The group assists members with research interest in South Australia to overcome the phobia most people have about it!  There is a great wealth of other source material available to family historians.   Our group hopes to bring these to the attention of researchers.   We also hope to foster contacts with the South Australian Genealogy and Heraldry Society and to broaden our knowledge of South Australian history and geography to enable us to better understand our heritage.

Newsletter:

Subscriptions $10.00 for four issues. Contributions welcomed from anyone.
Subs need to be sent to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , c/o SA Group, cheques are to be made payable to WAGS Inc. Contributions are welcome - contact the editor Richard Watts via This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

<< Central & Eastern Australia + New Zealand Forum

Contacts:

Convenor:           Ian Simon 

Email:                  SIGS Contacts - Convenor - South Australian SIG 

Meetings

Meetings are held quarterly in the Resource Centre at May St, Bayswater from 2:00 to 5:00 pm on Sundays - usually the fourth Sunday of February, May, August, and November.  Every meeting has a focus topic and sometimes a member or speaker will provide background information.  There is always a problem solving session, so please feel free to bring along your queries and we'll try to provide some light at the end of the tunnel!

Please note that all upcoming quarterly meetings will be online through Google Meet until the Society deems the situation safe for us to meet at May Street.

Meeting dates for 2021 are:

Sunday 28 February 2pm, research day in Units 5 and 6 or online

Sunday 23 May 2pm Unit 4 or online

Sunday 22 August 2pm Unit 4 or online

Sunday 28 November 2pm Unit 4 or online

Extra get togethers are planned online at dates to be determined. Members on the SA SIG mailing list will be advised and notice placed on this page.

Online meetings have also been booked:

Tuesday 30 March 10am

Tuesday 25 May 10am

Tuesday 12 October 10am

Next Quarterly Meeting

Sunday 22nd November  2 pm online

Beryl Schahinger, SAGHS' Research Officer, will be joining us and will talk about the birth, marriage and death records in SA. Bring along your issues and Beryl may be able to explain the situation or why you cannot find your record.

To make a booking indicating you plan to attend:

South Australian SIG Events

Get together:

Extra Online sessions. Date and time to be announced.

Research tricks and tips to widen your knowledge of South Australian records. This is your chance to share.

Download brief notes prepared for a talk at the WA State Library for National Family History Month on research in SA. Download here    SouthAustraliaResearchNotes2017

Anyone with South Australian ancestors must not go past the three following reference "bibles".  With them, researching in SA can be a joy.  All three are available in either WAGS or the State Reference Library.

South Australian History Sources   by Andrew Guy Peake.
The third edition of this invaluable work (2007) contains a wealth of information and guidelines, contact addresses and information sources. Copies can be purchased from the WAGS Bookshop and are in the library for reference or borrowing.

Ancestors in Archives (2002)   A guide to family history sources in the official records of South Australia, ie material generated by state government departments.  Armed with this handbook you can then quote reference numbers of various records and then contact State Records to ask for a quote for the records to be searched, which will be greatly reduced given your ability to pinpoint exact records of interest.  State Records also has an excellent website at:   http://www.archives.sa.gov.au/

Kith and Kin (1994)  A guide to the holdings of the State Library of South Australia, including the Mortlock Library of South Australiana.

Access to property titles at SAILIS are open again to guest searching of property titles. To search go to the link:

https://www.sailis.sa.gov.au/home/public

SA State Records have changed their services. To find out more:

https://www.archives.sa.gov.au/content/service-changes

SA State Records and National Archives in SA

If you are going to Adelaide check with both organisations for location and opening hours. You can find the organisations at:

National Archives at  naa.gov.au

SA State Records at  www.archives.sa.gov.au

Birth-death-marriage databases online

Ancestry.com.au, FindMyPast and GenealogySA (SAGHS) have the South Australian BDM databases online. Ancestry have included the events in their Australian BDM databases but have omitted some information that is in the indexes. GenealogySA Members Only Area and FindMyPast have the full databases online but searching is not as versatile as the Digger database versions which can be searched through EDR3 on computers in FHWA's Research Centre.

The FHWA Library holds all available birth (1842 to 1927), death (1942 to 1972) and marriage (1842 to 1937) indexes on fiche and digital format. The State Library has indexes in book and fiche format.

The Adelaide Cemeteries Authority has changed the search interface on its burial index database on the Internet, as a result an extra step is needed to find all buried in the same grave. You can search the database by going to: http://www.aca.gov.sa.au/

The cemeteries covered, with their commencement date, are

• Enfield Memorial Park  1947+
• Cheltenham Cemetery  1876+
• Smithfield Memorial Park 1986+
• West Terrace Cemetery  1837+