Tuesday's Tip: Research in the Ontario Death and Death Overseas Records, 1869-1947

The record collection for Ontario Death and Deaths Overseas Records, 1869-1947 is one of my favorite record collections.  It is online at Ancestry.com with 3,888,625 name indexed entries.  Note that this is a collection of over 3.8 million death indexed records with digital images.

The original source for this online collection is from three sources:

• *  Archives of Ontario. Registrations of Deaths, 1869-1947 (MS 935, reels 1-694), Archives of Ontario, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
• *  Archives of Ontario. Registrations of Ontario Overseas Deaths, 1939-1947. MS 944, reels 1-11. Archives of Ontario, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
• *  Archives of Ontario. Division Registrar Vital Statistics Records, 1858-1930. MS 940, reels 5-10, 16, 21, 26-27. Archives of Ontario, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

On Ancestry.com, the user will find this collection search page in the Card Catalog:

The description of the information in this record collection is (from the Ancestry.com collection page):

This database is an index to over 2 million deaths that were registered in Ontario from 1869 to 1947. The database also includes deaths of Ontario military personnel overseas from 1939-1947. 

Information contained in this index includes:

• Name of deceased

• Death date

• Gender

• Estimated birth year (calculated from age in years at time of death)

• Birthplace

• Ontario county of death 

Please note that not all of the above listed information may be available for all individuals. Information available in the index is dependent on the amount of information recorded in the original record. 

Each name is linked to an image of the actual death register or certificate in which the individual was recorded. Additional information may be found on the image that is not included in the keyed index. 

Civil registration began in Ontario on 1 July 1869. The Office of the Registrar General maintains the records and issues certificates for all vital events. Each year an additional year of vital records are transferred from the Registrar General to the Archives of Ontario where the records are then closed for a year while being microfilmed. The Archives of Ontario currently has death registrations on microfilm for the years 1869-1942. This database includes the registrations up to 1942, plus registrations from 1943-1947 that have been digitized from original documents. 

In addition to the Archives of Ontario, these records are also available on microfilm at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah. 

I searched for Seaver as a last name, checked the Exact box, and saw 14 results: 

I clicked on the first match, and saw the information extracted for the death of Isabella Swayne:

As you can see, this record summary provides the person's name, age, birth year, birth place, death date, death place, father's name, and mother's name. The user can click on the parent's name to see that person's suggested records.

For many of these death records, the parents names may not be indexed.

Plus, there is an image of this death record with even more information:

For the records post 1936, the death certificates also provide the birth date, birth place, spouse's name, and parents' names and birthplaces are usually provided.

Before about 1936, the death record provides the parents names and other information, but not the birth date.  Here is an example:

The "prizes" on these records are the names, birth dates or ages, birth places, father's names, mother's names, death date, death place, and cause of death.  
For my key surnames, this collection has these numbers of exact records:

*  Seaver:           14

*  Kemp:       1,015

*  Sovereen:       28

*  Carringer:        2

*  Auble:             1

*  Vaux:             17

The Ancestry "database number" for this collection is 8946.  I have over 140 profiles in my Ancestry Family Tree with a pending Hint in this collection.  I know that I have collected some of the entries already.

FamilySearch has a similar collection for Ontario deaths between 1869 and 1937 and Overseas Deaths, 1939-1947 in https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1307826

Findmypast has no similar collection.

MyHeritage has no similar collection.

Library and Archives Canada has information about Ontario Deaths, but refers to the Ancestry.com and Familysearch databases for access.

The Ontario Ministry of Government and Consumer Services web page has information about Ontario Deaths, but refers to the Ancestry.com and FamilySearch databases for access, in addition to microfilm at the Archives.

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NOTE:  Tuesday's Tips is a genealogy blog meme intended to provide information about a resource helpful to genealogists and family historians, especially in the U.S. online genea-world.

The URL for this post is:  https://www.geneamusings.com/2020/04/tuesdays-tip-research-in-ontario-death.html

Copyright (c) 2020, Randall J. Seaver

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