AN ON-LINE research facility for people tracking down their family tree will be unveiled in Strood on Wednesday.

Thanks to a £49,500 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Medway Archives and Local Studies Centre is the first local government archive service in the country to offer on-line access to parish registers dating back to 1538.

Medway Council secured the bid in 2004 as part of the fund’s Your Heritage scheme. The money donated was used to fund the filming and scanning of parish registers covering North Kent from Rainham to Dartford.

Now family historians, genealogists, local historians and others will be able to access the project, known as Medway Ancestors, via the web.

Archivist Stephen Dixon said: “Perhaps the best thing about Medway Ancestors is that people who would not otherwise have come across archives and original parish registers have now been introduced to this rich resource via the internet.”

Heritage Lottery Fund south east England committee member John Leigh Pemberton will cut the ribbon and declare the new service open at the archive centre’s annual mince pie morning.

The total cost of the project was £82,000.

* Medway Ancestors can be accessed via the website http://cityark.medway.gov.uk