El Salvador Quick Start Guide

El Salvador Quick Start Guide

Information about Records

 * All Records in El Salvador are in Spanish. If you are not familiar with Spanish, you should find someone who is. Another possibility is to use one or more of the new Internet translators.
 * Most Records in El Salvador are written long hand. If you are not familiar with reading Spanish handwriting, click Here
 * Not all Records from El Salvador are online. To find the online El Salvador records, click Here
 * Not all Records from El Salvador are indexed. To find the indexed online El Salvador records, click Here
 * To find all El Salvador records on microfilm, click Here

Searching for ancestor if little information is known

 * Contact Family Members to learn more information about your ancestor. This could be older aunts, uncles, grandparents, etc. The more information that you learn about your ancestor, the easier it will be to find them in the records.
 * Search records of immigration into the Unites States. You may learn where they left from and who they left behind.
 * Search records of emigration from El Salvador. You may learn where they left from and where they were traveling to.

Search for ancestors if some information is known

 * Search in the indexed records for the name of your ancestor and limit your results to El Salvador. Also limit by the name of the department, if known. When the results appear, carefully go thru them. A result should match all the information that you know to be considered your ancestor. Do not assume it must be your ancestor if only one result shows up.
 * Search for Death, Marriage and Birth records in El Salvador (in that order). These records might lead to names of the previous generation.
 * In Family Search, the El Salvador Civil Registration is mostly indexed. To search these records, try a variety of searches with the ancestor's name, or with parents' names, or just by parents' surnames AND using the option to limit record by the country El Salvador and the department.

Search for ancestors if none of the above works

 * Search the "Image Only Historical Records". You will have to browse image by image through the whole record, unless you can identify the locality of your ancestor. This narrows down the search. In Family Search, very few of the El Salvador Catholic Church Records are indexed, but they are online. They also cover a large period of time.
 * Search the records in the Family Search Catalog. Some of these El Salvador records are online, but most are not. Those records not online are on microfilm or microfiche. They must be searched image by image, unless you can identify the locality of your ancestor. This narrows down the search.

Research Strategies
Who to search for? If you don't know the names of the parents, but you know the name of the spouse and/or the names of some of his children, begin with a marriage search (if they married in El Salvador and you know the place). Or begin with a search for the birth/baptism record for one of their children (if you have an approximate birth date and place).

Finding a Locality

 * Google
 * Wikipedia (The Spanish version works the best)
 * Try a keyword search in the FamilySearch Catalog for El Salvador Gazetteers.

Online Resources
Biblioteca Nacional de El Salvador. This article written in Spanish.