Hello Nina,
Finding someone in a newspaper is somewhat different to finding someone in a census, or even, at least after statutory registration, amongst the births deaths and marriages. For the census and the BDM’s it’s fairly safe to make the assumption that they must be there somewhere, and that all you need to do is to keep looking till you find them.
With newspapers, people only get there if they advertise, either to draw people’s attention to a particular event, or to sell something, or whatever, or if something happens involving them that the newspaper thinks is newsworthy. For the large majority of people, especially in the period for which newspaper archives are currently available, there was no mention at all.
My Scottish great grandparents left Scotland in the 1880s but great grandfather’s siblings remained and had families. The only thing I’ve ever found in the Scottish newspapers for my Scottish lot was about a child who, in 1942, fell down a flight of stairs. Come to think of it the only time my own name has appeared in a newspaper was in a list of high school examination results, and on the death and funeral notices of an assortment of relatives.
There’s a great number of different newspaper archive databases scattered about and each one has its own method of searching. Most of those databases would have a link to their own set of searching tips. I’m not a very sophisticated searcher and don’t use many of the tricks that I’m sure would be used by some others. I just keep plugging away till I find something or I give up.
I went looking for a set of tips for the 19th Century British Library Newspapers, and found this one from the University of Exeter. Fairly basic and definitely worth reading, there’s some stuff in there I didn’t know about. I’ll have to print that out for future reference. There’s also the help link on the 19C Newspapers search page but it could be a bit tiresome to read all that’s there.
http://as.exeter.ac.uk/media/level1/aca ... papers.pdf
I can’t recall ever having had much success in searching newspapers by using wildcards and I very rarely use them. In the light blue bar at the top of the 19C Newspaper search page I don’t think I’ve ever used the Advanced Search or the Publication Search. I occasionally use the Browse Publications by Location link there to find if a newspaper is available for a particular range of years. Some years and ranges of years, especially the earlier ones, are missing for some unknown reason so if you’re getting zero results, and it seems a bit odd, you could check there
If I’m searching for two or more words as an exact phrase I enclose them within quotes. But if I’m searching for two words in close proximity to each other I just type them together without quotes. Apparently that’s the same as using n4 between the words. You can search for words a bit further apart by using say n9, but also try AND in between if you think the words could be much more separated.
If I’m searching for a surname such as McDonald, which will usually appear in the old newspapers as M’Donald, or for a name like O’Leary, I just type in the end bit such as Donald or Leary. In these cases the search will usually see the first letter as an isolated single letter and will ignore it. But that method is unlikely to work within quotes.
You can limit your search to specific newspapers via the Browse Publication Title link. But if you only want to search the four Scottish newspapers pasting all this, "1ZSV" OR "1ZTN" OR "2FXN" OR "1ZTB", into the box will do the job. Or else just type, for example, GLASGOW into the box and the search will be limited to the Glasgow Herald.
If you ever click on a result and get an image which doesn’t look right, either there’s no highlighting, or the highlighting doesn’t make sense, or the snippet looks like it’s been cut out by a drunken sailor, or whatever, click the back button of your browser and try again, maybe a couple of times, to see if things correct themselves.
That’s all I can think of at the moment, hope it’s useful and not too much gobblygook. If you have any questions please let me know.
PS.
I’m not sure what State you’re in at the moment, or if you can also access via your State Library. Here’s the NLA page for the 19C BL Newspapers. Click the A-Z Resources link, then the Licenced Resources link to find their other databases. They don’t have The Scotsman. You need to register etc.
http://www.nla.gov.au/app/eresources/item/3303
The Glasgow Herald at Google News Archive is available for a much greater range of years, 1800s to 1990s, than that at 19C BL Newspapers but the search is next to useless, and only worth the effort because rarely something turns up. Two other Glasgow newspapers available there are the Evening Times from 1950s to 1990s and the Bulletin 1950s. They are all very useful if you know the date of an event. You start the next to useless search here, in the pop-up type Glasgow or Evening Times or Bulletin in the source box.
http://news.google.com/news/advanced_ne ... ?as_drrb=a
For Browsing:
Glasgow Herald.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=G ... de=2&hl=en
Evening Times.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2 ... de=2&hl=en
The Bulletin.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=F ... de=2&hl=en
I’m not sure now whether you were asking about searching 19C BL Newspapers or Google News Archive but it doesn’t matter.
All the best,
Alan
Yep, it was him again, surname and forename reversed! I was so lucky to find that one, because it confirmed that it actually was him, as he had lied about his age by twenty years on enlistment. The pension record stated his real age of 49. Just goes to show you....the record you need might be there, but just not where you expect it to be!