registers came into being.

The larger estates were owned by the Church, the Crown, charities or various livery companies.

Because these were not public documents, many are still in private hands and not easy to locate. However, a growing number are being deposited in County Record Offices and are usually to be located under the name of the family who deposited them. It is therefore usually necessary to find out the name of the land-owner at the time your ancestor worked on a particular estate.

A gazetteer is a geographical directory typically containing information about the geographical make up of a country or region as well as social statistics such as population, literacy rate, etc.

Most also give information about the origin of the place names they cover which all goes to help add flesh to the bones of your ancestors lives in relation to where they lived.

The historical definition of a hearth is a brick or stone-lined fireplace or oven used for heating and/or cooking.

Due to fiscal constraints, the government introduced a tax on hearths on 19th May 1662. Householders were required to pay a charge of two shillings per hearth per year with half the payment due at Michaelmas and half on Lady Day. There were exemptions including those receiving poor relief, charitable institutions such as schools and alms houses and some industrial hearths. However, smiths' forges and bakers' ovens were not exempt. In 1664, the act was revised to include all those who had more than two chimneys.

The tax was finally abolished in 1689 by William III.

Although not always the case, hearths were generally in proportion to the size of the house and  hearth tax records can give a good indication as to the distribution of small and large houses within a particular area. As with many old documents, the information provided by them is limited to what was required by the officials at the time they were completed but often includes the names of individual householders together with the amount they were charged.

Immigrants have been arriving on British shores for centuries such as Huguenots fleeing religious persecution in Europe, the Irish fleeing famine in their own country in the 19th century right up to the economic migrants of more recent times.

One of the major sources of tracing ancestors arriving in the British Isles are Ships Passenger Lists. These were prepared by the Master of a ship and include such details as passengers name, age, occupation and intended place of residence. To avoid a prolonged search it is usually necessary to know the port of entry as well as an approximate date.

Naturalization papers are another source although only a small minority of immigrants bothered with such matters particularly since any of their children born here were automatically British citizens.

Whilst a few people emigrated from this country for religious reasons, others went abroad with the armed forces or because they worked in embassies or consular offices. However, most emigrants left for economic reasons and many continue to do so hoping for a better life in one of the former commonwealth countries.

As well as Ships Passenger Lists records of the Colonial Office, the Treasury and the Home Office can contain a wealth of information about your ancestor. Although passports were not required until 1914, a search of passport application records may reveal an ancestors intended destination.

Records also exist of the many orphan children who were sent to various corners of the Empire on child migration schemes.

Land Tax was levied on land with an annual value of more than 20 shillings and was collected from 1693 until 1963. Land Tax records primarily consist of assessments and the returns themselves. Assessments were normally produced annually and specify the amount of tax assessed. Returns state how much tax was actually paid

Because of the variety of maps that still survive from past centuries not to mention the very detailed modern aerial maps of today, it is little wonder that they are considered an invaluable research aid to the genealogist.

As well as tithe maps and parochial assessment maps, one of the most useful types are poverty maps. Of particular interest to those with London ancestors are the ones produced by Charles Booth. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Booth accompanied policemen on their beat and recorded the living conditions of the population not only area by area but street by street. They give a vivid picture of the lives of the people at that time.

Another big advantage of maps is that they can show how a particular town or village has changed over the years and which streets and buildings have survived or disappeared. This decline or expansion of a particular place can help put your ancestors lives in context with their surroundings and may explain why they made some of the decisions they did such as moving away to look for work.

Used in conjunction with other documents such as tithe records, maps should always be considered one of the most useful tools in the family history researchers arsenal.

Marriage Bonds and Allegations are basically 'application forms' for persons wishing to be married by license.

An allegation was a statement, made on oath, that both parties to the union were over the age of 21 (or they could supply other permission) and that there was no known impediment to them being married.

A bond was a sum of money to be forfeited if any part of the allegation proved to be untrue.

Marriage Bonds and Allegations are usually to be found in County Record Offices and many have been transcribed and indexed making them easier to search.

Organized records of a merchant seaman's career do not commence until 1835. In that year, the government saw a need to register all seamen who could be called upon to man naval vessels in times of war and alphabetical registers were compiled.

From 1844, any seaman wishing to leave the UK had to be in possession of a Seamen's Ticket. These numbered tickets were listed in their own registers with details of any voyages undertaken.

There are no organized service records of merchant seamen who served between 1857 and 1913 although the National Maritime Museum holds some crew lists for some of those intervening years.

Later records are filed in a card index and these often include personal details and sometimes, even a photograph. It is also worth noting that there are various sources for tracing the history of any vessel on which your ancestor may have sailed.

