West Virginia, Berkeley County, Church Marriages - FamilySearch Historical Records

United States West Virginia  Berkeley County

What is in the Collection?
The collection consists of an index to marriages from various churches from 1819-1889. The rights to publish the images associated with these indexes are not available at this time.

Collection Content
The collection includes records from the following locations in Berkeley County, West Virginia:


 * Bunker Hill
 * Hedgesville
 * Martinsburg

What Can this Collection Tell Me?
Marriage records may contain the following information:


 * Names of bride and groom
 * Place of marriage
 * Ages and estimated birth dates of bride and groom
 * Place of birth for bride and groom
 * Parents’ names
 * Previous spouses
 * Race

How Do I Search the Collection?
To use these records it is helpful to know:


 * The name of your ancestor.
 * The name of the intended spouse.
 * The approximate date of marriage.
 * The place of marriage.

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 marriage record, carefully evaluate each piece of information given. These pieces of information may give you new biographical details that can lead you to other records about your ancestors. Add this new information to your records of each family.

I Found Who I was Looking for, What Now?

 * Use the marriage date and place as the basis for compiling a new family group or for verifying existing information.
 * Use the birth date or age along with the place of birth of each partner to find a couple's birth records and parents' names.
 * Use the birth date or age along with the place of birth to find the family in census records.
 * Use the residence and names of the parents to locate church and land records.
 * Continue to search the index to identify children, siblings, parents, and other relatives who may have lived in the same area.

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

 * Look for variant spellings of the names. You should also look for alias names, nicknames and abbreviated names.
 * Look for another index. Local genealogical and historical societies often have indexes to local records.
 * 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. You could then browse the list for individuals that may be your ancestor.

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):