HSPV 809: Research Methods in Historic Preservation: Birth and Death Records

This series consists of 15 microfilm reels of the birth and death records kept by the Board of Health for the City of Charleston. The series is arranged roughly chronologically (death records series first, then births), sometimes listing names alphabetically within a given year or range of years. The organization of each volume varies and is sometimes confusing.

Reel 7 contains an Index to the Register of Deaths, 1850-1912

The original volumes were apparently transferred from the City of Charleston to the Charleston County Health Department, then from there to the Charleston County Library, and finally from the library to the Charleston County Records Center, where they were microfilmed in 1988.

SC Historical Society microfilm: 45/326

• Reel 01: Return of Interments in the City of Charleston, Jan. 28, 1821–Sept. 22, 1832 (includes both white and colored deaths)
• Reel 02: Return of Deaths in the City of Charleston, Sept. 22, 1832–June 10, 1854 (lists names, place of interment, sex, color, condition, age, place of birth, disease, physician, and sometimes occupation)
• Reel 03: Return of Deaths in the City of Charleston, June 11, 1854–Sept. 18, 1870
• Reel 04: Return of Deaths within the City of Charleston, July 11, 1880–Dec. 1906 (lists name, sex, color, cause of death, place of residence, place born, physician, and place of burial)
• Reel 06: Return of Deaths (Colored), Jan. 1, 1907–May 18, 1926 (names are arranged alphabetically within ranges of years)
• Reel 07: Index to Register of Deaths, 1850–1912 (arranged roughly alphabetically within each year); Record of Black and Colored Interments, Jan. 1, 1889–Oct. 31, 1911
• Reel 09: Record of Colored Births in the City of Charleston, Dec. 4, 1877–Jan. 24, 1881 (arranged alphabetically)
• Reel 10: Return of Births in the City of Charleston, Nov. 1877–Feb. 2, 1884)
• Reel 11: Return of Births in the City of Charleston, March 1, 1884–Oct. 29, 1893
• Reel 14: Return of Colored Births in the City of Charleston, Nov. 1, 1893–July 1918 (lists name, date of birth, physician or midwife, sex, birthplace, parents' names, parents' birthplaces, and sometimes the occupation of the father)
• Reel 15: Return of Colored Births in the City of Charleston, Jan. 1919–Dec. 1926