Using Newspapers to look for Irish Death Notices and Obituaries

OConnorAnne1

With thanks to Clare from CB Genealogy for the info.

There are two main types of notice to look for:

• A simple notice of a death and funeral arrangements
• An obituary detailing the life of the person

In Dublin, even through to the modern day, newspaper notices are only a bit longer. When looking for a notice, you have to consider the political and religious affiliations of the people and the paper. Protestants and unionist leaning people favoured the Irish Times. Catholics favoured the Irish Independent, the Evening Herald or the Irish Press. All but the last are still published today.

Outside of Dublin, regional urban newspapers had a similar style of notice but are a bit longer. 

So where do you go to look at newspapers online?

• The number 1 choice for Irish newspapers has to be the Irish News Archive. A huge selection of national and regional newspapers.
• Despite the name, the British Newspaper Archive has a vast collection of Irish papers. If you have a FindMyPast subscription, you can use the BNA via their site too.
• On Ancestry, they have a large collection of AI-created obituary databases. The Ancestry-owned https://www.newspapers.com/ (requiring a separate subscription) is gold for north American records.
• Down under, use Trove, which is free and Australian-state funded.
• For recent Irish deaths, RIP.ie is fantastic.

Shannon Potter Wilcox

@OConnorAnne1 Excellent information. Thank you for sharing.