Map of Australia with Tasmania highlightedIt’s always super-exciting when a major new record collection goes online, and I discovered “genealogy gold” when I found out that FamilySearch have in conjuction with the Archives Office of Tasmania have just put the images of Tasmanian Births, Deaths and Marriages online. These cover the period 1803-1933, and are to view for FREE!

When I heard about it, it sounded too good to be true, so I had to go and check it out for myself. And sure enough you can now get ORIGINAL IMAGES of baptisms, births, marriages, deaths and burial records.

These records are not indexed, so you will need to page through, or better still if you have the Digger CDs (Tasmanian Pioneer Index 1803-1899 and Tasmanian Federation Index, both now out of print), use them to find out the when and where, which will help narrow down your paging through.

Browse the Tasmania Birth, Death & Marriage Records 1803-1933 now.

These baptism records generally contain the following information:
– Name of child
– Date and place of baptism
– Names of parents
– Residence
– Father’s Occupation
– Gender

sample page of Tasmanian baptism records

sample page of Tasmanian baptism records

These birth records may contain the following information:
– Name of child
– Date and place of birth
– Name and surname of father
– Name and Maiden name of Mother
– Father’s occupation
– Date of registration

sample page of birth records from Tasmania

a sample page of birth records from Tasmania

These marriage records generally contain the following information:
– Name of bride and groom
– Date and place of marriage
– Age of bride and groom
– Occupation of groom
– Names of witnesses

a sample of early Tasmanian marriage records

a sample of a page of Tasmanian marriage records

a sample of later Tasmanian marriage records

sample of an alternate style Tasmanian marriage page

These death records generally contain the following information:
– Name of deceased
– Date of death
– Gender
– Age
– Occupation
– Cause of death
– Date of registration

sample page from the Tasmania death records

a sample page from the Tasmanian death records

These burial records generally contain the following information:
– Name of deceased
– Last residence
– Date of burial
– Age at burial
– Occupation of deceased

sample page from the Tasmanian burial records

a sample page from the Tasmanian burial records

Sure Tasmania is a small state, but it has a “long-for-Australian-standards” history, with many convicts being sent to Tasmania, with many more emigrating there to live, so it has a rich history.

And thanks to the Archive Office of Tasmania, who is truly a leader in the archives scene, for not only in preservation of these and the many, many  thousands of other historical documents they hold, but also for the fact that they are allowing the images to put online and FREE, as well a putting many on their own website recently. Now if only other Australian archives offices would follow suit!

Now for those that have family in other Australian states and just in case you weren’t aware of what other Australian BDM records are online, here’s the links to the relevant pages:
New South Wales 1788-1982
Queensland 1829-1983
South Australia 1842-1972
Tasmania 1803-1933
Victoria 1836-1985
Western Australia 1841-1971

and you may find some links to Tasmania in the following FamilySearch collections:
Australia, Births and Baptisms, 1792-1981
Australia, Marriages, 1810-1980
Australia, Deaths and Burials, 1816-1980