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Dorset ancestors online

A second batch of Dorset records have gone live on the family history website Ancestry (opens in a new window) .

As well as completing the set of Dorset parish registers, which are now available online back to 1538, you can now search bastardy records (orders and applications for maintenance payments to illegitimate children), 1821-1853, and parish poor law records, 1511-1910.

The release of these records online is thanks to a partnership between the Dorset History Centre and Ancestry.

Keeping it Julian

One vicar's battle against the newfangled Gregorian calendar in the January Document of the Month.

Did your ancestors live in Dorchester around 1900?

The 2012 Dorchester Community Play will be set in Dorchester in the period 1890-1914. The organisers are looking for information about the people who lived in the town during the Edwardian or late Victorian era. Did members of your family live here at that time? Do you have records or memories passed down to you about Dorchester in this period? If so, the Dorchester Community Plays Association would love to hear from you. Contact David Lang by email at davidlang72@btinternet.com or by phone on 01305 213444.

• Dorset History Centre online newsletter

  View the latest edition and find out about our work and how our collections can further your research.

• Dorset Ancestors Online

  Dorset History Centre is working in partnership with the genealogy website Ancestry to make tens of thousands of images of original documents available online, so they can be accessed by family historians all over the world.

• News July 2011 - Cosens archive now available

  The archives of Cosens of Weymouth, the company best remembered for its fleet of paddle steamers, is now catalogued.

• News January 2012 - History of the Town on the Hill

  The Shaftesbury Borough Archive cataloguing project is revealing intriguing facts and documents about the town's history, as well as involving volunteers in making this information more accessible.