Place:Wellington, Ontario, Canada

Watchers
NameWellington
TypeCounty
Coordinates43.7°N 80.5°W
Located inOntario, Canada     (1840 - )
Also located inUpper Canada, Canada     (1792 - 1841)
Canada West, Canada     (1841 - 1867)
See alsoHome District, Upper Canada, Canadaadministrative district 1800-1837
Wellington District, Upper Canada, Canadaadministrative district 1837-1850

Wellington County is a large straggling county located in southwestern Ontario, Canada. It had a population of over 200,000 at the 2011 census. The county seat is Guelph, a city which is politically independent from the county, but it does house the county's administrative offices.

The county went through a process of municipal reorganization in 1999 which reduced it from 12 townships and several independent towns and one city to 8 municipalities. Wellington is predominantly rural in nature, but good roads permits its citizens to commute to larger connurbations outside its borders.

The map of Wellington County circa 1951 from Ontario Archives locates the individual municipalities, townships, towns and villages of the county.

image:Wellington1.png

image:Wellington_County2.png

Current Subdivisions or Municipalities

History

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

In 1837 by Act of Parliament the new District of Wellington was formed and a court house and jail in the town of Guelph were authorized. In 1840 the county officials received their commissions. The District Council of the County of Wellington was formed and consisted of eighteen municipalities as follows: the town of Guelph, the villages of Fergus, Elora, Mount Forest and Orangeville, and the townships in the following list. (Source: Province of Ontario -- A History 1615 to 1927 by Jesse Edgar Middleton & Fred Landon, copyright 1927, Dominion Publishing Company, Toronto, page 1235)
NOTE: The town of Orangeville was transferred to Dufferin County when it was established in 1874.

Research Tips

The primary source for basic documents (vital statistics, land records, wills) for people who lived in the Province of Ontario is the Archives of Ontario, 134 Ian Macdonald Blvd, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M7A 2C5.

Early Records

Civil registration did not begin in the province until 1869. Before then there may be church records of baptisms and burials. For the most part these are still held by the denomination who recorded them. Copies of marriage records made pre-1869 had to be sent by individual clergymen to the registrar of the county in which the marriage took place. These marriage records are available through Ontario Archives, on micorfilm through LDS libraries, and on paid and unpaid websites, but because they were copied at the registrars' offices, they cannot be considered a primary source.

Vital Records after 1869

Birth, marriage and death registrations are not open to the public until a specific number of years after the event occurred. Births to 1915 are now available [October 2014]; dates for marriages and deaths are later. Birth and death registration was not universally carried out in the early years after its adoption. Deaths were more apt to be reported than births for several years. The more rural the area, the less likely it would be that these happenings were reported to the authorities.
Images and indexes of civil registrations for the "viewable" years can be found on paid websites, and indexes only on FamilySearch. The FamilySearch Wiki on Ontario Vital Records explains how these records are organized and their availability.
In September 2014 Ancestry.ca announced that its paid website has been subjected to a "houseclean" of its Ontario BMD database, adding data that had been omitted and making many corrections. Its provision now includes

  • Births, with 2,172,124 records covering 1869-1913.
  • Marriages, with 3,393,369 records for 1801-1928 including Ontario county, district and Roman Catholic origins as well as province-wide civil registration.
  • Deaths, with 2,190,030 records comprising Ontario civil registrations of deaths, 1869-1938 and registrations of Ontario overseas deaths for 1939-1947.

Land Records and Wills

Information on how to access land records and wills is best sought on the Archives of Ontario website. An ancestor's land holding might be found on Canadian County Atlas Digital Project if he was in occupancy circa 1878.

Association for the Preservation of Ontario Land Registry Office Documents (APOLROD). A list of Land Registry Offices for all Counties of Ontario.

Censuses

The original censuses are in the hands of Library and Archives Canada, known to Canadians as "LAC". Copies of original microfilms are online at the LAC website for all censuses up to 1921. Each census database is preceded with an explanation of the geographical area covered, the amount of material retained (some census division material has been lost), the questions on the census form, and whether there is a name index. Census divisions were redrawn as the population increased and more land was inhabited.
Other websites, some paid and some free, also provide Canadian census originals and/or indexes online. One can also view censuses on microfilm at the LAC, at the Archives of Ontario (see address above), or at large libraries throughout Canada.

Hard-to-Find Places

E-books, Books and Newspapers

source: Family History Library Catalog
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Wellington County, Ontario. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.