Commercial posting - this is just to keep you up to date with some of the commercial developments on the census front. I have no connection with any of the companies mentioned - this message is purely for information purposes. The census CDs below are NOT indexes, they are scans of the original books taken from the Public Record Office films. There will be some pages and some entries which are hard to read due to the quality of the film, and the quality of the original books, so don't expect perfection! You wouldn't get perfection if you hired the film from your local family history centre either. Of course it is always tough if the very page you want is the one which is faint or scored too heavily with the enumerators pencil, but that it beyond the control of anyone today. All three companies below use Acrobat reader and have a place index/place search facility to make it easy to find the page or the place that you want. Some have street indexes for larger towns and cities. ************************************************************************************************************************************************************* First from Archive CD books - a supplement to the 1861 Dorset census produced earlier in the year: See http://www.rod-neep.co.uk/books/census/index.htm for online ordering details. 1861 Dorset Supplement 1 (Places in Devon Registration Districts) Pieces RG9/1370-1372 These pieces do not appear on the Dorset 1861 CD set (C1861DOR). All of these pieces do appear on the Devon 1861 set (C1861DEV). Whole census peices are included, and therefore the places included are those on both side of the county boundary, and include Dorset places such as Axminster, Chardstock, Charmouth, Combpyne, Dalwood, Hawkchurch, Kilmington, Lyme Cobb, Lyme Regis, Membury, Stockland, Thorncombe and Uplyme, plus adjacent parts of Devon. I am not aware of an index of any sort for the 1861 Dorset census. Have no idea at all about Devon! ************************************************************************************************************************************************************* Second from the British Data Archive (S&N)...the 1891 Dorset Census film scanned onto CD rom is starting to be shipped this week. I don't know if it is too late to place an advance order at UK pounds 34.95 +p&p. The price will go up to 49.95 Uk pounds when the advance orders have been shipped. See http://www.BritishDataArchive.com for online ordering details. The site has been completley revamped this weekend and is now easier to use. Remember too that the Somerset and Dorset FHS and the Dorset FHS have jointly produced an index for the 1891 census, available separately in 19 booklets or fiche or in a CD rom for the whole county. *********************************************************************************************************************************************************** Thirdly Stepping Stones are advertising the Dorset 1841 census scanned on CD rom at a pre release price of £19.95 plus postage - but they do not give a date for release. See http://www.stepping-stones.co.uk There are probably other companies also scanning and selling census onto CD rom but these are the three that I have used mys *********************************************************************************************************************************************************** I also see that twr computing is selling CD roms of the material found on the Ancestry.com site, usually only available if you pay a subscription to use the site. There is a CD that covers Dorset, DEvon, Cornwall and Somerset. I do not have the CD myself and I have not used the material on the ancestry.com site so can't comment any further on this, except to say there is a list on the website saying exactly what each CD contains. http://www.twrcomputing.freeserve.co.uk I repeat that I have no connection with any of these companies and am posting this for information only as part of my policy of trying to keep you all informed about new Dorset products and publications which may be of interest! Happy Hunting Helen Helen Jones, Weymouth, Dorset http://www.melcombe.freeserve.co.uk List Admin Rootsweb Eng Dorset & Scammell Lists, and British Genealogy Eng-Dorset, Surnames & Forenames list