Step One: If you haven't already, determine your ancestor's country of origin. This can be found in many types of genealogical records, including immigration records, census records, and records of birth, marriage, and death.
Step Two: Once you've determined the country of origin, look for a national index to vital records for that country in the time period in which your ancestor was born (e.g. Civil Registration Index for England & Wales). If such an index exists, this might provide a shortcut to learning your ancestor's place of birth. You must, however, have enough identifying information to recognize the immigrant.
Step Three: If there is no national vital records index available, the next goal in your birthplace quest is to find a source that tells you specifically where to start looking in your ancestor's country of origin. While searching, it is important to remember that your ancestor's last residence prior to emigration may not necessarily be their place of birth.
- Check first with family members and even distant relatives for any clues to your ancestor's birthplace. You never know who may have personal knowledge or relevant records in their possession.
- Look at research already done by others. In many cases, other researchers have already found where the emigrant came from. This includes searching through published indexes and genealogies, local biographies and town histories, and databases of compiled records.
- Next search for original records related to the immigrant's death, such as death records, church records, obituaries, cemetery records, and probate records.
- Check both civil and church sources for a marriage record and records of the children's births.
- Search other types of genealogical records which may reveal an ancestor's town of origin, including census records, court records, and land and property records.
- Immigration records such as passenger lists and naturalization records are the next important source in the search for an immigrant's town of birth. The reason that this isn't an earlier source is that you usually need information found in the previous steps to enable you to locate immigration and naturalization records. In the United States, census records provide especially good clues to whether an ancestor was naturalized.
Step Four: Sometimes after researching all possible records, you will still be unable to find a record of the home town of your immigrant ancestor. In this case, an important next step is to look for family members -- brother, sister, father, mother, cousin, etc. -- in the same records to see if you can find a place name associated with them. For example, my great-grandfather emigrated to the United States from Poland, but was never naturalized and left no records of his specific town of oorigin. I was finally able to locate the town in which they lived from the naturalization record of his eldest daughter (who was born in Poland).
Step Five: Identify and verify the place name on a map, something that is not always as easy as it sounds. Often you will find multiple places with the same name, or you may find that the town has changed jurisdictions or even disappeared. It is very important here to correlate with historical maps and other sources of information to be sure that you have identified the correct town.
