Rhode Island Obituaries

Obituaries may provide information such as the age of the deceased, birth date and place, names of living relatives and their residences, maiden name, occupation, death date, cause of death, and place of burial. Deceased family members are frequently mentioned. Obituaries may also mention previous places of residence, immigration information, religion, and any social organizations or activities in which the deceased was involved.

Generally, the first step to obtaining an obituary is to find the death date of the person so that the obituary can be more easily found in a newspaper. Death dates may be obtained from the Statewide death index, or cemeteries in the local area where the person is believed to have died. Once a death date is known, the local library in the area may be contacted to learn whether or not they have newspapers for the time period needed, and if someone is willing to look for an obituary in that newspaper. If the newspapers are not held at the library, the local newspaper office may also be contacted to learn where older editions of the newspaper are kept. Some libraries and even newspaper publishers keep obituary files.

Online Resources

 * 1980-2014 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
 * Online Rhode Island Death Records &amp; Indexes
 * Archives.com Obituaries for Rhode Island ($)
 * Newspaper Obituary collection for Rhode Island: about 2003 to 2011 ($)
 * ProQuest Obituaries for Rhode Island($)
 * Ancestry.com United States Obituary Collection for Rhode Island ($)
 * Rhode Island Obituaries, index
 * Rhode Island, Deaths, 2013-2017 at MyHeritage ($)


 * Rhode Island Marriage and death notices, 1758-1833 from Rhode Island newspapers in Vital Records of Rhode Island 1636-1850, Vol. 12-21
 * Newspaper Archive ($)
 * Online Rhode Island Newspapers
 * Rhode Island Newspapers Online
 * Rhode Island Newspapers, index