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Learn how to trace your family tree! Every issue is packed with: family history research advice hands-on learning experiences to help you become an ancestor super-sleuth & step-by-step guides to show you the path to tracing the past. From vintage documents to the latest in DNA, we’re here to help you discover more! Get the latest in genealogy news, software, books, archives and expert answers. Plus enjoy those reader stories that remind what it means to trace your family story. Research & remember your roots with Family Tree!

Commemorating VJ Day 80 & remembering family

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Magna Carta: sold for 27 dollars (inadvertently) • King Edward’s 1300 vellum of the Magna Carta was accidentally bundled into a collection of family papers and subsequently went under the hammer in 1946, selling for a measly US$26.50. How did this happen? And when was the oversight discovered?

Protected: a time capsule of commercial history • The Adams Heritage Centre in Littleport, Cambridgeshire, has been listed at Grade II

Was your ancestor a Tudor rebel at the Bayham Abbey Uprising? • There are papers in existence documenting the names of 31 of the rebels at the Bayham Abbey Uprising – which took place 500 years ago (4 June 1525). English Heritage is now on the hunt for the rebels’ descendants. Can you help them with their quest?

Renewed: British Library & Findmypast partnership - 70 million further pages to be digitised • On 10 June 2025 Findmypast and the British Library announced an ambitious extension to their historical newspaper digitisation project

DNA Club news • DNA Club news reporter Karen Evans shares news from the genealogy scene

Railway database doubled in size • Newly available 69,000 records of casualties on railways in England & Wales, 1855-1929

USING CAMPAIGN MEDALS as a starting point for research • This month, Family Tree Academy tutor David Annal guides us through the process of using campaign medals as the catalyst for genealogical research, with a case study of a 19th century soldier who served in Crimea

DISCOVER THE THINGS that will improve your family history … • We caught up with esteemed professional genealogist Dr Sophie Kay to speak about a topic that sometimes gets overlooked in family history – namely ‘methodology’. But why is it important, and how can it help us (we mean really help us) improve our genealogy research? Let’s find out.

THRILL OF THE CHASE • Trotting back in time to locate her great-grandfather John Tonge as a boy, Gill Shaw finds she’s a song in her heart and a new mystery on her mind.

Dear Paul • This month, Paul Chiddicks reflects on findings in the GRO indexes, and brings us some entertaining stories from the records as well as a collection of unfortunate transcription errors

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CENSUS SUBSTITUTES & LOCAL RECORDS FOR MEDIEVAL RESEARCH • Discover the record collections and research know-how that will enable you to take your research into people and places, up to 1,000 years ago. Professional genealogist and passionate local historian Richard Tolson is here to guide you. In this article we will cover … the key records for the medieval period – census substitutes and local collections

‘Yours Affectionately, Vivien Leigh’ RITA MALYON’S LEGACY • Keen family historian Mavis Tilbury tells us how, in her search for her maternal grandfather, she made a connection with another relative, who had...