Visit Us
The renovations of our new home are now complete, and we're excited to announce an exclusive Member-Only opening from Wednesday 13th December 2023 to Friday 22nd December. We'll be open to the public from Wednesday 3rd January 2024.
For more information on how to pre-order collection items, book your visit, and get full details on how to get to our new home, please see our Visit Us page.
Collections Guides
Our comprehensive guides below explain the range of resources available at the Society of Genealogists. They are a great way of finding out more information about our holdings, their formats, and their availability. We're regularly creating more research guides and would be delighted to hear from you about any subjects you would like us to cover. To let us know your thoughts or to inquire about specific collections, please contact librarian@sog.org.uk.
Collections Guides
Online Collections
A guide to our Online Collections
Library Collections
A guide to our Library Collections
Archive Collections
A guide to our Archive Collections
Sources for Jewish Genealogy
A guide to our sources for Jewish Genealogy
Sources for Huguenot Genealogy
A guide to our sources for Huguenot Genealogy
JSTOR Resources
A guide to JSTOR's 19th Century British Pamphlet and Ireland Collections.
November 2023 Library Update
Work on processing books destined for the new library shelves has been underway for several weeks. Most of the textbooks have been completed and we are commencing work on county general and local history books. Over 2500 books have been processed so far. Processing includes amending the holdings information in each catalogue record, inserting security tags, and entering each item into the new security system software.
We are managing this work amid the building renovations and we're grateful for the assistance of volunteers helping out every day with this work. We look forward to getting the books onto the new library shelves when they're installed.
Here is a reminder of what will be on the open shelves at the new library:
- general and local history collections for English counties, Scotland, and Wales
- quick reference books and textbooks (including research and record guides)
- select items relating to Ireland and India research (space permitting)
- new periodicals and monographs in series
We're also planning a set of 'rotational' shelves, which we will use to temporarily bring various parts of the library collections out of storage (e.g., for one or two months) so that visitors can access them while we work on their catalogue records and carry out some digitisation.
While the library is closed for renovation you can consult the following to help you progress your research:
- Advice Line 6pm-9pm Thursdays (020) 7251 8799, option 5
- member forum https://members.sog.org.uk/forums
- staff genealogists genealogy@sog.org.uk
The March Genealogists' Magazine will contain a summary of archive collections processed in 2023.
There will be more to report when the renovation work for the library nears completion, so stay tuned for further news of our progress, and if you have any questions in the meantime let me know. librarian@sog.org.uk
Christine Worthington, Library Coordinator
Access Collections Remotely
- Members who cannot visit us can access and search our online collections., such as family trees and memorial cards.
- Check our library catalogue for any items that may be of interest to your research.
- Send your research questions to genealogy@sog.org.uk. Our genealogy staff can assist our members with general research inquiries, basic lookups and referrals. A search copy/service is available which can provide copies of pages and images from specific items in our collections for a fee. Quotations are available on request.
If you are looking for a professional researcher to carry out more in-depth or comprehensive research on your behalf, please take a look at our comprehensive guide Employing a Professional Genealogist, which provides details on both the Association of Genealogists and Researchers in Archives (AGRA) and the Register of Qualified Genealogists (RQG).
Join today and become a member
As a member, you can make the most of our resources, access our experts, and find a welcoming community of people interested in family history and genealogy.
We all have roots. Let’s find them together.
