Kentucky Bible Records

United States   Kentucky   Kentucky Bible Records

Bibles were often given to a bride as a wedding gift, and families recorded information about the immediate family and close relatives in them. Bible records can include birth, marriage, and death dates; parents’ and children’s names; and spouses’ names, including maiden names. Relationships are seldom stated. The age of a person may be given at the time of death. Many families kept Bible records, although some Bibles did not survive. Some Bibles may have been donated to local libraries or societies.

Start with the free Index to Early Bible Records (pre-1830; 17,000 entries).

The Kentucky Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) collections and the Julia Hoge Spencer Ardery collection contain transcriptions of Bible records. These are described in the Genealogy wiki page. Some additional Kentucky Bible transcriptions are found at the national DAR Library in Washington, DC, and on microfilm at the Family History Library. These are partially indexed in:


 * E. Kay Kirkham. An Index to Some of the Family Records of the Southern States: 35,000 Microfilm References from the N.S.D.A.R. Files and Elsewhere. Logan, Utah: Everton Publishers, 1979. Free online digital copy This surname index lists the state and the Family History Library film number where these Bible records can be found.

Some DAR transcriptions have been indexed and published in:


 * Daughters of the American Revolution (Kentucky). Records Research Committee. Kentucky Bible Records from the Files of the Genealogical Records Committee, Kentucky Society, Daughters of the American Revolution. 6 vols. Lexington, KY: KSDAR, 1962–1981.  Each volume is indexed.

Many periodicals publish family data from Bible records. These are referenced in the "Families" section of the PERiodical Source Index(PERSI), described in the "Periodicals" section.

Copies, or abstracts of old family Bibles that are no longer known to exist, may survive in Revolutionary War Pension application files at NARA, Washington, D.C., which are available online at three commercial websites: Ancestry, Fold3, and Heritage Quest Online.

The above sources and additional transcriptions of Bible records are listed in thePlace Search of the FamilySearch Catalog under:

KENTUCKY- BIBLE RECORDS

KENTUCKY, [COUNTY]- BIBLE RECORDS

Online Resources:


 * Kentucky Bible Archives on KYGenWeb
 * Additional Kentucky Bibles on KYGenWeb
 * Kentucky Bible Records on Kentucky Genealogy.org
 * Kentucky Bible Records on Kentucky Pioneers.com: Contains an index list of Bible records in their collection. You must be a Kentucky Pioneers member to see the contents of the Bible record.
 * If you are looking for Bible records in a specific county use your favorite search engine and enter the county name and the words "Bible records"