Armorial of Jersey - available online

Just a short post to increase awareness that the Armorial of Jersey by J. B. Payne is now publicly available via the Internet Archive.

The Armorial consists of alphabetical short notes (often accompanied by pedigrees) of Jersey Island families. Some of the entries (such as for the Hammond family) are quite short and others (de Carteret, Lempriere) run for many pages. Unfortunately there are very few dates noted in the pedigrees. Later research has showed that some of the information was incorrect but also that much of it was accurate. Payne wanted to publish a revised edition of the Armorial to correct inaccuracies but could not obtain funding. Certainly the Armorial of Jersey is an important starting point for those wanting to research ancestors in Jersey.

There are multiple ways of viewing the Armorial and one can download a pdf in colour (40 MB) or in black and white (34 MB).

For printing pages I found that the colour pdf version seems better than the black and white. I would not have expected this, thinking the colour of the pages would obscure the light text. However the black text turns out to be very pale at times in the monochrome version when printed.

Although it is pale at times in the colour version of the pdf, to me it's more readable.

I'd also recommend enlarging the view to better view the page content.

The pdfs are searchable.

For my own research the Armorial includes the family of my great-great grandfather William Montgomery Gosset (he is present in the pedigree given for the Gosset family), as well as the families of many of his ancestors.