We often think of Monumental Inscriptions only in terms of family gravestones in churchyards but they can also include those on plaques and slabs inside churches as well as those on war memorials.

The main reason that they are so useful to the family historian is that they often show the relationship of the deceased to other people and in Scotland they reveal the maiden name if the deceased is a woman.

If made of the right material, outside gravestones can still be legible after hundreds of years whilst many of our churches have tablets dating back to Norman times and may well give details of an ancestor from a time where no other records exist.

If your ancestor served in the army and the regiment in which they served is known, then another source of information may be the Muster Rolls. These were taken either monthly or quarterly and note a unit's location, officers and soldiers names, ranks, dates of enlistment, punishment and discharges among other details. They in fact provide a month by month account of a man's service in the army.

They are to be found at The National Archives under the name of the regiment and cover the period 1760 to 1898.

Whilst records for Naval personnel are numerous, one of the major problems of locating a particular ancestor is that they are rarely indexed by surname. Most are sorted either by the ships' name on which they served or by naval rank. It is usually easier to trace an officer than a rating depending on when they joined.

Before 1853, ratings were recruited to a particular ship and their names only recorded in the musters or pay lists of that particular vessel, whereas the vessel itself was recorded in civil registration documents, census returns, parish registers, letters, diaries, medal rolls and pension records.

After 1853, things become easier as there is an index to seamen which is held at The National Archives.

If you already know the name of the vessel then a search can be made of the muster rolls for the particular period you are interested in.

Officers are generally located through published sources such as navy lists, obituaries or the London Gazette.

Newspapers are an underused source but can contain a wealth of information about our ancestors. The first newspapers appeared as early as the 17th century although the first daily was not published until 1702.

The good news is that many survive and can readily be consulted at the Newspaper Library at Colindale or increasingly on line. The major downside is that very few are indexed so it is often a long haul to search for a piece of information particularly if you have no idea when a particular event might have taken place.

Nevertheless, birth, marriage and death notices often contain more information than can be found in official records and obituaries are usually very detailed revealing much about your ancestor which could not be found elsewhere. They are also worth consulting if your ancestor fell foul of the law as trials were often reported on in quite some depth.

Many local papers were also published and these can usually be found in the local library of the towns they relate to or in the County Record Office.

Strictly speaking, non-conformists are Protestant dissenters such as Methodists or Baptists but nowadays the term is more generally used to cover Catholics, Jews and other churches independent of the Church of England.

Religious intolerance was alive and well in England right up until the 19th century although non-conformists did enjoy a degree of freedom during the Commonwealth period.

It is often difficult to ascertain whether an ancestor was a non-conformist as many dissented from the Anglican church for only a brief period. If they are not recorded in Anglican registers then it is always worth checking out whether the records of local non-conformist chapels for their area still exist.

It becomes easier after 1754 and the introduction of Hardwicke's Marriage Act which made it compulsory for marriages to take place in an Anglican church. As this only applied to marriages, dissenters continued with baptisms and burials at their own chapels and therefore if you can find a marriage but not a baptism or burial in the Anglican registers, then this may be indicative of a non-conformist ancestor.

Records for non-conformists are widely spread but both the National Archives and County Record Offices are a good place to start your research.

The first place to check for photographic records is in your own family albums. Whilst photography was a rich mans hobby until the early 20th century, many families would pop along to the local studio to have their picture taken  in celebration of an event such as a christening or an engagement.

Apart from family photographs there are many collections lodged in archives or on-line covering every possible subject you can imagine. Most useful for the family historians are those showing street scenes or trades which all helps to put your ancestors into context with their surroundings.

Often, photographs in private collections are not identified but with modern dating methods it is often possible to narrow down the candidates in portraits simply by finding out when the photograph was taken.

It is just as important for family history researchers today to take photos of their families and surroundings so that future generations can put a name to a face and appreciate the lives that we lead.

Before the secret ballot for parliamentary elections was introduced in 1872, it was public knowledge who had voted and who they had voted for. This information was contained in Poll Books. They sometimes even state an elector's exact address.

Very early Poll Books are extremely rare but an act of 1711 required them to be deposited with the Clerk of the Peace and many survive from this period right up until 1868 when the last general election took place prior to the secret ballot being introduced.

Surviving Poll Books may be located at the Society of Genealogists, County Record Offices or at some local libraries.

In medieval times the church was considered morally responsible for the poor and were expected to give alms to them. During the time of Henry VIII, the parish became responsible for their care and two members of the vestry were elected each year as 'Overseers of the Poor'.

Poor relief was to be funded by voluntary donations from the parishioners but not surprisingly this did not generate sufficient funds so a parliamentary act was introduced authorizing overseers to levy a poor rate on the householders of the parish. This relief took the form of money, food, clothing or other goods provided the pauper continued living in their own, or a relatives' residence.

