Record Atlas
6 eras · 1493–2026 · 2 places

Northern Leeward Islands (St Kitts, Antigua, Sint Maarten, Montserrat)

Basseterre, St. John's, Philipsburg, Marigot, Plymouth. Which empire held this ground in which years — and, the part that matters, which archive that means.

Whose archive this ground was

YearsWho held itWhose archive that means
1493–1624 Before registers. no registers survive

Columbus anchored off Nevis on 11 November 1493.
1624–1648 English and French St Kitts no registers survive

Thomas Warner arrived in 1623-1624 and Pierre Belain d'Esnambuc in 1625. In 1627 they divided the island into four quarters, the English holding the middle half.
1648–1713 British Leeward Islands, French St Kitts and the Dutch-French partition of St Martin no registers survive

France and the Dutch Republic divided Saint Martin on 23 March 1648 under the Treaty of Concordia. The British Leeward Islands became a colony in 1671 with William Stapleton as first governor. The Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 gave the French part of St Kitts to Britain.
1713–1834 British Leeward Islands no registers survive

The Treaty of Versailles of 1783 finally recognised British rule of St Kitts. The Leewards federation was dissolved in 1816 and re-established in 1833. On Saint Martin the border has been stable since 1816, after 16 changes.
1834–1958 British Leeward Islands after emancipation The National Archives — Discovery

Emancipation was proclaimed on 1 August 1834 in St Kitts, followed by four years of apprenticeship. A Leeward Islands federation dated 1871 existed, and from 1883 St Kitts, Nevis and Anguilla shared one assembly. Dominica moved from the Leeward Islands to the Windward Islands colony in 1940.
1958–2026 West Indies Federation, then separate states and territories Archives départementales de la Guadeloupe

St Christopher-Nevis-Anguilla was part of the West Indies Federation in 1958-1962, Anguilla broke from the union in 1971 and the federation of St Kitts and Nevis became independent in 1983. Saint-Martin and Saint-Barthélemy were part of Guadeloupe until their separation, completed by 2007, and the Dutch part of Saint Martin became a constituent country in 2010. French civil registers for Saint-Martin from 1807 to 1874 are catalogued under Guadeloupe.

The rings are approximate — deliberately. They exist to shade which filing system a place fell under, not to adjudicate a border. A place near a ring's edge should be checked against both neighbours.

See the whole span, 1493–2026, on the map →

The map takes a range, and a range that crosses one of the rows above is where records get lost: the family never moved, and the archive on the far side of the handover will tell you it holds nothing.

2 places on this ground

193 FamilySearch collections reach this ground

Ranked with the regional ones first — a collection for a province is usually a better lead than a national index, though the national index is often where a name is actually written down. A free account opens the images.

…and 133 more.

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