Death Certificates Can Be Wrong!

I thought I'd share a quick helpful tip today concerning death certificates.  One of the biggest things we learn as genealogists is to document everything and to write down the sources.  Those sources should typically be as reliable as possible, such as birth and death certificates, marriage licenses, etc.  However, not every piece of information on these items will be 100% reliable.

Grandma's Death Certificate
When my grandmother passed away, I was not at her home.  Instead, my mother and my aunt were there to answer questions and fill out any necessary paperwork.  My aunt was considered the informant, therefore, her information was placed on the death certificate.  She was also the one giving certain answers, such as who my grandmother's parents were and where she was born.  The only problem with this was that my aunt was convinced that my grandmother was born in Fredericksburg, PA, which is what was written down on the death certificate.  However, my mother decided to call me to double check (I had seen my grandmother's birth certificate once or twice before to get the information down for my family history).  I told my mother that my aunt was wrong and the proper birth location was Swatara Township (Jonestown to be specific).  Luckily, my mother was there to tell my aunt the correct location when the obituary was being written.

This is just one of many examples.  The best place to get the birth information is on the birth certificate.  The best place to get the death information is on the death certificate.  This is the same for marriage applications.  There are birth locations, as well as lots of other information on them, but they might not all be true.  The marriage applications are the best place to get any information regarding to the actual marriage (date, etc.)

Don't rule out the information found on the death certificate completely!  It can still be used as a great jumping off point to find ancestors or a better source to prove the information.  For example, on a marriage application, it might have that a woman was married before and her husband died in 1890.  Her previous husband may or may not have died in 1890, but you now know that she had at least two husbands.  Broaden the search for deaths from 1890 to two years before and two years after (1888-1892).  Keep in mind that the first husband could have also been MIA in a war and was only declared dead.

That's all for this time.