Great news for those researching their roots in mid-19th-century Ireland: The Library Council of Ireland (An Chomhairle Leabharlanna) has recently completed digitization of Griffith's Valuation. It can be accessed online for free at this Ask about Ireland webpage. Although Griffith's has been on the web for awhile, it has been accessible online at fee-based sites. The council's digitzation efforts have resulted in an online archive searchable by name and place, and includes printable images of the original documents. It also includes access to mid-19th-century maps and modern-day maps from Google Earth.As this Irish Times article states, "One of the most important surviving genealogical sources from the era after the Famine, the valuation is likely to be of use to family history researchers in Ireland and throughout the world." Me included.
Not familiar with Griffith's Valuation? Read the Irish Times articles Property valuation of 19th century Ireland free online or Tracing ancestors for a brief introduction to these documents that became a valued census substitute after the destruction of other post-famine Irish records.
As the Irish Times states, the completion of this €230,000 project by the Libary Council of Ireland is a "long-term investment in the tourist industry" and "represents an important gesture of solidarity with the Irish diaspora". Thanks, Libary Council of Ireland. I for one hope to be buying my plane ticket as soon as I make a few more family history discoveries on this end.
Thanks to Margaret Jordan, the Cork Genealogist, for announcing the completion of the Griffith's Valuation project.
This is great news for Irish genealogists! Particularly interesting is the fact that, unlike census returns of the U.S. and other English-speaking countries, the records are actually the forms filled out and signed by the head of household, not the census enumerator.