Field of Stones

Have you ever hit a brickwall in your family research in trying to find inforamtion regarding a family member's death. You have searched everywhere you can think of to try and find the inforation, but have come up empty handed.  I would suggest looking in some of the cemeteries of the area you know your ancestors have lived to see if they might be buried there.  This can be helpful, but at times, there are cemeteries that are located on homesteads and/or private propterty, making it difficult to research.  Have you ever wondered about the inaccessible cemeteries located all over the world? Cemeteries which are located on private property, or long lost cemeteries?  In my search for new resources for everyone, I came across a website Field of Stones - Homestead and Inaccessible Cemeteries located in Ontario Canada.  The site is hosted on roots web, which has always been a favorite place for me while researching my family lines.




The Field of Stone site provides links to various cemeteries in a variety of locations in Ontario Canada and the side administrators  encourage you to return frequently as they update the site with new images routinely.  The site provides you images of various grave markers located on Homestead and Inaccessible cemeteries. Some of the stones are easily readable as the one noted to the left. Others are more difficult to read, but the people who have posted them to the site provide you information about the stone including the names and dates like the stone to the right.  Yet other stones have become damaged through the years are and cracked or broken.  If you have Canadian roots, or would like to view some of the grave markers, click Field of Stones - Homestead and Inaccessible Cemeteries.

Ontario Canada obituaries

I have several readers that visit this site from Canada so I thought that I would dedicate this post to them for their continued support and friendship. I found Ontario obits website where you can research for your ancestor that has passed away in Ontario. The site provides an index for you to research within. Once you have located your ancestor, you then contact one of the volunteers to assist you with your request.

The webmaster, Janet Jones provides the following instructions to utilizing the site:
1. Perform your search
2. Copy and paste the exact index line into your email request - Please DO NOT retype the index line into your email as it may result in errors.
If the index you are looking for contains *JFLH please visit "Jude's Family & Local History" to obtain that obituary.
3. Send your email along and it will be processed as soon as possible.
4. A maximum of 5 requests per email is requested

I would suggest that you check out the FAQ section where Janet discusses answers to common questions regarding the site and how it is set up. I found the site to be easily navigated and the FAQ section answered many of my questions. If you would like to research on this site, click Ontario Obits. Have fun searching!

Common Wealth War Graves Commission

The Common Wealth War Graves Commission (CWWGC) founded by Sir Fabian Ware, began in 1917 as memorial to those men and women from the Commonwealth who had died in World War I and II. Since the beginning of the Commission, the group has constructed 2,500 war cemeteries in over 150 different countries. They has also placed markers for those graves and in the case of missing remains, they have constructed memorials with the names of the missing inscribed. The Commission has the beliefs that:

1)Each of the dead should be commemorated by name on the headstone or memorial.
2)Headstones and memorials should be permanent
3)Headstones should be uniform
4)There should be no distinction made on account of military or civil rank, race or creed

Like many who perform genealogical research, Common Wealth War Grave Commission realizes the importance of remembering the past to protect the future. We hopefully will learn from the sacrifices of those who have come before and make a brighter future for those who come after us.

The CWWGC contains a searchable database that contains 1.7 million men and women of the Commonwealth military members who died during the first and second world wars and the 23,000 cemeteries, memorials and located throughout the world where they are remembered. The database also contains information regarding 67,000 Commonwealth civilians who died in the Second World War.

If you would like to learn more about the CWWGC or search in the database, click Common Wealth War Graves Commission. Have fun!

What Do Text Messages and Cemeteries have in Common?

As texting is taking over the communications of the young and old alike, you may be wondering what text messages would have in common with Cemeteries. I found Transcribing Monumental Inscriptions, a website designed to assisting others in transcribing cemeteries. This site is dedicated to the instruction of helping others learn the better ways to transcribe cemeteries, the reason for transcribing a cemetery, common abbreviations to use when transcribing cemeteries, ie. wid = Widow/Widower or IRO (In Remembrance Of) and how to publish the data once it is collected. These abbreviations or acronyms make it easier to remember what a memorial stone said without having to write the entire epitaph.

Recording of a cemetery would be a great Eagle Project or Service Project. As we remember those who have come before us, we will be able to understand our past and protect our future. If we can assist in taking care of the memorial stones, we are preserving the past for our future descendants. If you would like to read futher about how to record a cemetery, or would like to read some epitaphs (some are humorus) or learn how to publish the cemetery records you have already indexed, click Transcribing Monumental Inscriptions.

Greyfriar Burials Edinburgh

I have noticed lately, that several of the researchers coming into my site have been looking for information on the Greyfriar Burials. I wanted to learn more about this topic and found an index on the ScotsFind website that might be of interest to those searching this area.

