The 1939 Register for England and Wales is currently being digitised by the genealogy site Find My Past and will be published online within the next two years.
We understand that the Register is a record of the complete civilian population gathered just after the start of World War 2. It works in the same way as a national census and includes details of more than 30 million people. It was used to issue individuals with identity cards and set up rationing schemes.
Once launched, this is going to be a valuable resource for anyone researching their family tree in the mid-20th century as we hear that Britain’s 1931 census hasn’t survived and there wasn’t a census in 1941 because of the war. Look out for more news about the 1939 Register as we get it.
