Federal mortality schedules, 1850 to 1880

Who is listed, and who is not

Each schedule covers the 12 months before census day, which was June 1 in all four years. The 1860 schedules, for example, list people who died between June 1, 1859, and May 31, 1860. Someone who died in 1855 will not be on any mortality schedule at all, so the schedules cover only about one year in every ten.

Most deaths were reported by the surviving household, though in 1870 and especially 1880 some places copied deaths from local death registers, and in 1880 more were added from doctors' reports. Researchers at IPUMS, who worked with the full set of names, point out that only people whose household continued after the death were recorded. A man who lived alone, or a family that broke up and moved away after a mother's death, may be missing. Some counties and towns are missing entirely, and some places seem to have entries written twice.

In 1850 and 1860, enslaved people who died were also listed, and a column marked each person as free or enslaved. For descendants of enslaved people, these lines can be among the very few written records of a death, so read that column on every page with care.

What the columns tell you

The 1850 and 1860 forms asked for the name, age, sex and color, whether the person was married or widowed, the state or country of birth, the occupation, the month of death, the cause of death, and the number of days the person was ill. Babies under one year were often given in months, which helps you date a short life closely.

From 1870 the forms asked about the parents' origins: in 1870, whether the father and mother were foreign born, and in 1880, their birthplaces. The 1880 form also asked how long the person had lived in the county, where the disease was contracted if not at the place of death, and the name of the attending physician; the 1870 form asked neither of those last two questions. The 1885 form also named the physician.

In 1870 and 1880 the mortality form carried the family's number from the population schedule, so you can often find the household the person belonged to. IPUMS was able to link many 1870 and 1880 deaths to families in the census this way, but not those of 1850 and 1860, when family numbers were not written on the mortality form.

Reading the causes of death

Causes were written in the words a family used, sometimes corrected by a doctor. Expect old terms. Consumption or phthisis meant tuberculosis of the lungs. Dropsy was swelling from fluid, often caused by heart or kidney failure. Flux, bloody flux and summer complaint were forms of diarrhea, and cholera infantum killed many babies in hot months. Lung fever and inflammation of the lungs usually meant pneumonia. Childbed fever was an infection after giving birth. Teething, written as dentition, was blamed for many infant deaths that had other causes.

Treat the cause as what the family believed, not a medical diagnosis. A death from old age or debility tells you more about the person's last months than about any disease. Look up any unfamiliar word in our dictionary of causes of death.

The 1885 schedules

In 1885, Colorado, Florida, Nebraska, New Mexico Territory and Dakota Territory took a census with federal help, and it included a mortality schedule. It lists deaths between June 1, 1884, and May 31, 1885. The National Archives holds Colorado (microfilm M158), Florida (M845), Nebraska (M352) and New Mexico (M846). The Dakota Territory schedules never went to the National Archives; they are held at the North Dakota or South Dakota state archives, depending on where the person lived.

Why they matter between censuses

Suppose a woman appears with her husband and children in 1860, and in 1870 the husband is living with a new wife. If she died in the year before June 1, 1870, the mortality schedule may give her month and cause of death, perhaps childbed fever after a baby who also appears on the list. If she is not there, she may have died earlier in the decade, or her death may simply have been missed, so look in church, cemetery and probate records too.

The schedules also confirm a child who was born and died between censuses and would otherwise leave no trace at all. Write down every person on the page from the same township, because neighbors who died of the same illness may show an epidemic that passed through the area.