The Greyfriar Burial Grounds index covering the time period of 1658 - 1700, is in a PDF format that is organized alphabetically by surname. The site includes a map with a legend to locate the internment site in addition to the dates of internment. I would suggest reading through prefatory note prior to searching as it will explain how the author, Henry Patton has designed the document. If you would like to research this site, click on Greyfriars Burying Ground, Edinburgh 1658 - 1700. Have fun!

Niagra Falls Canada Cemetery

More and more cities are going digital and providing services to their communities online. One of those services at times can be a searchable database for cemeteries.

The Official City of Niagara Falls Canada has such a site for those researching their ancestors from the Niagara Falls Canada area. The database contains 23 different cemeteries that have been transcribed and are available for searching. The database also includes pictures of each of the tombstones that are clear and easily read.

The website is user friendly requiring you to just put in the first and last name in order to search the databases. I have no ancestors from Canada so I tried searching with just the first two letters of a surname and the search engine pulled up many possibilities. If you are interested in researching in this area for death and burial information this site would be one that I would search. If you would like to browse or search this site clickCity of Niagara Falls Canada Genealogy and Family Search. Have fun!

Danish Tombstone Projects

Are you researching for your Danish Ancestors Tombstones? This post will be of interest to you. Free access to pictures of various tombstones located throughout Denmark.


My great grandparents immigrated to the US in the 1800's. I confess that I have been very intimidated regarding the genealogical research on the Danish side of my family but I am beginning to research in Denmark and have found several websites that I have found to be of great use and would share them with you. The most recently discovered resource for those researching their Danish Roots across the pond titled "DK-Gravsten" meaning Danish Tombstones. The site is similar to several sites like Tombstone Inscriptions, Cemetery Records Online, and Find-A-Grave where volunteers have come together to preserve the heritage found in the various cemeteries across the world. DK Gravsten is the work of numerous volunteers in Denmark along with the website creators Joan Bedsted and Torben B. Sørensen photographing, and uploading the information in the the database of DK Gravsten. This site is in the early beginning, but already they have several cemeteries available for researching.

The information is provided in a transcribed format providing you with whatever information is inscribed on the tombstones. A digital picture is also generally available for viewing for each transcription. I have been conversing with Joan Bedsted one of the website creators regarding this site and we have had enjoyable conversations despite the language barrier. She has explained to me that she has approximately 469 cemeteries listed on the website that have been photographed are available for searching. Denmark has 3000 cemeteries so they are well on their way in providing a wonderful resource for those of us researching our Danish Roots. The website began on the Internet on November 14, 2007 and they have had over 43,000 visitors in the short time that it has been up. They have also created a page containing information regarding Danes who have died in other countries who immigrated from Denmark and encourage the public to contribute to this database if they have pictures of tombstones of their deceased Danish ancestors. In order to contribute to the "Deceased Danes abroad" you do not need to photograph the entire cemetery; just supply them with pictures of your deceased Danish Ancestors tombstones and they will be placed on their website for others to search. I browsed some of the names and found several from Nebraska where many Danes settled in the 1800's.

Access to this wonderful resource is totally free. You can contact the website author and they will provide you a copy of the picture of the tombstone for your records for free. Joan is a friendly and very kind person that wants to help gather families together.

In order to navigate the website successfully, I would provide you with a few hints.

First: You can view the first page in English by clicking on the English link on the left side bar. This will give you an overview of the website.

Second: To browse through the Deceased Danes Abroad click on "Danske i Udlandet." The page that loads allows you to browse the cemeteries according to ancestors name, providing you an alphabetic link table on the left of the page.

Third: A map showing which areas of Denmark have been photographed, click on Danmarkskortet.

Fourth: Lastly, you can view the cemeteries geographical by clicking on Jylland (Including Hjørring, Ålborg, Thisted, Viborg,Randers, Århus,Skanderborg, Ringkøbing, Ribe, Vejle, Haderslev, Tønder, Åbenrå, and Sønderborg), Øerne (Including Fyn [Odense, Svendborg], and Sjælland [Holbæk, Sorø, Frederiksborg, Roskilde, København, København, (City, Amager), Præstø, and Maribo], and Bornholm.) Once you have selected the geographical area, you need only to click on the index and you will be able to view the cemeteries that are available to search. The cemeteries that are listed in blue are those that are searchable.

If you would like to view or contribute information at the DK-Gravsten website, click DK-Gravsten. Have fun!

