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Author Topic: Advice please re death certificates  (Read 645 times)
maisie666
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Advice please re death certificates
« on: Thursday 04 June 09 17:52 UTC (UK) »

Hi - I'm pretty new to FH and I'm sure I'm missing something obvious here, but how on earth do you go about finding out when someone died.

I'm finding lots of rellies' birth and marriage certs and am doing reasonably well on censuses, but the only clue to when someone died appears to be when they stopped appearing on censuses - presuming it was in the timeframe of the available censuses and presuming you haven't just missed them!

With births and marriages I find you can often make an educated guess at the date to at least give you a place to start, but often a death can be any time in the next 50 years or so after a marriage and if they moved county etc there is nothing to double check anything with before ordering certificates - and if you have a lot of common names that could just be horrendously expensive......

Sorry to rant on but I'd appreciate any advice as, at the moment, I appear to have a lot of 200 - 500 year old relatives and I'd quite like to be able to kill a few of them off!

Thanks in anticipation
Maisie
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davidft
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #1 on: Thursday 04 June 09 17:59 UTC (UK) »

Its easier from the mid 1860's as the indexes then contain the age at death (as far as the informant knew it ie it may be out a little) so that helps narrow the options quite a bit
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Looking for any leads on ELIZABETH KNIGHT born c1877 died 1908 Sittingbourne, Kent. Married to William Crayden.
I know her father was Thomas Knight, no idea who her mother is, yet.
Grateful for any help
sarahsean
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #2 on: Thursday 04 June 09 18:01 UTC (UK) »

I`ve found free bmd useful for finding some deaths. I have been lucky in that some of my ancestors stayed in the same area and i have been able to find them. You don`t need to put in a date so  even with a commonish name using the last known date when they were alive you can narrow it down.


Having said that if you have a very common surname and forename it can be very difficult to find out when they died. I know which area my grandparents lived in but don`t know the year they died and as they had very common names have been unable to find them.

Hope this helps
Sarah


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davidft
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #3 on: Thursday 04 June 09 18:03 UTC (UK) »

(Reported) Age at death appears in the indexes from the March quarter 1866
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Looking for any leads on ELIZABETH KNIGHT born c1877 died 1908 Sittingbourne, Kent. Married to William Crayden.
I know her father was Thomas Knight, no idea who her mother is, yet.
Grateful for any help
c-side
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #4 on: Thursday 04 June 09 23:20 UTC (UK) »

Hi Maisie,

No, you are not missing anything obvious - I'm sure everyone on here will confirm that finding deaths and/or burials can be very difficult for the very reason you give.  You can take a guess at where to start looking for births and marriages but there are no 'rules' on when people die - or where, for that matter.

Some counties have their own bmd sites which can narrow the search a bit (Cheshire and Lancashire spring to mind but there  are others).  There is also the National Burial Index but this is anything but comprehensive - version 3 eagerly awaited.

Christine
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chirp
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #5 on: Friday 05 June 09 09:37 UTC (UK) »

Hi
I do agree with the points made by other Rootschatters on the subject of deaths and burials. A couple of other little notes I'd like to add: keep in mind anything you may find about outbreaks of disease or major industrial accidents which might have happened in your area of interest and which could have affected the lives of your ancestors. Also some records offices are steadily putting their parish records (or indexes to the records) online. Keep checking those for your areas of interest and you might find the burial of an ancestor. Good luck.
Chirp
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maisie666
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #6 on: Friday 05 June 09 18:42 UTC (UK) »

Thanks everyone for your replies - I'll just have to keep plugging away!

Maisie
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charlotteCH
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #7 on: Saturday 06 June 09 07:53 UTC (UK) »

Maisie, Plugging away is how family history moves along.

One point I'd add about death certs... if you buy one and don't recognise the informant don't just leave it there.. I look the informant up on the census previous to the death or the one following, dependant on the date of death- and fossick around a bit to see if there is a family connection.  I've hit gold twice- unknown niece in one instance which led me to a whole new branch of the family.
charlotte
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HARGREAVES, HANSON, BAILEY, BURTON, HEWITT, JAGGER, LOCKWOOD, UTTLEY, RUDD, TAYLOR, HOLDEN, SHAW  Halifax / Sowerby/ Southowram 18C+

GILL, Accrington, Blackburn, West Derby, Lancs, migrated USA 1891 to RI: GILL in SC: HOTCHKISS in RI: PELOQUIN in RI 

