These are some of my favourite links.
Scotlands People – a fantastic search facility for Scottish ancestors, with the ability to download images of original documents. Reasonable cost given the powerful search facility and download service.
Geneanet – a great resource for researching European ancestors in particular. Many previously free features now require a subscription.
Ancestry.com.au – an excellent resource, and the collection of original sources is growing rapidly. It is very commercial so be prepared to pay (free access is available at many libraries). Ancestry DNA is emerging as a very powerful add-on which can unlock new avenues of research and discovery. Beware of well-meaning folks and their poorly researched, or speculative, family trees. Many people simply block copy material from other trees without checking if it’s accurate. I’m staggered by the number of times something that is blatantly wrong is duplicated across many trees. You should read the Terms & Conditions carefully before using it as the repository of all your valuable research material, and consider the privacy options.
FamilySearch – the online repository of records held by The Church of Latter Day Saints (Mormons) and very useful. Once again, be wary of user submitted trees which can often be speculative or wrong.
State Records of New South Wales – some great online indexes especially for early shipping and immigration and Convict records.
Public Records Office of Victoria – some great online indexes for shipping and immigration into Victoria, as well as other documents. Their reading room is very well set up if you want to research original documents there.
New South Wales Births Deaths and Marriages – a very good (and free) online search facility, but would be so much better with a document download facility. The order and delivery service is reliable, however.
Victoria Births Deaths and Marriages Online – an average search (at a small cost) and excellent image download facility (also at a cost).
Queensland Births Deaths and Marriages Online – average search and order facility.
Trove – a fantastic free service provided by the National Library of Australia allowing you to search an ever expanding digital record of Australian newspapers and download digital images of the articles.
National Archives of Australia – a wonderful search and download facility for accessing service records for Australian servicemen and women as well as many other records.
Jewish Morocco – a fascinating website with some very good historical context around Jewish settlement and life in Morocco.
The Ships List – a great resource for some records of immigration into Australia and the ships that brought people here.
The Australian War Memorial – an excellent website for researching people who served in Australia’s armed forces. Huge repository of photographs and other material. Unit War Diaries can be viewed and downloaded online if you want to research where an ancestor was at any stage during his or her War service.
Irish Catholic Parish Registers online – a relatively new offer by the National Library of Ireland. A digitised version of Catholic Parish Records that you can browse by year. A brilliant way to explore your Irish roots, a bit laborious as there is no indexing of names but it’s certainly cheaper than flying to Ireland to research them! Slowly being indexed on Ancestry.com too.
Cornwall Online Parish Clerks – a very good resource for researching ancestors from Cornwall, especially the searchable database of Parish records.
findagrave.com – a rapidly expanding database of graves and their headstones, including photographs, submitted by helpful volunteers, especially in the USA. Some people submit other bits of genealogical information too. They say they have over 143 million graves recorded.
Cyndi’s List – a long-standing excellent resource for genealogists. A huge guide to online genealogical resources around the world.