Using Parish and Other Records. . .  to determine how natural phenomena affected people and communities

Natural phenomena, including long-term changes to environment, gradual changes to physical habitats and disasters resulting from rapidly-moving events, have significantly affected the lives and livelihood of our ancestors. Finding information that demonstrate what events occurred and how they impacted people and communities is an important part in constructing complete family histories.

Parish registers alone or in combination with other records normally consulted by genealogists can be useful in discovering what natural conditions affected procurement of food, shelter and employment or caused injury, sickness and death.

Birth and death statistics, in particular, can be most useful in illustrating both long-term trends in population growth or decline, and specific short-term events such as famine, epidemics, storms, floods and other natural disasters. The relationships of such data can assist in separating socially- or politically-related events, such as wars, from those caused by Mother Nature, like famines.

Commercial data may indicate what environmental conditions were extant, especially over several years or decades. Rapid or cyclical changes in food prices, for example, brought on by shortages through drought or other events, might have severely impacted how individuals or whole communities were able to cope or even survive.

Reports published in newspapers and periodicals will describe events that were experienced in local areas and across broad regions. They may also comment on resulting injuries, deaths or property losses.

Maps will be useful in showing whether families lived in areas subject to physical change, such as along major rivers or coastlines subject to severe weather or erosion. Both phenomena may have impacted lives and property.

Scientific reports and historical analyses of climatic and other natural situations highlight how the environment and living conditions were altered.

This presentation will involve a discussion of what types of information are available that show how natural phenomena impacted lives and livelihoods using specific examples of records and areas.

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