Kentucky Death Records - FamilySearch Historical Records

United States Kentucky 

What is in the Collection?
The collection consists of an index and images of state death certificates located at the Kentucky Office of Vital Statistics in Frankfort, Kentucky. Certificates are arranged first by year, then by month, then alphabetically by county. They have continuous certificate numbers for each year. Each month or certificates between months may have certificates for earlier months/years and certificates may also be for older deaths.The year date in the last column of the index indicates with which year the certificate is found. The collection covers the years 1911 to 1961.

What Can this Collection Tell Me?
The information in the records may include the following:


 * Name of the deceased
 * Date of birth
 * Place of birth
 * Marital status
 * Gender
 * Race
 * Age at death
 * Occupation
 * Date of death
 * Time of death
 * Place of death
 * Address of the deceased
 * Parents’ names
 * Places of birth of the parents
 * Date of burial
 * Place of burial
 * Cause of death
 * Name and address of the informant

How Do I Search the Collection?
To begin your search you will need to know:
 * The name of your ancestor.
 * The approximate year of death.
 * The place where your ancestor died.
 * The names of family members and their relationships.

Search by Name by visiting the Collection Page: Fill in the requested information on the initial search page. This search will return a list of possible matches. Compare the information about the individuals in the list to what you already know about your ancestors to determine if this is the correct family or person. You may need to compare the information about more than one person to find your ancestor. Keep in mind:


 * There may be more than one person in the records with the same name.
 * You may not be sure of your own ancestor’s name.
 * Your ancestor may have used different names, or variations of their name, throughout their life.
 * If your ancestor used an alias or a nickname, be sure to check for those alternate names.
 * Even though these indexes are very accurate they may still contain inaccuracies, such as altered spellings, misinterpretations, and optical character recognition errors if the information was scanned.

For tips about searching on-line collections see the on-line article FamilySearch Search Tips and Tricks.

What Do I Do Next?
When you have located your ancestor’s death record, carefully evaluate each piece of information given. Download a copy of the record, or extract the genealogical information needed. These pieces of information may give you new biographical details. Add this new information to your records of each family.

I Found Who I was Looking for, What Now?

 * Use the information to search the census
 * Use information to search church records
 * Use the information to search for obituaries
 * Continue to search the index to identify children, siblings, parents, and other relatives who may have died in the same place or nearby.
 * When looking for a person who had a common name, look at all the entries for the name before deciding which is correct.

I Can't Find Who I'm Looking for, What Now?

 * Look for variant spellings of the names. You should also look for nicknames and abbreviated names.
 * Search the indexes and records of nearby localities.
 * Try alternative search methods such as only filling in the surname search box (or the given name search box) on the landing page leaving the other box empty and then click on search. This should return a list of everyone with that particular name.

Citing this Collection
Citing your sources makes it easy for others to find and evaluate the records you used. When you copy information from a record, list where you found that information. Here you can find citations already created for the entire collection and for each individual record or image.

Collection Citation:

Record Citation (or citation for the index entry):