Diocese of Ontario Archives
Due to an increase in genealogical search requests related to Bill C-3, An Act to Amend the Citizenship Act (2025), archives staff are taking longer than usual to complete search requests. Your patience is greatly appreciated.
The Archives are currently closed to in-person research access. Requests can be made via email (archives@ontario.anglican.ca) for virtual records requests, including baptism, marriage, and burial registries.
Holdings
Parish Records consist of registers of baptisms, confirmations, marriages and burials, vestry minutes, service registers, accounts, correspondence, land documents, architectural plans, surveys, newspaper clippings, photos, and sentences of consecration. Diocesan Boards, Committees and Synod Office Records consist of Synod Council, Stewardship, Mission Board minutes and other committees; Episcopal records; as well as records of the Executive Office, Finance Office, and other departments. Other Diocesan Groups & Organizations consist of records of the Anglican Church Women, Woman’s Auxiliary, Camp Hyanto, Dialogue Newspaper, Lay Readers, and Cursillo.
Diocese in Profile
The Anglican Diocese of Ontario is a diocese of the Ecclesiastical Province of Ontario of the Anglican Church of Canada, itself a province of the world-wide Anglican Communion. Its See City is Kingston, Ontario, and its Cathedral is St. George’s, Kingston. The Diocese is not coterminous with the Canadian civil Province of Ontario, but rather encompasses approximately 17,700 square kilometers of it, and comprises the Counties of Prince Edward, Hastings, Lennox & Addington, Frontenac, and Leeds and Grenville. Apart from Kingston, the other major centres included in the Diocese are Belleville, Trenton, Brockville, and Kemptville.
The Diocese was founded in 1862, when it was divided from the Diocese of Toronto. The Diocese of Ontario was incorporated by “An Act Respecting the Incorporated Synod of Ontario”. Until 1896, it included the present day Diocese of Ottawa. Its first Bishop, John Travers Lewis, a Church of Ireland cleric, was the first bishop to be consecrated in Canada, rather than England.
