National Archives Military Records

[ORAC]

https://twitter.com/uknatarchives/status/1631233154517180419?s=61&t=rmEeUn68HhlFHGKbTPQr_A


National Archives

We’re pleased to announce that we've awarded AncestryUK the contract to digitise the first tranche of DefenceHQ (MOD) service personnel records.

Both parties are looking forward to working to make these important records accessible in digital format. Details of the schedule will be announced soon.

More about the records themselves, including answers to the most frequently asked questions about the transfer, here 👇

https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/about/news/mod-service-personnel-records-now-available-update/

[Asturias56]

and of course Ancestry will charge for access........................

[DHfan]

Why shouldn't they? They've put many, probably hundreds, of hours in to digitise the records.

[Expatrick]

Why shouldn't they? They've put many, probably hundreds, of hours in to digitise the records.

Be careful of Ancestry, skilled at charging, even after you have cancelled your subscription.

[Pypard]

This should be great as a start for tracing WW1 airmen who served after 1918 and have thus far been missing from the digitized TNA records,

[DHfan]

I should have added, apart from the many hundreds or thousands of hours in digitising the records, there's a lot more involved in indexing them.

[Asturias56]

Why shouldn't they? They've put many, probably hundreds, of hours in to digitise the records.


well they're OUR records - they should be available without commercialising them

[Pypard]

well they're OUR records - they should be available without commercialising them

If you'd accessed them in the past you'd know that TNA always charged for records downloaded from their site (£3.30 per download IIRC). That only changed when Covid prevented on-site visits and downloads for records which had been digitized changed to free-of-charge.

[Brewster Buffalo]

and of course Ancestry will charge for access........................

They will but some local libaries may be able to allow free access on the their public use computers.....

[DHfan]

well they're OUR records - they should be available without commercialising them

No arguments with that, they are.

You search through them with no index...

The records themselves are public property I believe. The index belongs to Ancestry as they created it.
Who did the initial digitising I've no idea, but if it was Ancestry why shouldn't they want, and get, a return on their labour?
Somebody's got to pay for the staff.

[Pypard]

Moving the conversation further, you can argue that our military aircraft are ours; few have issues paying a fee to see them in museums though. So why the (fake) outrage here? And as mentioned already, similar records have required payment of a fee for a long time already.

[FantomZorbin]

Let's hope that Ancestry uses better 'digitisers' than Find My Past, imho

[Asturias56]

A lot of the transcribers etc are UK prisoners I believe

[reynoldsno1]

Yes, they were subcontracted. Some of the UK Census record transcriptions are pretty poor, but you can still look at the original returns on Ancestry. The digitisation is OK.