Finding a Quaker Ancestor

 

Quaker: The Society of Friends was formed in England in 1648. Early restrictions brought them to New Jersey in 1675 and some 230 English Quakers founded Burlington, New Jersey in 1678. William Penn was granted the territory of Pennsylvania in 1681 and within two years there were about 3000 Quakers living there.

Records of Quaker Monthly Meetings hold the most vital information for genealogists. They may contain a history of the meeting, lists of members, marriages, deaths, removals, and disownings. Quakers did not practice baptism.

William Wade Hinshaw Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy consists of six volumes, each dealing with a different region, and is supplemented by Willard Heiss Abstracts of the Records of the Society of Friends in Indiana in seven parts. Volume I of Hinshaw is the abstract of the early records of North and South Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee. Volumes I through VI can be searched online at U.S., Quaker Meeting Records, 1681-1935 on Ancestry 

There are more records and links, both free and pay-to-view at Quakers and Moravians on Olive Tree Genealogy