Genealogy Chat

I am wanting to obtain births, deaths, and marriages information from Canada. So far I'm stymied in that all I get is the contact details for getting an agent to do it for me - at a price. I want to know if there is a site available where I can do my own searches of the records free. Any info will be most appreciated.

Pam

Just like the UK organizes its BMDs by country, so Canada organizes its by province, so which province are you talking about, and approximately when?

have a look on here it might help

http://www.collectionscanada.ca/index-e.html

However, unlike England and Wales, there is NO central registry for bmds



so you ahve to know which province your person was bron/married/died, and then try to access those bmds.

Plus many of the census information is by province.


PLUS, Canada adheres to a strict 50/80/100 year rule for releasing information on bmds




You just have to go grubbing.


Try looking at Cyndi's List (google for it), she provides names of a number of sites that may help you




sylvia

Thank you all for your information and advice. I will try them and see how I go.

Sylvia, the province of interest is Ontario and I shall certainly try Cyndi's List as you suggested.

Thanks again all, for you suggestions.

Pam.

Some Ontario Vital Statistics here:

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~onvsr/index.htm

Ontario deaths 1869-1947 here:

http://search.labs.familysearch.org/recordsearch/start.html?datestamp=1201994035790#p=collectionDetails;t=searchable;c=1307826

Ontario Marriages:

http://homepages.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~maryc/thisisit.htm

Up to 1926, I just found the one I was looking for.

Pam - check out:
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/genealogy/022-906.006-e.html#f
http://www.ontario.ca/en/services_for_residents/index.htm

Sylvia - I don't really agree - every province does have a central registery for BMDs. To pick out the two UK countries that were, for most of the past millenium, treated as one, and claim they've got a centralized registery, and ignore the fact that there are 3 other centralized registeries holding UK BMDs is somewhat misleading. It's also worth pointing out that, although they are not technically part of the UK, the offshore crown dependency of the Isle of Man also has its own centralized BMD registery,
whereas there is no centralized registry for the Channel Islands.

It really doesn't make sense to have a centralized registery for Canada when there is no uniform set of laws governing registration of BMDs, nor of solemnization of marriages - exactly the same situation as the UK.


As for your strict 100/80/50 year rule in Canada - not really. That might hold for your province, but in BC the rule is [later of 1903 vs 120 y old]/75/20, and every province pretty much sets its own closed periods - but they are regarded as high by UK standards.

mgnv


I am in BC .......... not paid much attention to things I've posted in the past about my province have you??

I never said each province did not have a centralized bmd ....... I said Canada had no central registry like the UK and you had to know your province of interest then search the records for that province.

Sorry if I didn't say it exactly as you would like ...... but it seems like a nitpicking post to me!


I always use that example of a centralized registry in the UK vs the provincial ones in Canada because many UK people assume province = county ................... and therefore find it hard to understand or appreciate why Canada does not have a country-wide centralized BMD in Ottawa.


I grant you, I got the number of years wrong, partly because I can never get the years for all the provinces straight .................. .... but I was attempting to provide a simplified message that wouldn't take ages to read and understand.



sylvia

Sylvia - I don't understand why you think the UK has a centralized registery - leaving aside the 2 non-UK crown dependencies I mentioned, UK BMDs are held in Southport, Edinburgh, Belfast and Dublin - doesn't seem very centralized to me.

As I nit-pickingly tried to point out, the correct equation was province/state=country. The UK model of each country having its own BMD laws was exported to the seperate colonies, and each colony had its own BMD laws. Later, when the colonies were combined into new countries, the former colonies retained their own BMD laws. In the case of Canada, the former colonies became provinces, and in the case of e.g., the USA and Australia, the former colonies became states.

now now children calm down!

Thank you to everyone for your input. I appreciate it and have learned a lot from it.

As soon as I get some time to indulge myself I will certainly try the URL's given and see if I can find the person/s I am looking for.

I'll let you know my results, when I have them.

Thanks again and have a great day.

Pam.