Enter your ancestor's name below and we'll search obituaries to help you learn more.
Trace Your Family’s Maryland Heritage Through Herald-Mail Obituary Archives
The Herald-Mail obituaries' archive is a great resource if you are interested in tracing back your family tree across the state of Maryland. The art of extracting this data lies in the way you navigate these archives because there are nearly 150 years of local history to discover.
Here’s why using local obituaries is great for genealogy research:
- Discover new branches of your family tree.
- Connect with distant family members.
- Learn the stories of your ancestors.
- 95% of the records on GenealogyBank are not available on other online services.
Search Newspaper Obituaries
How to Search Herald-Mail Obituary Archives
To get started, simply type in the last name of a relative and hit the “Search” button. This is a great way to begin digging into your family's past.
If you need to find more detailed information, follow these steps to do an advanced search in the Herald-Mail obituary archives:
- Step 1: Start by typing in the first and last names of your relative. If you know their middle name, include it for more accurate results.
- Step 2: Add a keyword like a school or a town to help narrow down your results.
- Step 3: Exclude certain words to avoid finding obituaries that aren’t related to your family.
- Step 4: Use a specific range of years. With nearly 150 years of records, there are likely many people with the same name.
- Step 5: Change how your results are sorted to find the best matches, newest, or oldest entries.
Extra Advice to Improve Your Search Results
If you’re struggling to find the information you need, here are some tips to help make sure you find your relatives on our database:
- Start with information from closer ancestors to help find older relatives.
- Sometimes older obituaries use initials instead of full names, so try searching by initials.
- If you're looking for information about a female relative, searching for their husband's name might help.
- Be aware of common misspellings, as names weren't always checked for accuracy in the past.
In addition to this, you’ve got the chance to go through the newspaper archives of the U.S., and also explore the birth, marriage, and death records, passenger lists and so on to get any additional information to complete your family tree.
For a more detailed guide, try visiting the GenealogyBank Learning Center to get acquainted with more in-depth exploration.
