Finding a burial in parish registers is notoriously difficult if the date of death is unknown. First, you should search GRO deaths from the last date the person was located, for example from a previous census or from births of children. Use data website www.thegenealogist.co.uk for GRO deaths from 1837 and many parish register collections, plus census searches.

If the place of burial is unknown, use Phillimore’s Atlas and Index to Parish Registers (available from www.genealogysupplies.com) to find all relevant parish churches.

Prior to 1812, general registers entries gave only first name, surname and date of burial, not death; or, for example, ‘Mary, wife of John Simpson’; or, for children under 21 years, ‘Robert, son of John Simpson’. It was left to the vicar’s discretion as to how much information was recorded. Many registers were written in Latin up to 1733.

After 1812, burials were separated into uniform registers which offered the deceased’s abode and age at death, although this was often inaccurate. This printed form allowed no room for vicars to add their own informative comments.

If parish registers are missing, other resources are available:

• Consult local record offices for any burial indexes transcribed by family history groups. The National Burial Index is available on CD from archive retailers.
• County record offices may have Bishops’ Transcripts (BTs), although these were not compiled during the commonwealth 1641-1660 and the general survival rate is patchy. Beware that a diocese did not always coincide with the county boundary.
• Monumental Inscriptions [MIs] are now widely published, or available on CD-ROM, and online, see more at www.genguide.co.uk inscriptions
• Cemetery records may help to locate a burial – beware that a grave may be re-used after 75 years and only the later burial will be shown on the gravestone.
• Death duty records contain images of all wills and administrations attracting death duty in England and Wales 1796-1903. ‘County court’ death duty registers from 1796-1811 are online at the National Archives
• If a burial cannot be found in Anglican churches, consider Nonconformist registers available at www.bmdregisters.co.uk.
• Try newspapers for death notices or obituaries.