Vital Records for Dutch Ancestors

The nation of The Netherlands in Western Europe has been keeping records of births, marriages and deaths since 1811, which is 200 years. Online is an excellent database in digital form of transcribed records. The site is titled: Genlias.

They continue to add new information to the site, including records from the various Dutch colonies; like the Netherlands Antilles. This site, Genlias, just provides the transcribed information, however, copies of the actual records can be ordered for a fee.

A marriage civil register is parked with information. It has the registration number the marriage date, the groom and bridge’s full names, where each reside, their parents’ full names for each, the occupation of the groom and for the groom’s father.  The ages for the bride and groom are provided and the case of a divorce occurring in the same region of The Netherlands, the divorce date is listed.

The civil death registration is just as informative. It provides the record number, the place of death, the full date, the person’s name, their spouse or parent’s names, where the decease was born and the occupation of the spouse or parent.

For the birth records, the birth registration number is given, along with the baby’s full name, date of birth, the complete names for the parents and the location of the birth.

Public domain records for The Netherlands are birth records prior to 1903, marriage records prior to 1933 and death records prior to 1953.

The search box allows you to just place a surname for any vital record at any time to see what comes up.  Most are the governmental civil records, but there are also the parish records   included in the database. One surprising element is the number of individuals marrying in The Netherlands, but who were from another country, especially from England.

Then there is New Amsterdam, which later becomes New York in the United States.  Being this was a Dutch colony, there are records in The Netherlands relating to this American area.  With some 20,219 baptismal records covering the years 1639 to 1800 and about 6,636 marriage records over the years 1639 to 1801 in New Amsterdam, there could all types of family connections found.

So it is beneficial to check any ancestral surnames, you just never know who might show up somewhere unexpected. Overall, it is an easy site to search and very worthwhile.