The Wigtownshire Free Press was the local newspaper for Wigtownshire, although it did include limited news from Kirkcudbright and Dumfries. There are in total four volumes of the Wigtown Free Press Index, covering the years 1843-1925. They contain details of birth, marriage and death announcements which were placed in the paper together with, on occasion, obituaries, advertisements and other information that local newspapers usually contain. The indexes give the year, month and date of the issue where the information is located which then enables the relevant microfiche to be checked. Birth/marriage/death notices are usually not much longer than the abstract given in the index. Additional information is generally limited to the actual event date, rather than the index's publication date. Obituaries are very good, but these are only found for prominent citizens. The fiches of the actual newspapers are available for viewing and copying at the Ewart Library in Dumfries and at the regional libraries at Stranraer, Newton-Stewart, Wigtown, Dalbeattie, Lockerbie, Georgetown (Dumfries) and Annan.