Each record contains a transcript and an image of the original entry in the 1939 Register. Like a census, the Register can tell you a lot about how your ancestors actually lived. You can find out if your ancestors had servants or staff, who their neighbours were, how many children they had and what they all did for a living.
What information can I expect to see in a record?Each person’s record contains:
- Name
- Full date of birth
- Address
- Marital status
- Occupation
Most people are recorded as a member of a household. Some people are recorded as a member of an institution. In this case, they are classified with one of 5 letters:
- O – Officer
- V – Visitor
- S – Servant
- P – Patient
- I – Inmate
What can I expect to find out about the occupation of my ancestor?
You can find out very precise details about the occupation of your ancestor. If they were a farm worker, you can find out what kind of farm they worked on. If they worked in a factory, you can find out what the factory produced. You can find out whether your ancestor made the goods they sold, if they worked in a shop. If they worked in medicine or the law you can discover what branch they specialised in.
The 1939 Register required people to explain exactly what they did. The notes that came with the form were very precise about how to note the occupation. General terms, often found on previous census documents, such as Foreman, Overseer, Doctor, Mill-hand, Porter or Farmer, were not acceptable. Instead, people were asked to be as specific as possible, giving details of the trade, manufacture or branch of a profession.
What else does the transcript of a record contain?
The transcript gives you the information from the record in an easy-to-read form. You can also see an image of the original handwritten record.
On the transcript page, you can also find many additional materials to help you better understand the record:
Articles and photographs – Find out more about life in wartime Britain.
Archive newspaper reports – Get a feel for the period. You can look at more newspapers in our newspaper collection – see the Useful links section on this page.
Detailed maps – See the address as it was in earlier times and how it is now. Maps display a marker pin which, for over 70% of the records, indicates the address to street level. Where there is no marker pin, you see displayed the borough/district instead. There are 3 maps – 2 historic, and 1 modern:
Ordnance Survey 1888 – 1913. Scale: 6 inches to the mile
Ordnance Survey 1937-1961. Scale: 1 inch to 25,000 inches
Open Street map of the present day. You can zoom in and out of the maps and you can make them full screen too.
