Got your attention, didn't I? haha. Read on: there are no computer databases, but still, you can save hours of searching.
I made these notes for myself several years ago, when I was doing microfilm research. It's a bit long, but worth it if it helps! Some of the Ponta Garca NS da Piedade church records were indexed by devoted souls. Even so , the indexes can be very tricky to figure out. These are the old indexes, handwritten in the church books, not modern searchable databases! As delighted as I was to find this time-saving blessing, it was very frustrating figuring out how to use the index to find the actual record. It made me crazy to see a baby of 'my' couple in the index and not be able to find the full record. I have found indexes in the back of volumes of records, so know that they apply to the previous pages, not the following. If a volume has records covering several years, there may be an index for each year, tucked in after that year, or the index may well cover several years. So go to the end of the year and then to the back of the book. An index may only be a couple of pages and can be easy to miss. One way to tell an index is, that the records themselves leave a clear margin on the sides, but the index lists names on the left. The baptismal indexes I've found list first names in the left column, then parents' names, and then page number where the record should be found. Some priests numbered each baptism for the year in the book, but the indexes I've seen always give the page number, not the baptismal number. Sometimes there is a V after the number, which means on the left hand page, which can mean on the opposite page to the numbered one or sometimes on the next page. Each page isn't numbered, rather as you turn the pages the number in the upper right hand corner of the right page goes up by one with each turn. Some lists start all parents' names with "de", meaning "(child) of". That was annoying and made it harder for me to find the name I was looking for! The parents' names are frequently abbreviated. If you are new at this, go carefully and keep an open mind. If you like to scan for a particular name, looking for its shape, don't. Your eye might miss it. Read every line carefully. J with a tiny superscript o or e, is Joao or Jose; Medeiros might be Med or just M with a superscript d. So "Joao de Medeiros" might be written as "Jo dMed". (The formatting might not come through, but I think you have the idea.) and of course you all know that names are flexible, especially for the women. Also remember that numbers may not be shaped like you would today and ink fades so what appears to be a "3" may be an "8". Remain open minded! Baptisms are indexed by the babies' first names, first in alphabetical order, then in the order they appear in the book. This can be very helpful. There is also a little "Whoops" list at the end of the index giving names the priest skipped. Knowing the names are in order can be helpful as the page numbers in the index are sometimes (make that, frequently) wrong. I have found more than one record a page or two after the number in the index. Also, I think the wonderful priest who went through and indexed one book might have gotten cross eyed and read the wrong line on his notes. Like buttoning your sweater wrong, one misread page number can put the next 6 names off. I always note the entries two or three before and after my family name. If I can't find my baptism, I'll look for the one after it. If I find it, I know that my Antonio is the one before it, and just go back until I find him. One name was the fifth from the last Maria for the year. I couldn't find her! I started with the last record and went back , looking at the names in the margin, carefully counting each Maria baptized. I found the five after her and the one before her, and so knew she had to be between them, and started reading all the records there with great care. Ah ha! The name in the margin was so faint and blurred that it didn't look like Maria. If I had not narrowed down the search, it would have taken me much miserable eye strain in that very hard to read, very poor quality microfilm, to find that child. May your searching be successful! Eileen Leite -- For options, such as changing to List, Digest, Abridged, or No Mail (vacation) mode, log into your Google account and visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/Azores. Click in the blue area on the right that says "Join this group" and it will take you to "Edit my membership." --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Azores Genealogy" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/azores.
