Daily AncestorWas the whole 1890 census destroyed?
Everyone in genealogy learns it early: the 1890 census burned. There is a twenty-year hole between 1880 and 1900, the years when Grandpa was born, the family moved west and the older generation died. Since the census is gone, the story goes, there is nothing to find for 1890 and no reason to look.
Most of the 1890 population schedules were lost after a 1921 fire, but fragments naming over 6,160 people survive, along with many special schedules of Union veterans and widows.
What happened to it
The eleventh census counted people as of June 1, 1890; counting began on June 2 because June 1 was a Sunday. On January 10, 1921, a fire broke out in the basement of the Commerce Department building in Washington, where the schedules were stored. The 1890 volumes were stacked outside the vault, and the Census Director's first estimate was that a quarter were destroyed and half of the rest damaged by water, smoke and fire.
The fire was not the whole story. A National Archives history of the loss shows that the damaged schedules sat for years afterward. In December 1932 the Census Bureau put them on a list of papers it no longer needed, the Librarian of Congress marked nothing on that list as worth keeping, and Congress authorized destruction on February 21, 1933. One report says the papers were destroyed in 1935, and a note in a Census Bureau file gives 1934. Families are right that the 1890 census is mostly gone; the full reason is sadder and more ordinary than one night's blaze.
What survives
Fragments of the general population schedules did survive, covering over 6,160 people in small parts of Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, South Dakota, Texas and the District of Columbia. They are on National Archives microfilm M407 with a separate surname index, M496, and both are online. As the National Archives article puts it, these are someone's ancestors, so always check before assuming your county is lost.
A much larger survivor is the special 1890 schedule of Union Civil War veterans and widows of veterans. It gives the veteran's name, rank, unit, enlistment and discharge dates, length of service, post office address and any disability. Schedules for states alphabetically from Alabama through Kansas and about half of Kentucky are almost entirely missing, but the rest of the country survives in large part on microfilm M123. Despite the title, enumerators often listed Confederate veterans and men from earlier wars too.
Smaller pieces add to the picture: an 1890 territorial census for parts of Oklahoma, and lists of selected African Americans in Delaware taken from the 1890 and 1900 censuses.
Filling the gap
The National Archives is honest that nothing fully replaces a lost federal census. But it points to records that can stand in for it: records about elections, taxes, statehood, war and vital statistics, and state and territorial censuses taken near 1890. The federal government helped Colorado, Florida, Nebraska, New Mexico and the Dakotas take an 1885 census, and 1890 voter lists, called Great Registers, survive for some counties in Arizona and California.
Add to that the records any family historian already uses: city directories, tax lists, church registers, newspapers and military pension files. Taken together, these can often place a family in a town in 1890 as firmly as a census line would.
- Search the surviving 1890 population fragments and their surname index before assuming your county is lost.
- Look for the veteran or his widow on the 1890 special schedule of Union veterans and widows, and check it even for Confederate service.
- Check whether your state took its own census in the 1880s or 1890s, and ask the state archives what survives.
- Use city directories, tax lists and voter registers to place the family year by year between 1880 and 1900.
- Request the Civil War pension file of any ancestor who served, or of his widow, for addresses and family details near 1890.
Record guides for this
Military pension files
A military pension file can hold an old soldier's own story of his service, his marriage date and his children's names, all sworn before a judge to win a few dollars a month.
Record guideCity directories
City directories list a town's residents with addresses and jobs, often year by year, so they show where your ancestor lived between censuses.
Record guideTax lists
Tax lists name taxpayers year after year, so they can stand in for a missing census, show when a son came of age, and hint at when a man died or moved.
Record guideVoter registers and poll books
Voter registers list people qualified to vote and poll books list who voted; they can place an ancestor in a precinct between censuses and may note birthplace and naturalization.
Record guideChurch records: baptisms, marriages and burials
Church registers recorded baptisms, marriages and burials long before states kept vital records, often naming parents, godparents and the family's home village.
Record guideOld newspapers: death and marriage notices
Old newspapers recorded deaths, marriages and local comings and goings, often naming relatives and hometowns; Chronicling America lets you search millions of pages free.
How to cite this page
Daily Ancestor. "Was the whole 1890 census destroyed?." Family myths. https://dailyancestor.com/myths/1890-census-all-lost. Last checked 2026-10-15.