BuffaloResearch.com: Vital Records

The Niagara Falls Underground Railroad Heritage Area celebrates, interprets, and preserves the wealth of places and stories associated with the Underground Railroad found within the City of Niagara Falls and the surrounding region.

Scroll to p. 11. Uses examples from upstate New York to urge caution when claiming sites for the UGRR. Our unforgiving geology make tunnels legends especially suspect.

By Eber Pettit, Fredonia, NY, ,1869

A short newspaper article from the Provincial Freeman, July 11, 1857

Jonson was an attorney, abolitionist, and Underground Railroad agent in Buffalo, NY. Here is a guide to his diaries, which reside in multiple institutions and are unpublished and undigitized.

A map done in 1941 as part of the Federal Writers' Project, brought to you by the Library of Congress.

Digitized newspapers from Ontario, Canada, in the 19th and 20th centuries, including "The Voice of the Fugitive," published by African-Americans who had escaped from slavery and settled in Canada

The full text of the book (1879) by Eber Petit, a Fredonia native. It is highly anecdotal and omits the details that historians depend on, such as full names, dates, and places.

Discover the many important historic sites, museums and interpretive centers related to Underground Railroad, slavery and anti-slavery themes in New York State.

Geography and politics conspired to make New York State a key link in the Underground Railroad. Though often romanticized, particularly concerning the role of Caucasians in its operation, there is no doubt that many fugitives from slavery followed the Underground Railroad on their way to freedom in Canada, or to destinations in safe proximity to the Canadian border. The purpose of this website is to catalogue information on the People and Places of New York that were involved in the activities of the Underground Railroad, and to provide reliable information about their role in African Americans' struggle for freedom.

There is no published book-length history of the Underground Railroad in Buffalo, NY. In the meanwhile, these titles come the closest.

The intention of this site is to compile documentation on what is known, or thought to be known, about URR and related activities in Western New York, and to encourage further research. Presently available only through the Internet Wayback Machine.

If you have a place name (for example, the place where an ancestor was born) but you're not sure exactly where in New York - or the U.S., or the world - that place is, one of the resources listed here may help you to pinpoint the location. Brought to you by the New York State Library.

Names of casualties

The men listed in these pages are men who served in New York Units during the Spanish-American War of 1898. For each man you will find a name, the regiment he served in, the volume the regiment appears in and the page the man is listed on. The volume refers to New York in the Spanish-American War 1898 (prepared by the New York State Adjutant General's Office. Albany: J.B. Lyon, State printer, 1900).

Full text of the 1841 volume

Names of veterans

All 140 names and birth & death dates from a handwritten card file in the Research Library in the Buffalo History Museum. Most are in Erie County, with a handful of names from Niagara and nearby counties.

Scroll down & click on the tiny camera icons on the right. These records are not name-searchable; you have to browse page by page to find a name.

Microfilm of original volumes at the Erie County Courthouse in Buffalo, New York, scanned and browsable online. There is no name-searching capability so you have to click on a volume and read page by page, just like you would if you were doing this research in person in the County Clerk's office.

Index to Holland Land Company buyers. While you can't read the full text, you can search it to see if an ancestral name is included.

Has the following items, which are not digitized and must be viewed in person: - Tax & Assessment Roll Books - 1815-1837 (Bound Volumes) - Tax & Assessment Roll Books - 1838-1997 (Microfilm) - Assessors Land Maps - 1855, 1870, 1912 (Microfilm)

Look up the current owner of any address in Erie County

A list of about 350 names

A text file of about 400 names from about 1804-1835

Has searchable mortages & deeds dating back to 1980

Aurora, Evans, Orchard Park, Wales, and West Seneca, and Sheldon (Wyoming county). Last item on film is marriages and deaths in Elma before 1902 and marriages and funerals from Reverend Richard M. Sandford's journal.

Where do you find your ancestors New York birth, marriage, or death certificate? You will be able to better answer this question if you have an understanding of how vital record keeping has evolved throughout the history of New York State.

Engagements, marriages & deaths among employees at the Curtiss-Wright factory. Courtesy of the Buffalo & Erie County Public Library

Includes births, marriages & deaths among employees at Bell Aircraft. Courtesy of the Buffalo & Erie County Public Library.