Worcester County, Maryland Genealogy

Guide to Worcester County, Maryland ancestry, genealogy and family history, birth records, marriage records, death records, census records, and military records.

Description
Worcester County was named for the family of Marquess of Worcester. The county is located in the southeastern area of the state.

County Courthouse
Worcester County Courthouse 1 West Market Street, Room 104 Snow Hill, MD 21863 Phone: 410-632-1194 Worcester County Website Clerk of the Circuit Court has marriage records from 1866, divorce records from 1900 and court records from 1916. Register of Wills has probate.

Populated Places
For a complete list of populated places, including small neighborhoods and suburbs, visit Hometown Locator. The following are the most historically and genealogically relevant populated places in this county:

History Timeline
The 300 or fewer American Indians of Worcester county for the most part avoided fighting and preferred living next to their new British neighbors. They left the county by 1748 eventually ending up in Ontario.

The first English/Scottish settlers of Worcester County were mostly religious dissenters (generally Presbyterian), voting with their feet by moving north from Accomack County, Virginia starting in the late 1630s. All social classes from gentlemen to freed indentured servants settled in the area. There is no evidence that transported convicts ever settled in Worcester as in other parts of Maryland and Virginia. The settlers were first attracted by furs, and by slowly expanding small farms in the forests. The ancestors of early Worcester settlers were almost all British.

Before long Virginia authorities were giving land grants in the area over objections from Maryland. Virginia granted 27,800 acres of land to settlers in Worcester from 1645-1666, more than Maryland had granted. After many disputes the Maryland was forced to recognize most of these Virginia grants. Lord Baltimore’s official Maryland proprietary land grants started in Worcester in 1651. Many of his grants were large 3,000 and 4,000 acre grants.

By 1662 Quaker and Presbyterian “dissenters” leaving Episcopalian Virginia, together with some of their Episcopalian neighbors, and a few Huguenots were among the first settlers in Worcester County. Baptist ministers, including Francis Makemie, arrived in 1735. In 1766 Methodist circuit riders began to appear including William Barnes and Lorenzo Dow.

In 1684 Maryland’s proprietary land grant system was replaced with a land-for-fee system which attracted large numbers of new settlers. For awhile tobacco was important both as a crop and as currency, but Worcester’s sandy soil could not grow the best quality. By 1700 indentured servitude began to decline and lifetime slavery became more prominent.

Maryland continued to dispute her border with Pennsylvania as well until the drawing of the Mason-Dixon Line in 1767. Old Worcester County was created about 1669 absorbing now extinct Durham County, and for awhile in 1672 claimed nearly all of the state of Delaware. But by 1685 the British Board of Trade and Foreign Plantations ruled old Worcester County, Maryland dissolved by degree, but the decree was not fully accepted until 1738. However, in 1742 a new Worcester was Country reconstituted out of the eastern part of Somerset County.

In 1878 the first Catholic church, and in 1903 the first Jewish synagogue were built.

Cemeteries

 * Some cemetery transcriptions on Interment.net

Census Records
Federal Census reports available 1790-1930 including slave and veterans schedules.

Church Records

 * 1668-1995 at FamilySearch — index- How to Use this Collection
 * Maryland State Archives' Guide to Maryland Religious Institutions is not intended to be a complete listing of all Religious institutions in Maryland. It was originally based upon the churches recorded by the Federal Works Progress Administration during a records survey conducted from 1935 to 1941. It has been expanded by later acquisitions from religious organizations to the Maryland State Archives. The following records, taken from its collection, have been digitized and made available to view for free online:


 * Presbyterian, Makemie Memorial Church, Snow Hill, MD. The church office has photographs of tombstones in the "old section" of the cemetery and recordings of the epitaphs.
 * Protestant Episcopal, St. Mary the Virgin (Pocomoke Parish, erected from Coventry Parish), includes: Parish Registers 1855-1930 (2 vols.) and Vestry Minutes 1855-1891

List of Churches and Church Parishes
 * FamilySearch Places

Court Records

 * Worcester County Courthouse and records
 * Worcester County, Maryland Register of Wills
 * Worcester County Orphans Court, Chancery Court and Wills transcribed and posted online by the Ocean City Museum Society - free

Emigration and Immigration
The New Early Settlers of Maryland database is a great place to start searching for immigrants who had arrived in the colony by the 1680s. The database "comprises entries from Gust Skordas' Early Settlers of Maryland and Carson Gibb's Supplement to the Early Settlers of Maryland." Available online, courtesy: Maryland State Archives.
 * 1897-1952 at FamilySearch — index and images - How to Use this Collection

Genealogies

 * Barnes, Robert W., F. Edward Wright, Vernon L. Skinner and Henry C. Peden. Colonial Families of the Eastern Shore of Maryland. 23 vols. Westminster, Md.: Family Line, 1996-2003; Lewes, Del.: Delmarva Roots and Colonial Roots, 2007. . [Worcester County families appear in Vols. 8-10, 12, 15, 17-18, 20, and 22.]