Winnipeg City Cemetery Online Searches

I have had several readers from Canada visiting my blog lately, so I thought that I would do a little research to see what I could find on the internet for them. I came across the City of Winnipeg's website where they have developed an online database avilable for three of the municipal cemeteries including St. Vital Cemetery, Transcona Cemetery and Brookside Cemetery. The three cemetery databases combined have information contain over 107,000 internments dating from 1878 to the present time.

The information provided at the site includes the following information: person’s name, burial order number, lot/plot/unit number and section or columbarium niche name, their date of death and their date of interment. The databases are organized under the individual cemetery name. Once the cemetery is selected you can then browse the entries for the various cemeteries alphabetically by the surname. The original documents are not available for viewing but an email contact address is provided and they may be able to assist you in ordering a copy of the interment information which is a valuable tool for the genealogist and family historian. Searching in the databases are free to the user of the site.

If you would like to research this site, click Winnipeg City Cemetery Online Search. Have fun!

"The Horrors" and Halloween

"The Horrors" associated with Halloween generally center around mummies, witches, ghosts, tombstones and creepy sounds in the dark. The closest"The Horrors" that I am discussing in this post comes to Halloween is that it pertains to tombstones. The archaic term "The Horrors" referring to Delirium Tremens, can be found on Death Certificate, Mortality Lists, and Church death records of the 19th century and is an archaic medical term.

How many times have you been reading a Mortality Schedule or Death Certificate and the cause of death or the contributory cause of death listed is a term that you can not understand? Archaic Medical Terms website provides a very comprehensive list of archaic medical terms along with their modern day counterpart. Not only does this site provide the archaic terms in English, but it also provides a international list of terms from various countries including Croatia, Danish, Dutch, German, English, French, Latin, Portuguese and Spanish to name a few. The webmaster provides an English translation for the terms from the other countries which is most helpful when researching family history from outside of the United States. The webmaster has also expressed that he would be happy to assist in the transcription and translation of a Cause of Death that you have been puzzled with; you just need to contact him via his website and provide him a scanned copy of the document in question. Also he is willing to accept new terms and their meaning to his website and that can be accomplished by contacting him via email as well.

Why is it important to know the cause of death of a family member? A person's health history is a good indicator of the possible health problems one might face during their lifetime. Please refer to these posts for further information regarding the importance of and how to conduct a family health history. I also think it helps one to understand the life of their ancestor in a more complete manner.

If you would like to browse this website or add it to your book marks, click Antiquus Morbus Home to be directed to the site. Have fun learning!

Ohio GenWeb Special Projects Web Page

The Ohio GenWeb Special Projects Web Page provides the researcher of this area with some wonderful resources. The Special Projects page include links for the following items:

1) Ohio USGenWeb Archives

2) Ohio Research Exchange Project

3) OHGenWeb Civil War Project

4) Ohio Tombstone Transcriptions Project

5) Ohio Tombstone Photo Project

6) Ohio Family Group Sheets

7) Ohio Biographies Project

8) Ohio Reunion's

9) Search Ohio Archives

10) Ohio Places Past and Present

11) Ohio Digital Map Archives Project


One of the unique links for this site is the Research Exchange link. I do not know that any of the other GenWeb websites provide this nice feature. The Hats of to the administrator of this site. If you look to the right, you will notice that there is a possibility to possibly exchange assistance in all 50 United States as well as a few international countries. This is a give and take exchange meaning that you when you ask for assistance, you need to provide assistance in return.


Other nice features of this site include tombstone pictures and inscriptions (the pictures are generally clear), historical maps , and family group records.

If you are interested in visiting this site, please click
here.

Ohio Veterans Home Cemetery

As a companion note to my previous blog on Sandusky Ohio, I wanted to share another site that I found regarding the Ohio Veterans Home Cemetery. The Ohio Veterans Home Cemetery Database is organized to allow searching with ease. You can alpha browse or perform an advanced search for a particular surname at this website. The cemetery website not only provides the vital record information, but also provides you with a picture of the grave marker.

If you are interested in searching the Ohio Veterans Cemetery Database, please click here to begin your search on the first page. Have fun!

Youth Involved In Genealogy Work

I am including on my blog tonight a video that shows how youth are being involved in Genealogy/Family History Work. This young man in the video is working on his Eagle Scout Project and helping those in the genealogical community. Want to learn how he is helping? Watch the video below. Click on the play button and the video will start. Enjoy!

Internment.net

Internment.net is a wonderful resource for those of us that are searching for cemetery records. This site is free to access and there are no hidden fees. The information provided is transcribed from various cemetery and tombstone inscriptions from around the world including the England, US, Canada and many others. There are no direct views of the actual records but only a transcription of the documents that people have volunteered to transcribe and post. If you are interested in this site click here.