Military Records - British Columbia

Online

• Ancestry.ca and FamilySearch.org include searchable military records in their databases.
• Library and Archives Canada holds Canadian military personnel and service files.  Records that are open to the public are pre-1914, World War 1, and World War 2 for soldiers that died in service. 
• Veterans Affairs Canada
• Books of Remembrance search page 
• Soldiers of the First World War:  Digital images of war diaries of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, searchable by unit name and date
• Canadian Expeditionary Force records:   searchable database. 
• Commonwealth War Graves Commission: A site that honors the 1.7 million men and women of the Commonwealth forces who died in the First and Second World Wars.
• Canadian Virtual War Memorial
• Royal Canadian Armored Corps Battle Honors
• Canadian Military Heritage Project  

Print

When searching for military print items in our library catalogue use keywords such as “soldiers – Canada”, “soldiers - Canada - indexes”, or “soldiers -location- registers”.  Some examples here:

BC Genealogical Society. British Columbia War Memorials: An index of names Library Call number 929.3711 BRI 1990

British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa.  Index to Canadian Service Records of the South African War (1899-1902) held at the National Archives of Canada.  Library call number 929.371 IND 1999

Cox, Kenneth.  A Call to the Colours: Tracing Your Canadian Military Ancestors. Library call number: 929.1072071 COX 2011

Microfilm

See Section 9 of the library’s guide Canadian Family History Resources which describes Canadian military records on microfilm available at the library. 

In 2001, vital events records were released that were related to the deaths of 3423 British Columbians in World War Two. Although British Columbia death registrations normally cover only deaths that occurred in British Columbia, these records are an exception. These records can be found on the BC Archives genealogy site. Search the site as usual by name but try adding “overseas” as a place name, as well as each war year between 1940 and 1945. You may also try searching by place name – most common are England, Holland, Hong Kong, India, Italy, France, and Germany. 

These records are available in microfilm format in our Family History department. The film numbers are B14424, B14425, B14426, and B14427.