 * Pilcher - Uhrbrock, Richard S. "Pilchers (Pilchards) and Reddens of Delmarva," The Virginia Genealogist, Vol. 18, No. 3 (Jul.-Sepl 1974):187-195. To locate digital pages use search form at American Ancestors by NEHGS ($); first select Virginia Genealogist, The from the Database list. Then select Volume number..
 * Robins - Dorman, John Frederick. Adventurers of Purse and Person, Virginia, 1607-1624/5. 3 vols. Baltimore, Md.: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2004-2007. Volume 2..

Land and Property Records

 * Through a Joint eGovernment Service of the Maryland Judiciary and the Maryland State Archives, free images and indexes of the complete series of Worcester County Deed Books (1742-present) have been uploaded to their website: A Digital Image Retrieval System for Land Records in Maryland. (Requires free registration.)
 * Salisbury University has published abstracts from Early Salisbury County Land records on its website, including 1670-1683 Land Surveys and 1685 Rent Roll. These cover land now in Worcester County.

Local Histories

 * Old Somerset on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. c1935. By Clayton Torrence. Richmond, Virginia : Whittet & Shepperson. Online at: FamilySearch Digital Library, Hathitrust, Ancestry ($); . Includes Worcester County history.

Maps and Gazetteers

 * 1835 Map of Dorchester, Somerset, and Worcester Counties, online at Library of Congress
 * 1877 Atlas of Wicomico, Somerset, and Worcester Counties, MD
 * FamilySearch Places: Map of cities and towns in this county - How to Use FS Places

Revolutionary War

 * A Census of Pensioners for Revolutionary or Military Services: With their Names, Ages, and Places of Residence, as Returned by the Marshalls of the Several Judicial Districts, Under the Act for Taking the Sixth Census. 1841. Digital version at Google Books et. al. 1967 reprint: 973 X2pc 1840. See Maryland, Worcester County on page 128.

War of 1812

 * List of Pensioners on the Roll, January 1, 1883; Giving the Name of Each Pensioner, the Cause for Why Pensioned, the Post-Office Address, the Rate of Pension Per Month, and the Date of Original Allowance... Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1883. 973 M2Lp v. 5; digital versions at Google Books and Internet Archive. See Vol. 5, Maryland, Worcester County, pp. 159-160. Identifies War of 1812 veterans living in this county in 1883.

Civil War

 * 1861-1865 at FamilySearch — index - How to Use this Collection
 * 1861-1865 at FamilySearch — index- How to Use this Collection


 * - Purnell Legion, Maryland Infantry, Companies D and G.

World War II

 * 1940-1945 at FamilySearch — index and images - How to Use this Collection

Newspapers

 * Worcester County newspapers are identified in "Guide to Maryland Newspapers," available online, courtesy: Special Collections, Maryland State Archives.
 * 1800s-1999 U.S., Newspapers.com Marriage Index, 1800s-1999 at Ancestry - index ($)

Probate Records

 * Worcester County, Maryland Register of Wills

Online Probate Indexes and Records


 * Maryland, Wills and Probate Records at findmypast - index
 * 1634-1777 Maryland, Index To Colonial Probate Records, 1634-1777 at findmypast - index
 * 1634-1777 Probate Records, Colonial Index, 1634-1777, Maryland State Archives
 * 1635–1743 Maryland Calendar of Wills 1635-1743 at Ancestrym — index and images ($)
 * 1635–1777 Maryland Wills and Probate Records, 1635-1777 at Ancestry — index and images ($)
 * 1796–1940 at FamilySearch images - How to Use this Collection

Social Security Records

 * 1935-2014 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index. Also at Ancestry, findmypast, Fold3, GenealogyBank, MyHeritage, and Steve Morse. Click here for more information.
 * 1936-2007 U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 at Ancestry ($) — index, click here for more information.

Tax Records

 * 1783 Worcester County Tax List of 1783: This is an alphabetical index to names to all property owners assessed. The index cards at the Maryland State Archives include county, hundred, names of tracts of land and whether individuals were paupers or single males as provided in the law.

Marriage

 * 1658-1940 at FamilySearch — index - How to Use this Collection
 * 1666-1970 at FamilySearch — index - How to Use this Collection

Death

 * 1898-1944 Maryland Death Index 1898-1944

FamilySearch Centers

 * Eastern Shore Virginia FamilySearch Center
 * Salisbury Maryland FamilySearch Center
 * Eastern Shore Public Library - Virginia - an affiliate library.
 * Eastern Shore Public Library - Chincoteague Island Branch - an affiliate library.

Libraries
Worcester County Library 307 North Washington Street Snow Hill, MD 21863 Phone: Phone: 410-632-2600 Email: [mailto:contact@worcesterlibrary.org contact@worcesterlibrary.org] Website Multiple branches

Societies
Lower Delmarva Genealogical Society Box 3602 Salisbury, MD 21802-3602 Phone: 410-742-4059 Email: [mailto:lowerdelmarva@yahoo.com lowerdelmarva@yahoo.com] Website Includes material for Dorchester, Wicomico, Somerset and Worcester Counties.

Websites

 * The Worcester County MDGenWeb Project, a member of The MDGenWeb Project
 * "Worcester Co.," in Genealogical Sources in Periodicals at The Maryland State Archives.
 * The USGenWeb Archives Project for Worcester County.
 * - The FamilySearch catalog contains descriptions and access information for all genealogical materials (including books, online materials, microfilm, microfiche, and publications) in their collection.  Use Historical Records to search for specific individuals in genealogical records