Wood Green and Uplands Cemeteries
now available on Deceased Online

Records from Uplands Cemetery in Smethwick and Wood Green Cemetery in Wednesbury, held by Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council in the Black Country, are available to view on www.deceasedonline.com. The records comprise digital scans of the original burial registers and grave details for each of the graves and their occupants. Uplands also includes a map showing in which section the grave is located.

Above: Some of the earlier scans show the cause of death and the occupation of the deceased

There are multiple interpretations of the name Smethwick, historically thought to mean 'smiths' place of work', but recent interpretations suggest that the name is more likely to mean 'settlement on smooth land'. In the Domesday book Smethwick was recorded as 'Smedeuuich'. As the Anglo-Saxon pronounciation of D was 'eth', this means that the name has remained largely unchanged for many hundreds of years.

Wednesbury has a rich local history going back to the earliest medieval times. The first known spelling of the name was Wodensbyri, recorded in 1004AD. Wodensbryi translates as Woden's borough and Wednesbury is one of the few places in the UK still named after a pre-Christian deity. In 1086 the Domesday book described 'Wadnesburie' as a thriving rural community.

As with a great deal of the West Midlands, and the Black country in particular, during the industrial revolution the population of Smethwick and Wednesbury grew around the coal and steel industries, with new railways and canals connecting towns and people, and new factories providing work.

Further information:

Sandwell records available to view on Deceased Online also include:

• Fallings Heath Cemetery
• Heath Lane Cemetery
• Oldbury Cemetery
• Rowley Regis Cemetery
• Rowley Regis Crematorium
• Sandwell Valley Crematorium
• Tipton Cemetery

Other local records in the region are available on Deceased Online courtesy of the National Archives for the West Midlands.

Upcoming Records

We're working hard on processing more than 1,000,000 burial and cremation records from authorities in London, the West and East Midlands, and the East of England.

Get the most out of Deceased Online

To narrow searches down to an area or to a specific cemetery or crematorium use the advanced search facility. For example, to search records in Sandwell, select the following:

Country - United Kingdom
Region - West Midlands
County - West Midlands
Contributor - Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council (for all Sandwell records)
or Cemetery - Uplands (for Uplands only)

Once you click on a name in the search results it will show the information that is available to view. Common types of information include:

• The scan of the relevant burial or cremation register page. This will show the handwritten entry made in the original register and will usually include details such as the age, dates of burial/cremation and death, and address.
• How many people are in the same grave as the record you've searched, their names, dates and the full grave reference
• A section map showing the area where the grave is located or the ashes are buried/scattered
• Some record collections also contain headstone images

Above: Viewing the other occupants of the grave

Useful search tips:

The wild card is a % and can be inserted anywhere that there may be a variation in spelling of a name. Typing "ab%" will return all the people whose name starts with Ab, such as Abbott, Abberley, Abbey, etc. Typing M%cDonald will return both McDonald and MacDonald.

For all variants on one letter in a name, use an underscore: _. Typing "H_ywood" will return both Haywood and Heywood.

Above: Searching a cemetery with the surname Ab%

Search tips are detailed in full on Deceased Online's help page