'In Georgian and Victorian Cheshire, salt was one of the county’s most important exports. In the early 1790s, over 80 Mersey flats were kept busy transporting 58,000 tons of salt yearly to Liverpool. In fact Cheshire had more salt than it knew what to do with, and the manufacturers tried to strictly control output in order to keep prices up.

By 1850, 525,000 tons of white salt and 86,238 tons of rock salt were transported along the Weaver Navigation from the Cheshire salt towns.' 

Join us as we listen to Cheshire author Sue Wilkes, who specialises in family history, social history, industrial history and literary biography, take us through the history of this important Cheshire industry 

Sue's website  👉 https://suewilkes.blogspot.com/

NOTE:  This meeting is via Zoom and takes place at 7:30pm 

To express an interest in joining us please email  putting the date of the meeting in the subject line of the email, the zoom links will be forwarded a day or two before the meeting 

Image: Open pan salt making, Illustrated London News, 24 August 1850

The MAC Users Discussion group meets on the third Monday of the month at 2pm via Zoom.

The group is led by John Reed, a perfect place to discuss any issues or share your hints and tips, and learn from other members 

To be included in the emailing list to receive the zoom link for these meetings please return to the Homepage of the website, scroll down the left-hand menu and click on Discussion Groups, then click on 'Subscribe' for this or any other Discussion Group you would like to attend.

How to resolve stumbling blocks in your family history research using new and unique search strategies on The Genealogist to find those missing relatives. Includes searching for a family using just the individuals' forenames, keyword search tools; using criteria other than a name to search on, using maps and other advanced search techniques. The talk also covers unique data sets such as Tithe records, The 1910 Land Survey, Non-Conformist records, Non-Parochial records, Fleet marriages, Will images, Parish Records, Directories, Newspapers and more.

Mark Bayley is 'Head of Online Development' at The Genealogist website

This event is for members only and registration opens on 1st November when the ‘Register [Individual]’ button will show on the bottom left of the Event details on the FHSC website for you to click and then process your registration, you will receive an email confirmation. Registration will close on  17th November.

The zoom links/meeting protocol will be forwarded the day before the talk.  If you run into any difficulties with this, then please contact us on the dedicated seminar email address – or see the 'Seminar Talks and how to Register' section under 'Online Talks and Meetings' in the FAQ section of the website.

The Seminar series is co-ordinated by Margaret Spate, Jean Laidlaw and Margaret Roberts and ALL correspondence, queries etc should be sent to the dedicated email address -   

PLEASE NOTE WE DO NOT RECORD SEMINAR TALKS

The Family Historian Users Discussion Group, led by Geoff Johnson takes place on the 3rd Thursday of the month at 7:30pm.  This is the perfect place to meet other users and share frustrations, hints and tips when using the software. 

To be included in the emailing list to receive the zoom link for these meetings please return to the Homepage of the website, scroll down the left-hand menu and click on Discussion Groups, then click on 'Subscribe' for this or any other Discussion Group you would like to attend.

The Publishing your Family History Research Discussion group meets on the fourth Monday of the month at 2:30pm via Zoom.

The group is led by Victoria Doran and covers all aspects of publishing your research, whether you are considering writing a book, creating a website or blog, submitting an article to the Cheshire Ancestor, recording a podcast etc, then this group is the ideal place to discuss your ideas and concerns.  

To be included in the mailing list for the Zoom link please initially email  

The DNA Discussion group meets on the fourth Monday of the month at 7:30pm via Zoom.

The group is led by Peter Rowley and all members are welcome to chat about DNA, your experiences and any help the rest of the group can offer 

To be included in the emailing list to receive the zoom link for these meetings please return to the Homepage of the website, scroll down the left-hand menu and click on Discussion Groups, then click on 'Subscribe' for this or any other Discussion Group you would like to attend.

Zooming in on Family History is a wide-ranging session whereby members can come along for help with their research, share success stories or just generally meet other members and chat about family history.  

All members are welcome, you can attend as often or as little as you wish, no rules, just a friendly meeting place

The meetings take place on the fourth Wednesday of the month and are led by Margaret Roberts and Sheila Jones.

To be included in the emailing list to receive the zoom link for the meetings please return to the Homepage of the website, scroll down the left-hand menu and click on Discussion Groups, then click on 'Subscribe' to this or any other Discussion Group you would like to attend. 

The Family Tree Maker Users Discussion group meets on the fourth Thursday of every second month at 7:30pm via Zoom.

The group is led by Tony Cox and covers all aspects of using Family Tree Maker, so this is the place for asking any questions or sharing tips on how to use the programme. 

To be included in the emailing list to receive the zoom link for these meetings please return to the Homepage of the website, scroll down the left-hand menu and click on Discussion Groups, then click on 'Subscribe' for this or any other Discussion Group you would like to attend.

The September FHSC Cheshire Research Buddies topic of the month is Alsager, Church Lawton, Rode Heath, and Oakhanger  - Do you have ancestors in the area, or are you researching a local family and want some help, perhaps on the other hand you live in the locality and could offer help with photographing gravestones or buildings. This is the chance for members to help each other, I'm sure there are many members out there with knowledge of the area that they could share. If you have a research question then please feel free to email me on   and I will circulate it among attendees beforehand.

You will need to register to attend, to do so please click on the 'Register [Individual]' button below on the left and process your registration, you will receive an email confirmation and the zoom links/meeting protocol will be forwarded the morning of the helpdesk meeting. If you run into any difficulties with this then please contact Margaret Roberts on 

NOTE that registration closes at 10am on the morning of the meeting.

The Online Historical Newspaper Discussion group meets on the first Friday of the month at 2pm via Zoom.

The group is led by Margaret Roberts and all members are welcome to chat about using historical newspapers, to pick up hints and tips from other members and generally to discuss any successes or failures! 

To be included in the emailing list to receive the zoom link for these meetings please return to the Homepage of the website, scroll down the left-hand menu and click on Discussion Groups, then click on 'Subscribe' for this or any other Discussion Group you would like to attend.