Resource Spotlight: NJ Death Index

Searching for that elusive New Jersey death record? Thanks to the efforts of Reclaim the Records, your search just got a little bit easier with the launch of the New Jersey Death Index.

A new project utilizing data from the New Jersey Department of Health and the New Jersey State Archives, the New Jersey Death Index makes available for free over 500,000 digitized images of death indexes covering 1901-1903, 1920-1929 and 1949-2000. These images have been uploaded to and are available for browsing on Archive.org. A searchable database covering death indexes from 2001-2017 is also available on the New Jersey Death index website at NewJerseyDeathIndex.com.

There are gaps in the years available for the New Jersey death indexes including 1904-1919 and 1930-1948. There are hopes that the 1904-1909 indexes may be found and made available, but it is unlikely any indexes will be located for 1930-1948. This is still an incredible resource now available for New Jersey genealogy researchers.

Who is Reclaim the Records?

Reclaim The Records is a not-for-profit activist group of genealogists, historians, researchers, and journalists. They work to identify important genealogical record sets that are not online anywhere and not broadly available to the public. They then use state Freedom of Information laws to compel government agencies and archives to hand over copies of these records to the public, which they then digitize and put online for free use. CLICK HERE for more information on Reclaim the Records.