Any way to access a coroner's report from the 1900s?

Hi Alicia!

I assume the deaths occurred in the Republic of Ireland.

I checked Find My Past.ie  and they do not have the coroner's reports. I don't believe they are online anywhere.

I found this information from a Brian Donnelly on the National Archives site  https://www.nationalarchives.ie/topics/Medical_sources/HR_2.html

Coroners’ records
Initially transferred from the Crown and Peace offices in the 19th century and more recently from the county registrars offices, coroners’ records are a useful source of medical information. Many of the earlier records were destroyed when the Public Record Office was blown up in 1922 but some 19th century coroners’ records dating mainly from the 1880s are held in the NAI as are the Official Papers which include summary coroners’ returns, giving name of deceased, date of inquest and cause of death etc. Such data survives for most Irish counties between 1835 and 1837 and for the years 1857, 1873, 1875, 1876 and 1878 with less extensive returns from 1858 to 1863.

Twentieth-century coroners’ records also survive, with some counties being better represented than others. The most complete set of coroners’ records survive for Dublin city, namely the morgue registers for the period 1871–1933. These provide details of bodies brought to the morgue and subsequent inquests on them, in addition to registers of coroners’ inquiries and coroners’ registers from the 1890s. The former relate to cases – later called natural causes cases – where there was some initial enquiry into a death but it was later decided that an inquest was not necessary. The coroners’ registers relate to deaths for which inquests were held and files on deaths survive from the 1930s. Many of the files contain postmortem reports on the deceased and all provide a unique insight into the circumstances of an individual’s death, generally through a police report and depositions of witnesses. These records are available to the public.

 

I would e-mail the National Archives in Dublin and see if they are available if you visit the Archives. Not sure where you live so you may need to have a reseacher look for you for a fee.

Roger McDonnell

Many inquests were reported in local newspapers. If you have access to an on-line newspaper site you could search and you may find reports of the cases there. Probably easier than trying to locate the coroners files. I’d also wonder if a Coroners file from the 1950s would be open to the public yet. It might still be closed.