If there was someone in your ancestry connected to a prestigious institution, like a royal chapel, you’d undoubtedly want to know and perhaps feature it in your family history. Although your chances may not be great, if you do have family links to royalty, the nobility or ordinary folks living in the vicinity those below are not-to-be-missed online records.
At BIFHSGO’s monthly meeting last Saturday Kristen Mercier presented 600+ years of stories from St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle. Until recently Kristen was Assistant Archivist for St George’s Chapel Archives & Chapter Library, and now Archivist for the Arnprior & McNab Braeside Archives.
The website www.stgeorges-windsor.org/archives/ has links under the Resources tab to Research Guides on The Order of the Garter, Military Knights, Naval Knights, The College of St George and The Properties of St George. There is almost a century of annual reports, and, of great interest, 16 out of print pdf versions out of 19 Historical Monographs, Volumes of particular interest-
Volume. 10. The Baptism, Marriage and Burial Registers of St George’s Chapel, Windsor is of obvious genealogical interest. Much of that data has been incorporated into the databases of the major genealogical websites.
Volume. 16. The Order of the Garter: It’s Knights and Stall Plates, 1348-1984 is another name-rich source. It’s a diversion to scan the often rightfully obscure royalty and nobility, foreign and domestic, and occasional worthy Prime Minister included. Also, those who had their banner removed like the German Kaiser of the First World War.
Both volumes are well indexed in the original, so the pdfs not being word-searchable is a minor irritant.