Death Certificates and family health history

Written as part of Amy Johnson Crow’s “52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks” challenge. This week’s topic: Health

Death certificates include more than the date and place of an ancestor’s death. They usually have information on the deceased’s parents, essential for confirming or establishing a direct line from one generation to another. But they are also an incredibly useful source of information on health issues that may plague families through generations.  

My father, Douglas Hamilton Macnee, died on 16 April 1967 in Torquay, of complications following a stroke.  He was 64.  It seems that circulation diseases – of the heart and brain – ran through several generations of his family.  

Douglas’s mother, Emma, died of Heart Disease: Syncope (irregular pulse), Dyspnoea (shortness of breath) and vomiting.  She had suffered myocardial degeneration for several years.   She was 74.

 His father, Robert Hamilton Macnee/MacNie, died of “Arteriosclerosis, Myocarditis, Cardiac failure”.  He was 80.  

 Going back one more generation his paternal grandfather, Robert MacNie died of brain disease - probably a stroke.  He was 79.  

Robert’s wife, Elizabeth Hamilton, died of heart failure.  She was 89.

And even further, Robert MacNie’s mother Jean McCulloch, died on 2 April 1859, suddenly ‘probably of heart failure’ in East Boreland, Denny, Stirlingshire, Scotland.  She was 76 years old. 

So it should be no surprise if this cause of death continues into my generation.