size=4>Confirming Genealogical Information Using Catholic
Church Confirmation Records
By Lynn Turner

Confirmation
records found in Latin American Catholic parish registers have
proved to be an invaluable asset to genealogists.  These
records usually contain the name of the person being confirmed and
names of his/her parents.  Even though the records lack
excessive genealogical information, they can be useful in other
ways.  Confirmations are useful in the following ways:

? As a
locator tool
? Speeding up baptismal, marriage, and death
searches
? Filling gaps between children

Sometimes
confirmations are often found in the parish baptismal book. 
Other times they are maintained in there own book.  Depending
on parish size and location confirmations may have been done every
year or once every several years.  In small parishes far away
from the Diocesan bishop a researcher may find a child and mother
being confirmed at the same time.

Often times
when we think of a locator tool we think of census records. 
Unfortunately Latin American countries did not record many censuses
like the United States did.  Confirmation records can help
place a family within a particular parish.  One of the quickest
ways to know if a family lived in or moved to a parish is to check
the confirmation records for that parish.  Unlike census
records confirmations will not list every person living in the
parish, but will only list those being confirmed. 

Recently I did
some research on a family from Spain.  The information given to
me identified a parish, but when the couple married and began having
children had not.  None of the records had been indexed. 
I estimated a time period when the couple should have been having
children.  Instead of searching several pages of baptisms I
began with the confirmations.  Very quickly I learned that the
confirmations were taken approximately every nine years.  In a
matter of minutes I determined that the family was having children
between 1730 and 1750.  I checked the baptisms between these
years and found that the couple had seven children between 1731 and
1746.

If a child is
found in the baptismal records but not in the confirmations he/she
may have died as an infant.  Death records should be consulted
to verify any assumptions of an infant mortality.  This should
narrow death record searches and eliminate any searching for
marriage records. 

Confirmation
records are also great gap fillers.  As a general rule couples
tended to have children every two years, sometimes spanning twenty
or more years.    At times four or five years will
pass between before another child is found for a couple.  If a
gap of more than three years is discovered, the confirmations should
be checked to see if a child was overlooked in the baptisms. 

size=3>Confirmations, when available, can save you valuable time
while doing your family history.  To know if your parish of
interest has confirmations available perform a place search on the
family history library catalog found at
href="http://www.familysearch.org">www.familysearch.org
.  If you find that your parish has not
been microfilmed, a letter to the parish priest might be
necessary.  

Lynn
Turner is a senior at Brigham Young University.  He will
graduate with a B.A. in genealogy and family history in August
2004.  His areas of specialty include Latin America, Spain, and
the United States.  He provides research services and
consultations; he can be reached at
href="mailto:lynnturner@...">
size=3>lynnturner@...
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