Alabama Genealogy & Ancestry Resources

Alabama Genealogy Resources

From 1519 – the state was claimed, explored and then settled by the Spanish, French and British.
By 1702 – Fort Louis (on the present site of Mobile) had been settled as the capital of the french colony known as Louisiana.
1763 – with the Treaty of Paris, the French ceded most of louisiana to Great Britain.
1779 – When Spain declared war on Great Britain, the American Revolution came to Alabama.
1780 – Bernardo Galvez captured Mobile from the British.
1783 – The Treaty of Paris ceded to Spain and the British holdings in the Mobil region.
1795 – The Treaty of San Lorenzo more specifically stated that all Alabama lands below the 31st parallel belonged to Spain, and lands above the 31st parallel belonged to the United States and in turn to the Native Americans living there. At the same time the Ellicoot Line was being surveyed, ‘squatters’ (those having no legal claim to the lands they settled) began to move into Alabama, forcing the various tribes off their lands.
1812 – The area below the 31st parallel was added to Mississippi Territory.
3 March 1817 – Alabama Territory was created.
14 December 1819 – Alabama became a state.
1835 – the last native lands were ceded.

Bef 1881 – A limited amount of information concerning births and deaths of a few individuals before 188 is available indirectly from probate court records. Such records include guardianships, apprenticeships, recorded wills, and the various other records maintained in the settlement and division of an estate.
1881 – An act of 1881 provided that all births and deaths were to be registered with a county health officer. Later legislation required that these registrations be made within the first five days after the birth or death and required that the county health officers registry books be deposited with the county probate judge. Such records, when they survive at all, are found today in the individual county probate courts.
1 January 1908 – Statewide birth and death records became mandatory.
1936 – Statewide marriage records begin. Marriage license has been required since the territorial period in 1799 and were issued by the clerk of the county Orphans’ Courts in which the bride resided. After 1850 the orphans’ court was superseded by the probate court.
1950 – Statewide divorce records begin.

US Federal Census Record
- Population Schedules began 1830. The only portion of the 1890 Census are portions of Perryville (Beat No.11) and Severe (Beat No. 8) of Perry County.
- Soundex – 1880, 1900, 1910, 1920, 1930 ((You can find definition of Soundex at FamilySearch.org wiki at https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Soundex).
- Industry and Agriculture Schedules: 1850 ,1860, 1870, 1880
- Mortality Schedules: 1850, 1860, 1870, 1880
- Slave Schedules: 1850, 1860
Colonial Territorial and State Censuses:
- 1706, 1721, 1725, 1810, 1816, 1850, 1855 and 1866.
- 1820 State Census exist for following counties: Baldwin, Conecuh, Dallas, Franklin, Limestone, St. Clair, Shelby, and Wilcox.
- 1907 of Alabama’s Confederate veterans
- 1921 census of Confederate pensioners in Alabama.

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AL Genealogy – Alabama Genealogy and History
https://alabamagenealogy.org/

Alabama Genealogy Trails Website
http://genealogytrails.com/ala/

Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness (RAOGK) – Alabama Records Guide
https://www.raogk.org/alabama/

AL GenWeb part of the USGenWeb
https://www.algw.org/

Source: Third Edition Red Book, American State, County, and Town Sources, Edited by Alice Eichholz Ph.D., C.G., Ancestry Publishing,The Generations Network, Inc.1989, 1992, 2004. Now digitized online at Rootsweb wiki: https://wiki.rootsweb.com/wiki/index.php/Red_Book:_American_State,_County,_and_Town_Sources.