Tennessee Vital Records: Difference between revisions

== Introduction to Vital Records  ==

== Quicklinks to Online State-wide Tennessee Birth, Marriage and Death Records  ==

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Four cities recorded births and as indicated in the chart below.&nbsp; These records are available from the [http://www.tn.gov/tsla/history/vital/vital.htm Tennessee State Library and Archives].&nbsp;&nbsp;Most of these records are also available at Family History Library.  

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County marriage records are the earliest and most complete vital records for Tennessee. The records&nbsp;which have survived usually begin within a few years of each county’s organization. Marriage records from the earliest dates to the present are kept by the county clerk for each county. Since 1 January 1949, duplicates have been sent to the [http://health.state.tn.us/vr/ Office of Vital Statistics].  

About 20 Tennessee counties did not begin officially recording marriages in registers until a state law passed mandating the practice in 1838.<ref>Gale Williams Bamman, C.G., "Research in Tennessee," ''National Genealogical Society Quarterly,'' Vol. 81, No. 2 (June 1993):105. {{FHL|39597|item|disp=FHL book 973 B2ng v. 81 (1993)}}</ref> Many of the loose marriage licenses and bonds created before that time have been lost. Soderberg and Creekmore quote the ''Acts of Tennessee'' (1838, ch. 118, sec. 2) as follows:  

:It was not until 1838 that the clerks were required "to keep a well bound book, in which they shall register the names of the parties, and the date of issuance of each marriage license."<ref>Soderberg, Gertrude L. and Pollyanna Creekmore. ''Tennessee Marriage Records, Volume 3, Greene County, Volume 1, 1783-1818: Being Transcriptions from the Original Bonds and Licenses at the County Courthouse, Greeneville''. (Knoxville, Tenn.: Clinchdale Press, 1965), Introduction. {{FHL|237705|item|disp=FHL book 976.891 V2s}}</ref>

*Lucas, Silas Emmett. ''Marriages from Early Tennessee Newspapers 1794-1851''. Easley, S.C.: Southern Historical Press, 1978. {{FHL|10843|item|disp=FHL book 976.8 V2L}}.

In the 1930s, W.P.A. workers indexed many Tennessee county marriage records. Edythe Whitley Rucker notes that when she went back to these courthouses several decades later to make new indexes, some of the records the W.P.A. found had gone missing for various counties. Sometimes this is due to theft, for an example, see Dick Eastman's articles:  

Therefore, it is crucial to search W.P.A. indexes for your county's marriages, in addition to more modern published indexes and online indexes, or you may overlook marriages that have disappeared.  

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[[Tennessee County Marriages (FamilySearch Historical Records)|Tennessee County Marriages]]

== Death Records  ==

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'''1908 to 1912'''  

''Click on image to enlarge''  

Tennessee began registration of deaths after 1914. Originally, deaths were reported by the local undertaker. If a family buried their dead without the use of an undertaker, often the death was not recorded in state records. Some deaths were unreported as late as 1936. Also check vital records on the county level. Occasionally deaths recorded at the county level were not returned to the state. Certificates more than 50 years old are housed at the [http://www.tn.gov/tsla/history/mailstat.htm#Deaths Tennessee State Library and Archives].  

*Meier, Oveda. ''Tennessee Ancestors: The Brave and the Dead, Probate and Death Records of Early Middle Tennessee, 1780–1805''. Salt Lake City, Utah: O. Meier, 1990. (Family History Library {{FHL|594741|item|disp=FHL film 1697372; book 976.8 P2m}}. This source contains abstracts of probate, Bible, and court records, county histories, and military death records for Davidson and Sumner counties. It includes a surname index.

== Divorce Records  ==

Prior to 1834, divorces are found in legislative papers. The [http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/history/misc/actsintro.htm Index to Names in Acts of Tennessee 1796-1850] provided by the Tennessee State Library and Archives will search for any person found in the legislative papers. The state constitution of 1834 then gave&nbsp;inidividual county circuit and chancery courts the power to grant divorces.&nbsp; Circuit courts handled divorce proceedings which did not involve a dispute over the division of property.&nbsp; Divorces that did involve property disuputes were handled by the Chancery court. The Tennessee State&nbsp;Library and Archives&nbsp;suggests that you read their&nbsp;document [http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/history/county/court.htm Courts Where&nbsp;Tennessee Court Cases Were Tried ]to&nbsp;aid&nbsp;in&nbsp;determining which court records are most likely to hold the records you desire.&nbsp;&nbsp;

The Tennessee State Library and Archives has a state-wide divorce index for July 1, 1945 - December 31, 1959.&nbsp;See their website for instructions to order&nbsp;[http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/history/mailcnty.htm#Divorce_Records divorce records prior to 1960]. &nbsp;  

*Bamman, Gale Williams. ''Tennessee Divorces, 1797 to 1858: Taken from 750 Legislative Petitions and Acts''. Nashville, Tennessee: G.W. Bamman, 1985. {{FHL|976.8 P2b|book}}This book contains abstracts of divorce decrees in alphabetical order by the name of the person requesting the divorce. It indexes every name.

TENNESSEE - COURT RECORDS  

The Tennessee State Library and Archives offers a free online research guide:  

=== Lost and&nbsp;Missing Records  ===

See the heading "Record Loss" in each individual county. <br>For further information on researching in burned counties, see the following:  

=== Substitute Records  ===

*[[Tennessee Probate Records|Probate Records]]: If no death record exists, probate records&nbsp;may be helpful in estimating when an individual has died. Probate records in the 20th Century&nbsp;often contain the exact death date.

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=== More Online Tennessee Vital Records Links  ===

*Progenealogists Links for the [http://www.progenealogists.com/ United States]. Press '''Ctrl + F''' on the keyboard to search for '''Tennessee''' or '''TN''' -&nbsp;Free/$  

*[http://fhlfavorites.com/bookmark.htm FHL Favorites] for Tennessee  

== <br>Family History Library Vital Records Collections  ==

::TENNESSEE - VITAL RECORDS  

<br>This is a collection of Family History Library records which are abstracted, indexed and titled the [[Tennessee Vital Records Index (FamilySearch Historical Records)|Tennessee Vital Records Index.]] For over 30 years, volunteer indexers extracted this information from microfilm copies of the original records. In 1998, a few of the entries were published on 7 CDs by the Family History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as the "North America Vital Records Index." This index is an index of the births, marriages, and deaths throughout Kentucky. The index is not necessarily complete for any particular place or region.  

== References  ==

{{Tennessee|Tennessee}} {{U.S. Vital Records}} {{-}}