How to search The British Newspaper Archive for a person’s name

Newspaper articles can provide incredible detail about peoples’ lives, whether you’re looking for your ancestors or researching a particular character from history.

Search for a person’s name –>

Searching newspaper articles for an ancestor or person from history

1. 1. Enter the name of the person you’re looking for in the search bar at the top of the homepage. Put a double quote mark on each side of the name and click the ‘search’ button.The quote marks will make your search results more relevant because they tell the website that you’re looking for a phrase. This means your results will only include articles in which these words appear next to one another.
      

1. 1. You may need to try alternative names to find the person you’re looking for. In this example we’ve included a middle name in our search, but Richard James Howard’s name might not have been included in an article in that exact way.Richard could have been referred to as Mr R Howard, Mr Howard or Richard Howard, so it’s worth searching for a few of these variations.
      If you’re looking for a woman, remember that she may have been recorded as the wife or daughter of somebody, rather than by her own name.
      

1. You can also use extra information you know about the person to focus your results. In this example, we know that Richard Howard was a chimney sweep so we’ve entered that in the search bar too.Putting a + mark before the name you’re searching for will tell the website that while we’re interested in reports about chimney sweeps, they must always include the name ‘Richard Howard’.
   

Search for a person’s name –>