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File Surname Ancestry Results

Our indexes 1000-1999 include entries for the spelling 'file'. In the period you have requested, we have the following 32 records (displaying 1 to 10): 

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Official Papers (1656-1657)
The State Papers Domestic cover all manner of business relating to Britain, Ireland and the colonies, conducted by the Council of State, as well as other miscellaneous records. These records are from July 1656 to May 1657.

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Official Papers
 (1656-1657)
National ArchivesMasters and Apprentices (1723)
Apprenticeship indentures and clerks' articles were subject to a 6d or 12d per pound stamp duty: the registers of the payments usually give the master's trade, address, and occupation, and the apprentice's father's name and address, as well as details of the date and length of the apprenticeship. 7 January to 31 December 1723.

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Masters and Apprentices
 (1723)
National ArchivesMasters of apprentices registered in Derby (1762)
Apprenticeship indentures and clerks' articles were subject to a 6d or 12d per pound stamp duty: the registers of the payments usually give the master's trade, address, and occupation, and the apprentice's name, as well as details of the date and length of the apprenticeship. There are central registers for collections of the stamp duty in London, as well as returns from collectors in the provinces. These collectors generally received duty just from their own county, but sometimes from further afield. The indentures themselves can date from a year or two earlier than this return. (The sample entry shown on this scan is taken from a Bristol return. Each entry has two scans, the other being the facing page with the details of the indenture, length of service, and payment of duty.) IR 1/54

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Masters of apprentices registered in Derby
 (1762)
Freemen of Canterbury by Apprenticeship (1392-1800)
No man or woman could trade in the city of Canterbury without having obtained 'freedom' of the city, unless they paid an annual fee to do so. Admissions of freemen were recorded on the Chamberlains' Accounts of the city, which were prepared annually from Lady Day (25 March) to Lady Day until 1752, and thereafter each set runs from 1 January to 31 December. The accounts for 1392 are incomplete, but thereafter until 1800 there is a complete series except for the years 1455 to 1457 and the year 1552-3. Joseph Meadows Cowper, Honorary Librarian to the Corporation, produced this extract of the names from 1392 to 1800, and the volume was privately printed in 1903. There are five groups of freemen: those who obtained freedom after serving out an apprenticeship to a freeman; the children of freemen; those who married a freeman's daughter; those who claimed freedom by 'redemption', i. e. by purchase; and those who were honoured by a gift of the freedom from the Mayor and Court of Aldermen. Cowper published his lists divided into the five categories: the sample scan is from the list of those who obtained freedom by marriage. This is the index to those who gained their freedom by apprenticeship.

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Freemen of Canterbury by Apprenticeship
 (1392-1800)
Deaths, Marriages, Bankrupts, Dividends and Patents (1819-1820)
Death notices and obituaries, marriage and birth notices, bankrupts and dividends, and patents, as reported in the Monthly Magazine or British Register. Includes some marriages and deaths from Ireland, Scotland and abroad.

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Deaths, Marriages, Bankrupts, Dividends and Patents
 (1819-1820)
National ArchivesBritish merchant seamen (1835-1836)
At this period, the foreign trade of ships plying to and from the British isles involved about 150,000 men on 15,000 ships; and the coasting trade about a quarter as many more. A large proportion of the seamen on these ships were British subjects, and so liable to be pressed for service in the Royal Navy; but there was no general register by which to identify them, so in 1835 parliament passed a Merchant Seamen's Registration Bill. Under this act this large register of British seamen was compiled, based on ships' crew lists gathered in British and Irish ports, and passed up to the registry in London. Each seaman was assigned a number, and the names were arranged in the register by first two letters of the surname (our sample scan shows one of the pages for 'Sm'); in addition, an attempt was made to separate out namesakes by giving the first instance of a name (a), the second (b), and so on. But no effective method was devised to prevent the same man being registered twice as he appeared in a second crew list; moreover, the original crew lists were clearly difficult for the registry clerks to copy, and some of the surname spellings appear to be corrupted. A parliamentary committee decided that the system devised did not answer the original problem, and this register was abandoned after less than two years: but it is an apparently comprehensive source for British merchant seamen in 1835 to 1836. The register records the number assigned to each man; his name; age; birthplace; quality (master, captain, mate, 2nd mate, mariner, seaman, fisherman, cook, carpenter, boy &c.); and the name and home port of his ship, with the date of the crew list (usually at the end of a voyage). Most of the men recorded were born in the British Isles, but not all (for instance, Charleston and Stockholm appear in the sample scan). The final column 'How disposed of' is rarely used, and indicates those instances where a man died, was discharged, or deserted his ship during the voyage.

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British merchant seamen
 (1835-1836)
Dissolutions of Partnerships (1848)
Trade partnerships dissolved, or the removal of one partner from a partnership of several traders, in England and Wales

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Dissolutions of Partnerships
 (1848)
Insolvents (1848)
Insolvency notices for England and Wales: insolvency often caused people to restart their lives elsewhere, so these are an important source for lost links

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Insolvents
 (1848)
Trustees and solicitors in England and Wales (1850)
Perry's Bankrupt and Insolvent Gazette, issued monthly, included lists of assignments of bankrupts' estates. Each entry gives the name of the bankrupt (surname first, in capitals), the date (in brackets), address and trade; followed by the names and addresses of the trustees to whom the estate was delivered, and the name and address of the solicitor. This is the index to the names of the trustees and solicitors, from the issues from January to December 1850.

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Trustees and solicitors in England and Wales
 (1850)
National ArchivesPersons of standing recommending London police recruits (1843-1857)
The Metropolitan Police Register of Joiners (MEPO 4/334) lists policemen joining the force 1 January 1843 to 1 April 1857 (warrant numbers 19893 to 35804). The register is alphabetical, in so far as the recruits are listed chronologically grouped under first letter of surname. It gives Date of Appointment, Name, Number of Warrant, Cause of Removal from Force (resigned, dismissed, promoted or died), and Date of Removal. Although the register was closed for new entrants at the end of 1842, the details of removals were always recorded, some being twenty or more years later. Those recruits not formerly in the police, the army, or some government department, were required to provide (normally) at least two letters of recommendation from persons of standing, and details of these are entered on the facing pages. Where a recruit was only recently arrived in the metropolis, the names and addresses of the recommenders can be invaluable for tracing where he came from. Those recruits not formerly in the police, the army, or some government department, were required to provide (normally) at least two letters of recommendation from persons of standing, and details of these are entered on the facing pages: the names in these are indexed here (the police recruits are indexed separately and not included here). Recruits transferred from other forces or rejoining the force did not normally need recommendations - in the latter case, former warrant numbers are given - but some recommendations are from police inspectors, even other constables. Recruits coming from the army sometimes have general military certificates of good conduct, but most often have a letter from their former commanding officer; recruits recommended by government departments (most often the Home Office) similarly have letters from the head of department. But the great majority of the names and addresses in these pages are of respectable citizens having some sort of personal acquaintance with the recruit. Where more than two recommendations were provided, the clerk would only record one or two, with the words 'and others'. Tradesmen are sometimes identified as such by their occupations; there are some gentry. Although the bulk of these names are from London and the home counties, a scattering are from further afield throughout Britain and Ireland.

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Persons of standing recommending London police recruits
 (1843-1857)
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