City of London Records Office

[kathyhpink]

If I'm to try and find the record of an inquest, is it best to pay a personal visit, or can I pay a member of staff to do this for me?

[Phoenix]

If death cert is issued by the coroner, then you have a narrow time span to search, so I would have thought the actual looking up would be easy enough.

What you need to check - and that would be free - was whether the actual records exist. Most of us have to rely on newspaper reports, as the inquest papers don't survive.

[KiteRunner]

A quick Google search found this:

The City of London Record Office is now closed. Our archive collection is currently being relocated to the London Metropolitan Archives. The London Metropolitan Archives (LMA) is located about one mile away from Guildhall.

When I've looked at the London Metropolitan Archives site before, I seem to remember the fee for having the staff look stuff up for you was very high.

[KiteRunner]

Oh wait, there's this bit too:

It is intended that the official City of London archives will be returned to Guildhall in 2008/09 once this programme has been completed

Have to see if I can find some firmer dates! Sorry, I can't see any.

[Merry Monty Montgomery]

It must be at least ten years since I got something from the LMA. It was only one sheet of paper and I had an exact date and place for them to look and the fee was still over £30. I coudn't look at the item myself as access was restricted, so I had no choice if I wanted to see the document. :(

[Pipemma]

A whole load of info from the LMA is due to start coming online from next year:

Digitisation

Yay! I've been able to put something back into the site

[Little Nell]

The inquest papers I looked at from the 1930s were arranged by year and then by month. It was quite easy to find the one I was looking for.

[kathyhpink]

Thanks everyone!