Ada we can all only give heaps of thanks to you and others for the fantastic work that you've done over the years. Can you give advice for "where to go" if people would like to help with indexing, checking files etc and have the necessary research skills and eye for detail. I'm still working in paid employment but would love to have something like this to keep me occupied and intellectually stimulated when I retire in a year or so. Sincerely Beth Beth Codling bcodling2@bigpond.com -----Original Message----- From: Ada Ackerly [mailto:aackers@alphalink.com.au] Sent: Thursday, 24 November 2005 10:03 AM To: AUS-VIC-GOLDFIELDS-L@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: inquests At 06:01 24-11-05, Janine Dale wrote: >To add to the inquest discussion, I have a death cert for a g g >grandfather who died at Axedale 1884. The cert states there was an >inquest into his death. >This inquest also does not appear on my Vic inquest cd. It appears >the index has many missing entries. <snip> Hello Listers, The inquest index was a transcription from original departmental indexes which originals had all the ommissions and errors of any index. When I was working on the Supreme Court Equity Case Files, because I had to sort a dreadful mess of mixed up and broken files, I sought the Supreme Court indexes available and compared what I found in the files with the few surviving indexes which had a partial coverage of the cases. I found, from a so-called complete file for one part of the files, the so-called "Miscellaneous Files", many discrepancies.In comparing the first 4,000 files in that series: 340+ files not included in the original index 47 completely mis-transcribed surname titles (not even lateral thinking would have helped here) 30 indexed under the wrong file number (number ommissions and duplicate numbers) and other minor difficulties. These were found by a physical examination of each file, cross-referencing case numbers, surnames, dates, etc from my listing with the official listing. INQUESTS: The same has been found by the lass who did the original combined departmental inquest index which has been available on microfiche. Last year she was doing for the inquest files what I had been doing for ten years with the 12,000 Equity case files. I sat next to her on many occasions, and she was working through the mis-transcribed names, the files ommitted from the original departmental indexes, the "cause of death" ommitted from the original indexes, etc. I believe, when she has finished (a BIG job) the index will be re-issued and brought up to date. An enquiry to MacBeth's Genealogical publishers might be able to suggest a date for this, though Marge had been working on it once a week for a full day in 2004, I have not been at my usual place at the VPRO in 2005, and my own work has been "on hold". Hence I have lost touch with progress. regards, Ada Ackerly, Melbourne, Australia formerly Ackerly DocuSearch