RG17 (Record Group 17) is a collection of the Canadian Department of Agriculture records. Prior to 1892 (when it was taken over by the Department of the Interior), the Immigration Branch was under the jurisdiction of this department. The General Correspondence Series includes correspondence between the Immigration Branch and various UK sending organizations.
These records have not been microfilmed and are only available at Library and Archives Canada (LAC) in hard copy form. They are stored off-site and are difficult to access so BIFHSGO volunteers extracted all mention of Home Children from within these records.
This transcription work was carried out between 2009 and 2011 by the following volunteers: Jean Eppich, Marlyn Henry, Robert Manchip, Audrey McAllum, Frank McAllum, Marnie McCall, John Mullin, John Sayers (Team Leader), Audrey Stiles, George Swift
725 volumes (physical boxes) covering the years 1869 to 1896 were searched for files. Some years had no files while others had many files. The years with most names mentioned were 1886 to 1891. 14,169 names were extracted, some repeated in several entries. Other than the ships manifests, this set of records provides the most complete set of Home Children names for the period 1869 to 1892.
The transcribed records have been merged into LAC’s Home Children database as part of an agreement forged between LAC and BIFHSGO in 2006. However, BIFHSGO is now offering researchers a targeted view of the RG17 records here on its website. Click on one of the links below to view records in spreadsheet form. They may be searched using the CTRL+f function.
Congratulations to John and his team for their hard work resulting in comprehensive documentation of the Home Children, one of the most important founding generation for Canada!
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