Explore State Library’s family history resources

Are you looking to fill in some gaps or add some colour to your family history? Have you hit a brick wall, and don’t know where to go next? When researching family history, you will find yourself looking in all sorts of resources for that elusive piece of information. Not everything is available online. There are many items in State Library of Queensland’s collection that might help solve that missing piece to your family’s history. Here are just a few.

Looking for information about a particular vessel or want to know more about its voyage and passengers?

State Library has a varied collection of books relating to arrivals into Queensland and other states. Some of the collection includes 19th Century Voyages to Queensland series published by Genealogical Society of Queensland, Voyages to Queensland series compiled by Pennie Manderson, and Tall ships on the river series amongst others published by the Maryborough Family Heritage Institute. One thing that all these books have in common is they cover all voyages made by a specific vessel. This can be handy if you know what vessel your ancestor arrived on but you're not sure what year. The dates range from the late 1840s through to the 1880s. Included are descriptions of the voyages and lists of the passengers. For example, I was able to use Tall ships on the river : Ariadne to answer an enquiry from a client looking for information about the ship and it’s connection to the Black Ball Line enabling me to locate the information I needed in one place instead of searching several resources.

The They came direct series of booklets compiled by Eileen Johnson, covers immigration vessels arriving in Queensland during the 1860s and early 1870s. Queensland immigration records are patchy specifically for the 1860s due to records being destroyed or badly damaged during the 1893 Brisbane floods. The booklets cover all known information relating to the voyage of a particular vessel that could be located at time of publication. Information comes from newspapers, and government sources held at the Queensland State Archives such as land order records. These booklets are a handy starting point drawing together information from different sources into a single place.

Passenger arrivals for German ancestors can be problematic so one place to look is “Ances-tree” – Journal of the Burwood & District Family History Group. The Burwood & District Family History Group have published a few articles in their journal over the years concentrating on lost or problematic German passenger lists. The articles cover German immigrant vessels to Eastern Australia – Resources & problems, Assisted German immigrants who weren’t assisted and German ships with no list. The articles contain information related to the voyage, a brief history of the ship, the sources used with information, including names; and a 'Likely’ passenger list. A very useful resource for tracing those elusive German ancestors.

You know when your ancestor arrived in Australia, you’ve explored their life but where are they buried?

Cemetery records allow researchers to trace their ancestors to a particular area and time and may provide links to other members of the family buried in the same cemetery. Also, not all of our ancestors are interred in public cemeteries. In some cases, family members buried their dead on their rural properties or in the local church cemetery.

State Library’s collection includes numerous books containing burial registers and headstone or monumental transcriptions for Queensland as well as interstate. They include public run cemeteries as well as church cemeteries, and can be found in books, CD-ROMs, microfiche or microfilm. One well used collection is the Queensland cemetery records series published by the Genealogical Society of Queensland. It contains over 100 books of burial registers or monumental inscriptions from Apple Tree Creek to Rockhampton to Yungaburra. Many of these cemeteries are not available online therefore it is a valuable link to locating that burial of a long dead family member.

Have you considered funeral directors’ records? The information in funeral director records can vary depending on the time period or funeral director but they can be a valuable source of information which adds colour to a family history. They can include such information as:

• the name of the deceased;
• place and/or date of death; 
• age, name and address of the person paying for the funeral (may include their relationship to the deceased which can be of help for married daughter’s names); 
• from where the funeral left;
• and the details of the funeral such as coffin, wreaths and cost. 

State Library holds indexes to numerous funeral directors located throughout Queensland as well as some interstate. They are available in books, CD-ROMs, microfiche or microfilm. Some of the funeral directors for Queensland that we have indexes for include Metropolitan Funeral Directors, Alex Gow, T. T. Cornes Funeral Directors, and Cannon & Cripps to name a few. The original Cannon & Cripps Funeral Directors Records 1897-1975 are held at State Library so if your ancestor died in Brisbane their funeral may have been conducted by Cannon & Cripps. Check the index to see what you can discover (access conditions apply).

These are just some of the amazing resources available at State Library. So, check the One Search catalogue for further detail such as a specific ship, cemetery or funeral director; send in an online enquiry or come for a visit and talk to the staff on level 3.

More information

• Family History research guides
• One Search
• Ask a Librarian