HUMPHRIES, HILLIER, ALLEN, LYDBURY  Nunney/Frome 18-19C

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musicbank
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #8 on: Thursday 18 June 09 16:33 UTC (UK) »

Fossick ohhhhh what a great word   Cheesy
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Les de B
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #9 on: Friday 19 June 09 04:12 UTC (UK) »

If you can get onto the Gales website for London Times/or old English newspaers (other threads explain how), that is also a good source to find deceased ancestors. The only problem though, if your ancestor was a farmer, labourer, layman, etc....... there isn't a great chance of finding the ancestor in the newspaper. Genetlemen, military, religious, business, educated, (and their families) have more chance of appearing in a newspaper Death Notice.

Les
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Nick29
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #10 on: Sunday 21 June 09 10:17 UTC (UK) »

Maisie,

one thing to bear in mind as far as women were concerned is that women dying in childbirth was much more common in those days.  Healthy married women under about the age of 45 tended to have one child a year, and if several years go by without a child, then the child probably died, or it didn't reach full term.  If a woman suddenly disappears off the census, look for a death about 1 to 2 weeks from the birth of a child (death due to complications from the birth) or 1 year from the previous birth (complications from a birth where neither mother or child survived).

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Best Wishes, Nick.

Research interests:
Field - Luton & Islington
Hole - Somerset, Suffolk & Surrey
Farnish, Parker, Cattermole, Last, Wasp, Church - Suffolk
Lewin/Lowin/Lowen - Hertfordhire
Martin - Eltham & Greenwich, Kent (London)
Stead - Greenwich, London (Kent) & Maidstone
Wood - Hertfordshire

Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
Paul Caswell
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #11 on: Sunday 21 June 09 20:05 UTC (UK) »

The technique I use on FreeBMD http://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/search.pl is:

Fill in the name etc. and put @yyyy-yyyy in the Death age/DoB field. Use a date range of about 4-5 years, i.e. dob +/- 2 years, as age is very often misjudged for people who lived a long life.

For example, for someone born 1850 I might use @1848-1852.

Paul
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charlotteCH
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #12 on: Monday 22 June 09 00:47 UTC (UK) »

Yes,
Paul is quite correct there especially if the infomant isn't a close family member. I bought a death cert for a cousin who dies in 1988 in a hospital where no one knew here- they had her age as 8 years too old.
So allow some latitude there.
charlotte
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HARGREAVES, HANSON, BAILEY, BURTON, HEWITT, JAGGER, LOCKWOOD, UTTLEY, RUDD, TAYLOR, HOLDEN, SHAW  Halifax / Sowerby/ Southowram 18C+

GILL, Accrington, Blackburn, West Derby, Lancs, migrated USA 1891 to RI: GILL in SC: HOTCHKISS in RI: PELOQUIN in RI 

HUMPHRIES, HILLIER, ALLEN, LYDBURY  Nunney/Frome 18-19C

HUMPHRIES, JOYCE, HEWITT, ROBINSON, McMULLEN, SUFFEL, CARNEY, MARRON, COMPTON, FREEMAN  Ont. Canada 1830+

PILSEN, Sask.

82nd Regt of Foot 1808-1825
1st WRY Militia 1780-1800
Nick29
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Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #13 on: Monday 22 June 09 09:07 UTC (UK) »

That's less likely to happen these days, because the NHS now has a computerised database, which makes people easier to trace.  When my half-brother was rushed in to hospital (where he subsequently died), the ambulance crew gave the hospital his address, which enabled his full details to be found.

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Best Wishes, Nick.

Research interests:
Field - Luton & Islington
Hole - Somerset, Suffolk & Surrey
Farnish, Parker, Cattermole, Last, Wasp, Church - Suffolk
Lewin/Lowin/Lowen - Hertfordhire
Martin - Eltham & Greenwich, Kent (London)
Stead - Greenwich, London (Kent) & Maidstone
Wood - Hertfordshire

Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
maisie666
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Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk


Re: Advice please re death certificates
« Reply #14 on: Thursday 25 June 09 11:56 UTC (UK) »

Thanks again for all the great advice. 

I seem to have a family with very common names, nearly all ag labs and who also moved around the country a lot - so I often get bogged down with too many possibilities, so these tips will help me narrow things down a bit before I bankrupt myself with applying for certificates!!

Many thanks
Maisie
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