David Just over a year ago, TNA put their naturalisation catalogue on-line. Is this your guy, Diedrich Schroder resident in Liverpool in 1879? http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/displaycataloguedetails.asp?CATID=5066933&CATLN=6&Highlight=%2CSCHRODER&accessmethod=0 In getting my Geordie born ethnically German Grandfather's line out of England and onto German records, I found that I had to trace him every inch of the way, turning over every possibly stone rather than trying to jump the North Sea in one go. Records in Germany are very decentralised. The German Empire didn't come into existence until 1871, and eve then it had a Federal structure. Hannover became part of the Kingdom of Prussia in 1866. The Hanoverian Monarchy separated from the British Monarchy in 1837 because Salic Law meant that Victoria couldn't inherit Hanover because she was a female. Saxony (Sachsen) was split between Prussia and autonomous states. Wikipedia has articles on the subject. The Lutheran Church has realised that their records are a source of income and they have their own archives who will undertake research for a fee (Their charges are reasonable). If you ever want to engage the services of a record agent in Germany, use the Association of Professional Genealogist's website to locate one. I'm not surprised to hear that the "Germany" list is quiet. You will need to subscribe to a more specific List. The Prussia List is quite helpful and for the reasons above, will cover Hanover. There are people on it who will help with transcribing scans of old German records. The Family Search website has a guide to the old German script. Also, bear in mind that the German alphabet has 5 extra letters - ä, ë, ö, ü and ß (a double S). They affect indexing. My Grandfather's surname was Kunde which in a German index comes AFTER Künder because of the umlaut on the U. And don't forget, In German, Hannover is spelled with a double N which will help you find microfilms in the LDS catalogue - there are plenty of microfilms of church records for Hannover in the LDS catalogue. (Abbreviations and bad hand-writing are a bigger problem than the lack of German). Good Hunting David Armstrong Maylands, Western Australia ----- Original Message ----- From: David Railton To: [email protected] Sent: Wednesday, August 15, 2012 2:48 AM Subject: Re: [ENG-LIV] German ancestry Liz, Thanks for your reply. I have just been on Family Search looking at Germany, Births and Baptisms, 1558-1898. Unfortunately nothing there for the person I am looking for: Dietrich Schroder, born Hanover, 1831, son of Frederick Schroder. I now need to find if any records held in Hanover can be viewed on-line, and in English. David