I heard last week via the email newsletters from UKBMD of the announcement by the General Register Office of the release of their own indexes to the Births (1837-1915) and deaths (1837-1957). If you don't already subscribe then I would recommend that you do so by registering to keep up to date with all the latest news on the Local BMD indexing projects.
You will find details if you use the GRO online ordering system.If you haven't used if then you will need to register first.
So what is special about this index?
Well it contains mothers maiden name from 1837 and the death indexes have age from 1837. with the original indexes which of course all the other sites have created their own indexes from only contain MMN from 1912 and age at death from 1866. It should help all family historians in the future.
So far I have only had the chance to check the details that I have for the first 3 years but alread it has thrown up one birth that wasn't in the other indexes and had a mothers maiden name I wasn't expecting in another. This led to the discovery that she had been married before - mind both her marriages were prior to the start of Civil Registration in 1837 and often the condition of a wife was not indicated.
Mind there does appears to be an issue with the death indexes in that ages under 12 months have occassionally been indexed as imply a number of years rather than being 0 as in the later entries. So check thoroughly any entry where the age is anything up to at least 12 against another source. maybe the birth entry if the first names are unusual, the burial index or one of the local registrar indexes.
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