Apologises to MadAboutGenealogy readers for my not posting last week I was putting the last touches to my presentations for the Unlock the Past cruise plus I had a host of non-genealogy events and there just wasn’t enough hours in the day to do everything that needed to be done!!
Anyway I’m back 
Ancestry.co.uk have added a new feature to their site, it could be viewed as a crafty way to add content at no cost to them, but let’s be charitable and say that they are simply alerting us all to what else is on the internet which might of help to family historians.
I am talking about the Web Search feature, basically it is a search engine link which searches non Ancestry databases and if a match comes up it connects through to the external website which holds the information.
The first offering is the “Recommendation for Military Honours & Awards 1935-1990” which is held by The National Archives.
I entered the name Pottinger to see how the system worked. It came up with 2 entries and I chose the one for Frederick Pottinger and clicked on the View Record button. The usual Ancestry page came up with the following information …
| Name | Frederick Pottinger |
| Publication Date | 27 July 1944 |
| Rank | Corporal |
| Service Number | 2047371 |
| Regiment or Unit | 1 Battalion The Northamptonshire Regiment |
| Theatre of Combat | Burma |
| Award | Military Medal |
| Date of Action or Award | 1944 |
A link to the National Archives website is at the end of the details. Clicking on this brings up a warning that you are leaving Ancestry for an external site, getting rid of this pop-up takes you to the TNA site.
The National Archives site gives you the same info that Ancestry has, but with the opportunity to purchase a copy of recommendation document in this case 2 pages. A fee of £3.36 if charged for this, but the document can be downloaded immediately the payment has gone through.
All in all quite a handy feature as it will alert researchers to other documents that might be of help in tracing your ancestors. It will be interesting what other archives are added in the future.
