The Society of Genealogists (SoG)
What are the Civil Service Evidences of Age?
The CSEA are 60,000 files for established civil servants and civil service examination candidates, which were collected by the Civil Service Commission (CSC) from 1855 in order to establish accurate birth dates for the purpose of either ensuring that an examination candidate was of the required age, or granting a pension.
By the 1980s, the CSC had accumulated original documents for approximately 60,000 individuals, consisting largely of items that it would be impractical to replace, such as personal testimonials or documents from overseas. This important genealogical collection was deposited at the Society of Genealogists (SoG) and provides unique evidence of birth for which other sources are unlikely to be available.
The collection might more properly be titled the Remainsof the Civil Service Evidences of Age, as it is estimated that it constitutes only 2% of the papers originally collected. It is important to realise that not all civil servants are reflected in the collection, let alone all those who applied to the Civil Service Commission for employment. In general, papers were not retained if the information could easily be obtained again from another source (such as through the Registrar Generalâ??s birth index).
What period is covered by the collection?
This collection spans evidence of birth from 1752 up until the twentieth century, though the great majority of births recorded took place in the nineteenth century.
The SoG indexers transcribed not just the civil service post-holder or candidate, but also any relatives named in the same document where a date of birth was given for them. There may be very little information recorded about such relatives: typically, an estimated date of birth and their relationship to the main individual. Where these relatives were parents of civil service employees, they may well have been born well before the start of the nineteenth century.
What types of people are contained in the records?
The collection does not include the Whitehall staff usually thought of when the Civil Service is mentioned. It does include many others who were appointed through the Commission, often in comparatively humble posts â?? for instance, prison officers, post office workers and workers in Admiralty dockyards.
What geographical area is covered?
Many candidates for the Service had been born in places and at times when no state registration of births existed. This was particularly the case for Scottish and Irish candidates and also for those born in foreign countries, on board ship (over 80 births) and in the British colonies. There are also many cases of candidates born in England after the start of civil registration whose births had not been registered: non-registration was not uncommon until fines were instituted in the 1870s.
The collection comprises those born in England (37% of all entries), Ireland (28%), Scotland (6%), Wales (2%), the British Empire and further afield. Of those born in England, counties well-represented include Middlesex/London (7% of the whole), Kent (3%), Devon and Dorset. There are five times as many Irish in the database as those of England per head of population. The Irish counties of Dublin (5%), Cork (3%), Armagh, Carlow, Queen"s (Laois) and Kildare are particularly well represented.
Elsewhere there are over 2,500 individuals born in the Indian sub-continent, and 1,250 born in Malta. Many of the latter group were employed in the Admiralty Dockyards in Valletta â?? their birth certificates give three generations of the family.
This data stems from a time when the British Empire was at the height of its power and influence.
There are also significant numbers of records (approximate number of files given in brackets) for the following countries: Canada (545), Australia (520, including Australians who worked in branches of the Royal Mint in Perth and Sydney), USA (475), South Africa (410), Gibraltar (400), France (240), Jamaica (155), Ceylon (150), Germany (125), Bermuda (115), New Zealand (110), Burma (95), Barbados (90), China (75), Greece (60), Egypt (55), Hong Kong (55), Italy (55), Belgium (50) and Bahamas (50). There are of course lower numbers of persons born in other colonies and foreign parts.
What can I find in the online index?
The index gives full name, date and place of birth, CSC reference number and additional notes made by indexers at the Society. Where no birth date is given, the SoG transcribers have recorded the baptismal date and place where these are given. 4% of entries therefore relate to baptisms and not to births.
The original documents are fascinating historical records. They may (or, of course, in some instances, may not) provide further information such as the address at time of application to join the Civil Service, details of other family members, and of the civil service department where the candidate would work. Many documents are also in the handwriting of the Civil Service applicant or post-holder, or of a member of their family.
What is the reference given in the index?
Each reference is composed of two parts: the first is a serial number, the second a box number.
It is not known what the serial number signifies. However, reference numbers beginning ICS (for example ICS 1866) indicate an applicant to the Indian Civil Service in the year 1866.
The collection came to the Society in some 200 boxes and the documents were in recruitment order, seemingly by department.
What do the original documents look like?
The original documents appear in a variety of languages other than English, including Dutch, French, German, Italian, Latin and Swedish.
Documents vary from originals of personal testimonies, certified copies of parish registers and birth certificates to such miscellaneous documents as original Indian horoscopes. Most files contain only one or two documents, while some where queries were evident run to 30 pages.
SoG charges a flat fee for producing all the documents within an individual"s file, as stated. If the document is an index card, please be aware that these were transcripts, made in the 1960s and 1970s, of original documents and may contain little information beyond that given in the online index.
Examples of original documents
The examples here are typical, but the amount of information contained in the files varies very widely.
Ordering copies of documents
Once you have found on Find My Past a CSEoA index entry which interests you, you will be able to send the Society of Genealogists an e-mail with relevant details. The Society will then contact you with details of what is available in the relevant file and how you can order copies of the file documents. Full details of the document-ordering process may be found on the Civil Service Evidence of Age search and results pages.
Start searching the Civil Service Evidence of Age records now.
Acknowledgements
The Society of Genealogists is grateful to all those volunteers who participated in the creation of this index. Colin Gibbens instigated the project and worked on it from start to finish.
The Society has no accurate record of all those who worked as Basement volunteers of the project and apologise for any whose faces are remembered but whose names have been forgotten.
The following all worked on the indexing project: Jeanne Bryan, Isobel Charlton, Doreen Clayton, Helen Cohen, Jean Driver, Don Halliday, Lauren Harvey, Heather Hebblethwaite, Jo Hobday, Roy Kraske, the late Elisabeth McDougall, Dick Mynott, Gladys & Peter Paterson, Gill Pickup, Myrtle Rogala, the late Margaret Thomson, Roger Walpole, Barbara Westmuckett and Ann Wilkie.
The following individuals worked on the resulting data: Robert Charnock, the late Chris Loveridge, David Squire and David Walsh.
