Where to next?
Once you have worked your way through our Beginner's Guide and looked through our Finding Family Information pages, it is time to look further afield at other national and international organisations who may have the information you are looking for.
Christchurch Groups
The Aotearoa New Zealand Centre specialises in Christchurch and Canterbury family history information, with some national resources. For international resources there are several local groups and organisations who hold a wide range of material.
Contact details of the local genealogical groups below are provided from the CINCH database.
- Canterbury Pilgrims and Early Settlers Association
- Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints: Family History Centre
Check the international website of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for further information. - New Zealand Family History Society
- New Zealand Founders Society. Canterbury/Westland Branch
National Resources
Other organisations who may be able to assist in your search for New Zealand family history information include:
- Alexander Turnbull Library
- Anglican Archives
- Archives New Zealand
- Auckland City Libraries Research Centre
- Canterbury Museum - Documentary Research Centre
- Hocken Library - University of Otago
- Identity Services, Births, Deaths & Marriages
- Land Information New Zealand
- MacMillan Brown Library - University of Canterbury
- Methodist Archives
- Presbyterian Archives
New Zealand Society of Genealogists
Local branches:
- New Zealand Society of Genealogists. Bishopdale Branch
- New Zealand Society of Genealogists. Canterbury Branch
- New Zealand Society of Genealogists. Riccarton Branch
- New Zealand Society of Genealogists. Waimakariri Branch
Check the national website of the New Zealand Society of Genealogists for further information.
Special Interest Groups
The New Zealand Society of Genealogists supports a range of special interest groups. These groups create and collect various resources for their areas of interest. Contact details are provided at the links below:
- Australian Interest Group
- European Interest Group
- Irish Interest Group
- Scottish Interest Group
- Welsh Interest Group
Researchers
You may get to a stage that you want to hire an independent researcher to conduct research outside of your local area or country of residence. Many family history groups will know of researchers who practice in their area. The New Zealand Society of Genealogists may be able to help for the wider New Zealand area and will be able to link you to their international counterparts. Other international organisations, archival collections and libraries may provide links of researchers for their local area as well.
The Aotearoa New Zealand Centre also offers a research service , for a maximum of 2 hours research time. We provide a quote before beginning the research, and payment is to be made in advance.
International Resources
Our holdings
The Aotearoa New Zealand Centre focuses on family history resources for New Zealand, with the primary focus being the Canterbury and Christchurch geographic region.
There is a small collection of international genealogy resources, including Burkes, Debretts, parish maps of the British Isles, and more, held on the first floor of the Central Library. This material is not available for loan. All items are available on the catalogue with the location given as 'Genealogy Collection'.
Links to online international information
A list of key international websites regarding genealogy can be found from this website including links to:
- Archives and Public Records for Australia, Canada, New Zealand and United Kingdom
- Key Australian sites
- Key United Kingdom sites
Ancestry Library Edition
Christchurch City Libraries provides access to Ancestry Library edition for our customers inside our libraries. This is an international family history database, with more than 1.5 billion names from over 4,000 collections. Ancestry Library Edition includes records from
- United Kingdom and Ireland Census Collection
- Birth, Marriage and Death Records Collection
- Family and Local History Collection
- US Federal Census Collection
British geographical dictionaries
Topographical dictionaries , a series published around 1825 - 1850 are available for:
Other works which will help with finding a family’s British background are:
- Ekwall, E. The concise Oxford dictionary of English place-names
- Bartholomew gazetteer of Britain
- A dictionary of English place-names
- Arthur Mee’s England - a series of titles aimed at providing interesting geographical information on the towns and villages where people who emigrated to New Zealand came from.
Old parish registers
Old parish registers (OPRs) constitute the main source of information for the pre-1855 period in the United Kingdom. There were 900 parishes, the records vary in legibility and quality and, in the main, have not been indexed.
Further sources include tombstone inscriptions, wills, post office directories, armed services records and war registers.
- Phillimore atlas and index of parish registers
- Phillimore lists the English counties and tells the names of the parishes within those counties. Often people would name their parish as the place where they were born.
- New Zealand Scottish directory
- This work, published in New Zealand in 1996, lists the clans and families of Scotland and the names and addresses of organisations in this country which are interested in clans, Scottish history and genealogy. The directory is very much a beginner’s guide.
