Research Strategy – London

Introduction

It seem unlikely that we will find any spontaneous occurrence of Badham in the Capital so that the task will always be to work back the families until we can link them to their home county. Until recently this was a daunting if not impossible task but as with much in family history things are changing at a fast pace. The collaboration of the London Metropolitan Archives (LMA) with Ancestry has markedly changed this and the major gap of the Westminster City parishes is being closed through Find My Past. How long this last will take I don't know but there is some useful coverage if you are searching one of the few parishes covered so far and especially if you are more interested in the ninteenth century than earlier. Since first writing this in May 2012 there have been no substantial additions to this project so it is difficult to judge the pace of it.  It is likely to be slow because, for example, of the numbers of baptisms involved. St George Hanover Square in 1823 performed 892 (see Delvings p186 footnote). St Margaret Westminster ( the one you see next to the Abbey on the News when they are interviewing politicians) is due to be covered from 1539 to at least 1853 for baptisms, marriages and burials and this is certainly a parish with Badham conections. If you want to find out what has been covered so far make sure you look at the Westminster Collection details on the Find My Past website and be careful you find the 'Currently online' pdf at the top of the page (as at 7-12-2012) otherwise you may be led to believe coverage is complete! At present only 4 out of the eleven parishes which have baptisms covered go back before the nineteenth century so there is a long way to go.

Strategy

  1. Continue efforts to take back the London branches so far unattached to the Wonastow and Eton Bishop DNA lines or, indeed, to any other homes to which they may belong outside London.

  2. Look for evidence sources that might show migration roots, e.g.

    1. Apprenticeship and Freedom papers (some in B1NS database)

    2. Settlement papers