Moers, Germany, Births, 1798-1907

About this collection

This collection contains bith records from Moers covering the years 1798 up to and including 1907. Moers is a city in the district of Wesel and is part of the administrative district of Dusseldorf. It is located along the Lower Rhine on the western edge of the Ruhr area about 6 miles west of Duisburg and about 9 miles north of Krefeld in what is now North Rhine-Westphalia. The area was colonized early. Roman settlers arrived in what is now Asberg around AD 69. Moers was chartered in 1300. The city's notable attraction and oldest known building is the Moers Castle. During the time period of this collection, Moers first belonged to the French Département de la Roar until 1815 and thereafter to Prussia. The collection also includes records from the communities of Baerl, Kapellen and Repelen. The records for urban and rural Moers were managed separately between 1859 and 1875, when a mayor's office for rural Moers was created .

On September 20th 1792, the French National Assembly passed a law governing the documentation of civil status in France. The French model for recording Births, Marriages and Deaths was officially introduced when French troops began the occupation of the left bank of the Rhine on May 1st, 1798 and established new departments of France. In the former Prussian provinces, on 1 October 1874, the responsibility for this documentation was assumed by local registry offices and referred to as "civil registers."

The civil registration records are usually arranged chronologically and bound in yearbook form. Occasionally, alphabetical directories of names were also created. While churches continued to keep traditional records, the State also mandated that the personal or marital status of the entire population be recorded.

What you can find in the records

Civil registry records were initially handwritten. Later, they were recorded in German on preprinted forms. The French Republican Calendar was used as the dating system in the registers until 1805. Births between 1803 and 1814 are documented in French. Starting in 1815 they were recorded once again in German. Beginning in 1876, standardized preprinted civil registry forms were used. The date that a birth was recorded commonly differs from the actual date of birth. Depending on the individual form or on the formulations used by the registrar, you may find:

• Sequential or Certificate Number
• Registration Date
• Informant: Occupation, Given Names, Last Name, Maiden Name, Residence/Address, Denomination
• Mother: Given Names, Last Name, Maiden Name, Denomination, Residence/Address
• Child: Birth Date, Time of Birth, Sex, Given Names
• Signatures

More about using this collection

Additional events from the life of the child were sometimes recorded later on in the margins. These notes, sometimes referred to as "narration," can contain very useful information but they have not been indexed. As a result, information from the notes will not be found via the search form. The “Informant” was often a midwife or the child's father. Under "Browse this collection,” select the Civil Registry Office and Year Range of the register desired.