There are many free resources available online to help you find your ancestors. One of my favorites places online to search parish registers is FreeReg. FreeReg includes a large collection of transcribed Parish Registers and non-conformist registers from across England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland.

Free Transcribed Records: Search Parish Registers Online

These records include baptisms, marriages and burials. The records start around 1538 and continue into the 1900s.  These parish records include Church Records, as well as, non-conformist records like Area Circuit Registers.

Some of my relatives lived in Glamorgan (Bridgend) and I found their records in the Glamorgan Area Circuit Registers. This means, when you are searching for your ancestors you may need to search in a slightly larger date range because the circuit registers were not done regularly.

For example:

Sarah Jane Pugsley was born in 1875 but her baptism wasn’t registered until 22 January 1878 when she was 3 years old. Her baptism was done at the same time as her 2 siblings. Her brother Fred was baptized at 6 months on 22 January 1878 and her brother William James was baptized at age 5 years. When the non-conformist ministers came through on their circuits was when the baptisms took place.

The records are still being transcribed so some of your ancestors may not show up yet but the volunteers are hard at work making more records available every day.

You can check out their free records right here: FreeReg