How to Find Someone Who Is Deceased
Finding a deceased person can be a challenge, depending on whether you are looking for a specific grave site for genealogical studies or trying to find proof that someone died. Fortunately, with some modern resources, the search is easier than in times past. You could even do most of the preliminary research in the comfort of your own home.
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Instructions
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Write down everything you know about the individual whose death you are trying to confirm. Inquire around to see if friends or family of the deceased have any stories about him, including possible burial plots and location.
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Use online resources to locate a death certificate so you can determine the place of death. Sites like Ancestry.com offer services allowing individual researchers to look up information such as death records.
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Browse through websites like FindaGrave.com to find a deceased person. This site specializes in famous historical figures and offers photographs and brief histories of individuals. It also tells researchers where the person's grave is located.
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Sort through town and city records if you know the name of the town where the person might have died. Look for information on deaths and funeral homes. Keep in mind that the individual you are researching might have had a simple burial that did not involve a funeral home.
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Consult with the local historians to see what information they might offer on the person you are researching. Find out what they know about the person's death.
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Call existing funeral homes in the area where you think the individual died to see if they have records of the individual. If there are no records of the person, ask the funeral home to put you in touch with someone in the area who might offer more information.
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Go to the town's local library where you think the person might have died and look through microfiche films of old newspapers. If you know the approximate date of the person's death, you might find a death announcement or full obituary in the newspapers. You might also find death information in church records, which might tell about the person's burial location.
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Make a formal request for death certificate information from your state's Bureau of Vital Statistics. The bureaus keep track of all deaths within a state.
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