The McKirdy Index is described as "an Analytical Genealogical Finding Aid to the Statutory Registers of Death for Scotland 1855-1875." This online database enables genealogy researchers to locate death records of Scottish ancestors. Some of the data listed shows details that date from the mid 1700s, given that death entries for someone who died in 1855 aged 80-100 may show their parents.
Wayne McKirdy, a Wellington, New Zealand, genealogist, has spent the last decade manually entering 310,000 Scottish death records into this electronic database. He was inspired to create the searchable digital archive during his own research into his Scottish heritage.
"I was researching my own family and looked at one of the registry entries and saw there was a lot of information. But unless you know the person and can find the right document, it just gets missed," he says.
The data has been extracted from the Statutory Registers of Death for Scotland, 1855-1875, and has been done so with the permission of the Queen's Printer for Scotland and HMSO. The Data extracted is Crown copyright as well as copyrighted to the McKirdy Index Limited. The data may be reproduced for private and personal use only unless permission is granted from the Crown and McKirdy Index Limited.
The McKirdy Index is a "for pay" site. You may search for names free of charge. The search will tell you whether or not there are names in the database that match your search criteria. However, to look at the record details, you must sign up and pay a fee:
- Bronze Membership - $5.00 New Zealand dollars ($3.34 U.S. dollars) for three months with basic search results only, no location details displayed.
- Silver Membership - $9.00 New Zealand dollars ($6.02 U.S. dollars) for three months with detailed search results. Silver members also can search by location.
- Gold Membership - $15.00 New Zealand dollars ($10.03 U.S. dollars) for three months, or $45.00 New Zealand dollars ($30.09 U.S. dollars) for twelve months. Gold members can perform detailed search results and can search by location. Gold members also can view the complete details including all named persons on each entry.
For more information about the McKirdy Index, look at http://www.mckirdyindex.co.nz
Mr. McKirdy also plans to digitize the Scottish marriage registers from the same time period.
