If the hugely popular TV programme 'Who Do You Think You Are? has made you want to know more about your family history there is a wealth of material in Swindon’s Central Library for those with Wiltshire roots. But even if your ancestors are from further a field there is still plenty of lines of research to explore. Civil registration was introduced in England and Wales on July 1,1837 after which every birth, marriage and death was recorded at a local register office. Throughout the Victorian period and up to the 1980s every district registrar sent a quarterly summary of the registers to the General Register Office. The index of these returns, published in hundreds upon hundreds of large leather bound volumes, was until recently, housed at the Family Records Centre in London. Fortunately a microfiche copy of this index is much closer to hand and available for consultation at the Central Library, Regent Circus, Swindon. Here you will be able to obtain the date during which the ...