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That's jolly bad luck, as in these cases you pray that the person will have survived until 1851! You could look for other Fowlers of similar age in the 1851 census for Birmingham, in the hope that they will turn out to be siblings of Christopher's, and that their birth place will lead to his. Otherwise, Fowler is a familiar local name in that area, and bear in mind that Birmingham (Warwickshire) was near the meeting point of Staffordshire and Worcestershire (and not far from Leicestershire), so those would be the counties worth trying first.

Free BMD is not complete, and there are only a few parish registers on this site, and not for the period you want. You need to look in the General Register Office's marriage indexes. They have been indexed on this site, under 'search records'. As you know your great grandfather was called John, are you quite sure the entry you have found for 'James' is correct? Bear in mind that they may not have married in England and Wales. 'Cullen' has strong Manx connections.

Well, if you're not sure, you want to focus on Edgar, and learn more about him first, and this will provide you with greater certainty on his father. Look for both Edgar's marriage and birth records, as both will name his father, and seek him in the earlier censuses, where you will hopefully find him with his father. The censuses will say where his father was born, and roughly when, and you can then seek his baptism in the relevant parish register.

I'm not quite sure I understand the question here (you say you don't know her name, and then say what it was), so please come back and ask more: you're right about court records, but you can make an educated guess as to where she is likely to have committed her crime, and been sentenced, on the basis of where she lived, and newspapers local to her home are likely to have reported her misdemeanours anyway.

That's a big question to ask! I wrote a book called Tracing Your Family History (published by Collins) that answers it. You can start by typing your family tree such as you know it into this site, and seeing if it results in any matches - these could be relatives, who may be able to tell you more. Then start looking for your parents and grandparents in the birth, marriage and death indexes (under 'search records') and when you get back to 1911, start looking them up in the censuses (also under 'search records').

By all means! Divorce in that period was still quite unusual, as it was expensive, and a difficult procedure. The records are at Divorce records for the period 1858 to 1943 are at the National Archives (class J 77), and searchable through www.catalogue.nationalarchives.gov.uk. I've had a quick look and - bingo - there they are in 1902, under Gooderham (lucky and sensible you for taking into account variant spellings!) The link is http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/displaycataloguedetails.asp?CATID=-3082581&CATLN=7&Highlight=%2CGOODERHAM%2CGOODERHAM&accessmethod=0,

Death records for recent years are available on microfiche in a limited number of record repositories, including the London Metropolitan Archives. It's a bit of our national record system that hasn't gone high-tech!

Once you have found a promising-looking character in another tree (using the 'search trees' button, above) you can press the button that allows you to send a message to the person whose tree it is, and explain who you are. They may then allow you access to their tree- in which case you will be able to see it.

You are lucky to have such nice, distinctive names to research. Catholics who have been divorced are not allowed to remarry, but I presume you're talking here about an Anglican wedding. I don't know chapter and verse on this, but as the Anglican Church is effectively an arm of the state, I'd guess that they accepted that a properly granted divorce left both parties free to re-marry - in church if they wished. For more details you'd better ask a vicar!

I am sorry to hear this: the last thing we want is people being connected to the wrong relatives! I'm afraid though that I have no expertise in the technical side of things, but the site's managers will help you - go to 'Contact us' under 'Help, above.

That's a good question to start with. Prison records tend to be divided between the National Archives and local ones, which in this case would be the London Metropolitan Archives. They may not be publicly accessible for as recent a date as you will need - I don't know your Grandmother's dates - so alternatives would be court records of the newspapers, that would have reported her crime: it occurs to me that the newspapers that have been newly digitised on this site might help here.

If you can prove you are the next of kin of a deceased serviceman who was in the RAF, you can contact the RAF Personnel and Training Command, Branch PG 5a(2) (for officers) and P Man 2b(1) (for non-officers), RAF Innsworth, Gloucestershire, GL3 1EZ. Those for the Fleet Air Arm are at the Ministry of Defence, CS(R)2, Bourne Avenue, Hayes, Middlesex, UB3 1FR.

How fascinating - but lucky that Sarah told you by writing that note. He may well have gone abroad - you could try the outgoing shipping lists, or the American censuses - or look in Ireland or Scotland. I'll wish you good luck, and with a man who deliberately 'went missing' from his family, you will probably need it!

The clearer the copy, the better. I should have mentioned another option - each attorney, scrivener or notary who wrote up wills had a seal for general use, and some of these look awfully like proper, armorial seals - but are not. It fact that two generations of your family used the same seal is encouraging - though of course it may just be that they'd used the same solicitor! But let's see it anyway.

It's always worth re-checking - and remember that this site has not had these indexes for very long. .

Ok: a husbandman was a tenant farmer, though they might have sunk down from yeoman level - and thus from more exalted levels. The main thing, then, is to identify the arms. E-mail me a picture at mail@anthonyadolph.co.uk and I'll see what I can do.

Well done for having checked the original register. If the family were using the same seal from one generation to the next, and were using their arms properly, then it suggests they belonged to an armigerous family. Did Joseph describe himself as 'Esquire' or 'Gent'.? . I suggest looking them up in Burke's Landed Gentry. The Stanleys were Earls of Derby, so if you are very lucky your Joseph will appear in Burke's Peerage, in one of the junior lines. Their arms show three stags' heads on a bend - a bar running diagonally across the shield.

There are many outgoing ships' passenger lists on this website, but the bulk of this work is best tackled through the archives in New Zealand. Jeremy Palmer of Anzestry is a good person to ask.

Genes Reunited's membership is international, but if your relatives are not on the site, your best bet is to start seeking them through research in America. The Find My Past website has the 1940 American census, which is good way 'in' to research across the pond.

You are welcome! Masons and Freemasons had their lodges and knew who each other were, but they didn't leave us any nice records from that period to help our research. You've just got to rely on the usual sources, parish registers and wills, and hope that people who were masons will be identified as such. You may find a few in the freedom records of the borough of Oxford, if the records go back that far (I forget).