Later, relief came in the form of workhouses although these were originally intended for the sick, the elderly and orphans.

Vestry Minutes, Overseers' Accounts and Poor Rate Books are just some of the records that can be consulted in search of an ancestor who fell on hard times.

From the 14th century, Justices of the Peace (otherwise known as Magistrates) dealt with the less serious criminal cases in courts that were set up four times a year (Easter, Trinity, Michaelmas and Epiphany). Each county held their own Quarter Sessions, as these courts were called, although certain towns and cities had the same right.

The records of these sessions can be broken down into Minute or Session Books (Clerk of the Peace notes on the proceedings), Indictments (in which the criminals personal details were noted along with the crime he was charged with), Order Books (a formal record of the Magistrates' verdict and the sentence dished out) and Session Rolls (petitions, jury lists, etc).

Most of these records are lodged with County Record Offices or in borough archives.

Rate Books were compiled in order to record each person's assessment and whether or not their rates had been paid.

Originally used for the relief of the poor, rates were soon being levied for all sorts of purposes including maintenance of bridges, roads, sewers and general repairs. It wasn't long before they became one of the major sources of local authority funding.

The Royal Air Force (RAF) was formed in 1918 by the amalgamation of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS).

Records for RAF personnel are primarily consulted to discover more about an ancestors life rather than personal family details.

Various types of records can be consulted from Operational to War Diaries. Muster Rolls, Medal Rolls and Casualty Cards may also be of use to anyone with an ancestor who served in the RAF. Most of  these records can be consulted at The National Archives at Kew.

The Women's Royal Air Force (WRAF) was also formed in 1918 and enlisted over 25,000 women but it was disbanded in 1919 and all service records are still retained by the Ministry of Defence.

The first place to look for school records is in your own family papers. School reports, examination certificates or awards may well be found amongst them.

Educational records are very varied and can contain much useful information about your ancestors. Registers, Log Books and Admission Records may well have survived and often these can be found in the archives of the school in question. If your ancestor attended a charity school or perhaps a Quaker school, the records may well be lodged with the particular body that supported the school.

Many of the large public schools have published registers of their students and these can be found at the Society of Genealogists or perhaps at the local reference library.

Depending on the record consulted, they can contain anything from names and addresses of parents to the various punishments meted out to students who misbehaved.

Although the first telephone directory was published in 1880, they are generally of more use in tracing more recent ancestors.

They are most useful when tracing family businesses as they will give addresses. They are also worth consulting if you are researching an unusual name as they may list a few lost cousins.

Old telephone directories can be found at County Record Offices, Local Libraries and even on-line.

British Trade Directories have their origins in the late 17th Century although their heyday was the early 20th Century when over 250 were published each year. They are the pre-telephone equivalent of the modern 'Yellow Pages' and provide first hand data about local towns and villages, their infrastructure and the people who inhabited them.

As many were published each year, they can provide a useful record of communities between census years.

Travelling Salesmen would use these directories as a source of information when they made their rounds.

They contain the names of gentry, clergy and tradesmen who have their own business. For genealogists, they are also useful for the potted history they give of each town and village helping to put ancestors into the context of their surroundings.

Street Directories emerged from Trade Directories in the 1850s . These would list streets alphabetically and in house number order showing all inhabitants of a particular place. 

Particulars of businesses will be found in the more general records such as Census Returns, Probate Records or Trade Directories but there are a number of records specifically concerned with businesses. The biggest problem is in locating them. Many larger companies have their own archives whilst others have deposited their records in County Record Offices or perhaps one of the Guild archives. There is a National Register of Archives which may help to locate particular business records.

It may be possible to locate an ancestor through Trade Union or Friendly Society records or if they were involved in agriculture or farming, through Estate Records. Perhaps they patented a design or invention! If so, they can be traced through Patent Office records.

There are many sources for checking the history of companies themselves and more general information about certain professions is widely available.

It is a sad fact that many of our ancestors ended up in the workhouse. If you do not find them on the census at the location you expect them to be, it is possible they may have fallen on hard times and have taken refuge in the local workhouse.

Conditions in the workhouses varied enormously from clean and humane to prison-like and intolerable. They were places best avoided but that wasn't always possible. Conditions outside such as a poor crop or enforced homelessness may have led your ancestor to seek refuge in one for a short period of time.

Some of the records to be consulted include admission registers, discharge registers and not forgetting employee registers. After all, it is possible that your ancestor may have been a member of staff in a workhouse.

There are many general accounts of what life was like in the workhouse and more recently, full histories of many of the workhouses in England and Wales have been put on-line.