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The British Armed Forces and National Service website (www.britisharmedforces.org) includes all three armed forces. It looks like an official site (although it isn't) due to its support from senior serving and retired officers. Its webmaster, who will answer your queries by email in return for a donation, has two other websites: British Light Infantry Regiments (www.lightinfantry.org.uk) and The Somerset & Cornwall Light Infantry (www.scli.co.uk).

It's easier to find your military ancestors online if they died in action rather than if they survived. If your ancestor died in one of the two world wars, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC, www.cwgc.org) should have a record. The CWGC maintains cemeteries and memorials for the Commonwealth war dead of two world wars, including servicemen and servicewomen as well as some civilians. For each cemetery and memorial, there's a register of the people buried there. You can search these records online at the CWGC's free Debt of Honour register. As well as name, rank and serial number, you get regiment, unit, date of death and place of memorial. You may also find personal details such as names and addresses of next of kin. Just bear in mind that, for whatever reason, many recruits lied about their age.

Perhaps the most significant information you'll find is your relative's service number. This is the key to locating his service records. The Commission webpages have details on how to apply for service records.

Working with wills

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wills proved since 1858 are kept at the Principle Probate Registry at Somerset House (www.somerset-house.org.uk). Although Somerset House has a website, there is no hard information online. For wills made before 1858, you will need to consult diocesan records in England and Wales, including the Prerogative Courts of York and of Canterbury.

The National Archives offers an online index at www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documentsonline/wills.asp. Origins Network (www.britishorigins.com) has some online indexes, with viewing by subscription. In Wales, pre-1858 wills are held mainly at the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth.

Many wills and inventories are also held in local archives, so look at records archived by the county where your ancestor died. Cheshire, for example, maintains a searchable online index (www.cheshire.gov.uk/recordoffice/wills) that includes name, residence (at the time of making the will), occupation and date of probate (usually within a year of death). Some Derbyshire records are indexed at www.genuki.org.uk. Some indexes for Lancashire north of the Ribble and parts of Cumberland, Westmorland and Yorkshire (1748-1858) can be viewed at www.uclan.ac.uk/facs/class/humanities/family/Probate/WillIntro.htm.

Building the family tree

You can also use your computer and the internet to record the results of your findings. One option is to use lineage-linked family tree software. Enter the details of all the relatives you know or find out about, and the software builds a family tree. It also builds a Genealogy Data Communications (GEDCOM) file that you can upload to your own website, to space on the software publisher's website, or to the commercial genealogy websites. A GEDCOM file is a dedicated file format for genealogy data transfer between family history software, and it appears with the extension GED.