Only the 1820 directory had been transcribed. The others
are available only as scanned images of photocopies, which cannot be
searched but may be viewed at reasonable magnification. Some of the files
are very large, and may take some time to load.
By 1860 at the latest Yardley was listed in the Birmingham Post Office
Directories. From the early 1880s Sparkhill was not to be found under
Yardley but was absorbed within the Birmingham street listings, and Acocks
Green was listed separately from Yardley as a suburb. The Wake Green part of
Yardley was listed under Moseley. So if you are looking for Sparkhill or
Moseley Wake Green after then, these pages will not help you. After 1897
there was no separate listing for any of Yardley.
Directories are not comprehensive. If you had a trade or a business, you
might appear, but not if you were a labourer or worker of similar class. To
appear in the Court or Private Residents you had to be of some standing. If
you do not find what you are looking for here, it may be worth using the
Ancestry website, where
you can access the Victorian censuses for a small charge, unless you are
using a computer in Birmingham's public libraries, where access is free.
Searchable directories going up to 1973/4 can be found at
www.midlandshistoricaldata.org. A range of searchable voters lists can
also be found at the same site, currently at five-yearly intervals. The site
can be used free of charge on computers in Birmingham's public libraries. |
