I'm attempting to improve my knowledge of the sorts of records available for Caribbean family historians. I think that I am OK with the records created by Christian religions but have not been able to find anything on the other religious groups represented in the Caribbean especially Muslim and Hindu religions. Can anyone offer any advice on rites of passage such as birth, marriage and burial - were (are) these recorded and available for researchers; what other sort of records were (are) created. Were (are) these types of records routinely used by all mosques/temples or would they vary according to the incumbent? Are they stored in the mosque/temple or centrally in the archive, register office, or religious headquarters? What experience have people had trying to obtain information or gain access to these records? Thanks for any advice - please share it with the group rather than to me directly. Guy Grannum

I am not affiliated with FamilyTreeDNA. Since I have written about the DNA tests in the past and I saw this in an email circular I get and though it would be of interest to this list. Rory In the News: Family Tree DNA announces African Data =================================================== Family Tree DNA is pleased to announce that it has started to integrate a large number of 12-Marker and 25-Marker Y Chromosome African test samples to the Haplogroup database. The initial upload, which has already taken place, consisted of several hundred samples from Zaire, Kenya, Ghana and South Africa. It is important to know that in many cases, tribal references are included. Several thousand samples will be added once the integration is completed in about 60 days.