Searching and finding your French ancestors, as well as your French Belgian (Walloon) ones, used to be a herculean feat. Where to start, where to look, how to make sense of what you are reading, and how to navigate through the complicated archival websites. What is equally frustrating is finding
- You don’t know the language,
- You don’t know the town your ancestors came from
- What kind of online French genealogy records are out there
- Where can I find online French genealogical records, sources and information
- How to understand what you are seeing; i.e. Is it a birth or baptismal record?
- Deciphering sloppy handwritten old records and margin notes
- How to navigate through complicated repositories of records.
- Do I have to pay for all of this?
Good news is that you, as an English language person, can find answers to your questions here. You can research more easily with the help of my step-by-step how-to tutorials, articles, resources, & navigation tools.
And you can do it online for free or nearly free
What Are Belgium Genealogy ‘Extraits’
Search for Belgian Genealogy documents and information can be exasperating. Belgium has strict laws banning certain genealogical records, like early censuses, from being published online………
Examine French Birth Record Margin Notes
The beauty of an individual’s parish or civil records of birth/baptism in France, is that it can also contain written notes of vital genealogical information in the margin area….
Examine Godparents in French Baptism records
In this tutorial, we are going examine the newly christened infant’s names of godparents & extract any genealogical information that can be found in French parish baptismal records….
What Are French ‘Dit’ Names?
In your research, you may have come across individuals with seemingly two surnames with ‘dit’ in between them….
Online French Department Archives
We cried “Where can we find French birth, baptism, marriage, death, military and census records?” And then it was so.
Online Resources
Around 1998, French Genealogy online databases and resources, if any, were in it’s infancy…..