West Virginia Genealogy Search

West Virginia family history has the best free vital records site of any state: the West Virginia Vital Research Records project of the West Virginia Archives and History, which posts free searchable images of birth, death and marriage records from the counties, many from the 1850s, when West Virginia was still part of Virginia, through the twentieth century. Statewide registration began in 1917, but the county registers from 1853 onward, kept under Virginia law, carry most families.

The Archives and History Library in Charleston holds the county records of 55 counties on microfilm, the Civil War records of a state born in that war and the land records from the Virginia grants.

Official sources on this page were checked on September 25, 2026.

West Virginia statewide genealogy links

• West Virginia Division of Culture and HistoryVital Records Search
• West Virginia Archives and History Genealogy Corner
• West Virginia Health Statistics CenterHealth Statistics Center
• West Virginia Records Management and Preservation BoardLand Records
• West Virginia State Archives Naturalization Records
• West Virginia Historical, Genealogical, and Preservation SocietiesHistorical and Genealogical Societies
• Library of VirginiaState Library Collections

West Virginia began statewide birth and death registration in 1917, with counties keeping registers from 1853 under Virginia law, and the West Virginia Vital Registration Office in Charleston holds the certificates, with county clerks holding the county registers. Birth records become public after 100 years and death records after 50, and the Vital Research Records site posts free images of county births, deaths and marriages through the public years, indexed by name. Marriage records were kept by each county clerk from the county's founding, and divorce records sit with the circuit clerk.

• West Virginia Vital Research RecordsFree searchable images of West Virginia birth, death and marriage records
• West Virginia Vital RegistrationBirth, death, marriage and divorce certificates from 1917
• West Virginia Vital Records guideHow to order certificates and what is public

The Archives and History Library holds the Virginia land grants and the West Virginia land office records, county records on microfilm, Union and Confederate Civil War service records for West Virginians with an online index, Revolutionary War pension abstracts, the West Virginia Penitentiary registers from Moundsville, county tax lists and the state's World War I service records, with its research library in Charleston free to use. West Virginia took no state censuses, so the federal censuses from 1790, taken as part of Virginia, and the tax lists carry the family. West Virginia University's West Virginia and Regional History Center in Morgantown holds manuscripts and family papers, and the National Archives at Philadelphia holds West Virginia's federal court records.

• West Virginia Archives and HistoryResearch library, Civil War index, land and county records
• West Virginia and Regional History CenterManuscripts and family papers at West Virginia University
• National Archives at PhiladelphiaFederal court records for West Virginia

West Virginia county clerks are the recorders and probate custodians, holding deeds, wills, estates, marriage licenses and the county birth and death registers from each county's founding, and circuit clerks hold civil, divorce and chancery cases, with most county clerks posting online deed indexes. The Archives and History Library has microfilmed the older books of all 55 counties. Because West Virginia's counties were Virginia counties until 1863, the oldest records for Berkeley, Hampshire, Greenbrier, Monongalia and other early counties reach back to the 1700s under Virginia law.

• West Virginia County Public RecordsCounty clerks and circuit clerks for all 55 counties
• West Virginia Court RecordsCircuit and magistrate court case searches

• National Archives, genealogyCensus, military, immigration and land records
• Library of Congress, genealogy guidesResearch guides for family history