How To Find Your Ancestor’s Gravesite

Recently, I was thrilled to receive several emails from fellow Crawford County Chapter members, telling me about my ancestors. I found out that the Weavers arrived in Crawford County Ohio around 1840. Immediately, I wanted to my ancestor’s gravesites, but being fairly new to genealogical research I didn’t know where to start. Mary Fox, President of the Crawford County Chapter of OGS, nudged me to the Crestline library where I found what I needed to visit their cemetery and easily find their gravesites.

Gather identifying information

To find your ancestors, you’ll need to know a few pieces of identifying information before you get started on your research. You’ll need: your ancestor’s name, the city or county where you believe your ancestor died or is buried, and at least an approximate year of his or her death. If you’re not sure of these yet, try searching with information you do know on FindAGrave.com to find possible matches. Another helpful tool for researching Ohio ancestors is the free obituary index hosted by the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library.

Library or local genealogical society

Next visit the local genealogical or historical society website for where you suspect your ancestor is buried. There you may find an index of the cemeteries in the county or where an index is available. If you don’t find anything, call the local libraries to see what they have. It is likely they have books of the area cemeteries. These books are usually published by the local historical or genealogical society.

At the Crestline Public Library, I searched through the Crestline Cemeteries Book to find where my great-grandparents were buried. First I found their surname in the name index and noted the section where their graves where located, and then I scanned the cemetery maps in the book to find how to get to each section.

Visit the cemetery

• 

The only thing left to do is go visit the cemetery. In my case, it is only a five minute drive from my home. My parents and I visited Saint Joseph’s Cemetery on a beautiful summer evening last August. But, I plan to use this same process to find my Coshocton County Ohio ancestors and take a long weekend trip to visit their hometowns.