United Kingdom Civil Registration from 1837 (England & Wales)
The Government in the United Kingdom has registered births, deaths and marriages in England and Wales since 1 July 1837. This process is known as civil registration. This information sheet explains how to locate and purchase information about registered births, marriages and deaths.
The registers where birth, death and marriage details are recorded are not accessible to the public. Instead, you can purchase information from the registers as certificates. However, before a certificate can be ordered you must first consult an index to the registers.
UK civil registration indexes
UK civil registration indexes are commonly known as St Catherine's House or GRO (General Register Office) indexes. These are the indexes you will need to search before you can obtain a birth, marriage or death certificate.
What information is in the indexes?
From 1837 onwards, entries in the indexes provide:
- surname
- given names
- registration district
- volume and page number of the register where the event was recorded.
Birth index entries include:
- the mother's maiden name from 1 July 1911 onwards.
Marriage index entries include:
- spouse's surname from 1 January 1912 onwards.
Death index entries include:
- the age of the deceased person at death from 1 January 1866 onwards
- the individual's date of birth from 1 April 1969 onwards.
Information about British nationals overseas
Indexes to births, deaths and marriages of British nationals overseas are separated from the main St Catherine's House indexes. These additional indexes, known as the GRO Miscellaneous indexes, include:
- War deaths of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Indian Services
- Army births, marriages and deaths
- UK High Commission and Consular births, marriages and deaths
- Air and marine births and deaths.
Where can I use the indexes?
The St Catherine's House indexes are available at the State Library of Victoria's Genealogy Centre.
Visitors to the Centre can access these indexes in two formats:
- on microfiche at call number GMF 73 (1837-2002)
- electronically via the Ancestry Library Edition database (1837-2004)
You can find out more about accessing this database in our Ancestry Library Edition information sheet.
The following websites provide free online access to parts of the indexes:
- FreeBMD provides access to over 162 million civil registration index entries for England and Wales. Volunteers are gradually adding entries for the period 1837-1919. Coverage is incomplete as entries for some years and many events have not yet been transcribed.
- UK BMD lists websites that provide information about birth, marriage and death records in the UK and Ireland. Some of the sites listed include transcripts of original county records, from which the civil registration records were created.
There are also a growing number of websites that provide fee-based access to civil registration index entries:
Indexes relating to British nationals overseas are available in the Genealogy Centre on microfiche at call number GMF 73, and via the fee-based FindMyPast website.
How are the indexes organised?
The indexes for the years 1837 to 1983 are in separate death, marriage, and birth sequences. Each sequence is published quarterly, so a year needs to be searched in four three-month sequences - January-March, April-June, July-September and October-December.
From 1984, the birth, death and marriage indexes are published annually.
Identifying civil registration districts
It can be useful to locate the district where a birth, death or marriage was registered, as this is often where a relative lived.
Locating registration districts is also important when the index lists several people of the same name for a given year or quarter. You will often have other information about a family indicating where they are likely to have lived or worked. These areas can be compared with the districts listed to help determine those people most likely to be your ancestors.
Geographic coverage of and changes to registration districts are listed in:
Wiggins, Ray 2001, Registration districts: an alphabetical list of over 650 districts with details of counties, sub-districts and adjacent districts, 3rd ed., Society of Genealogists, London.
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UK certificates
Once an entry has been found in one of the indexes, a certificate can be ordered. Certificates are available in full or brief formats. Full certificates should contain the following information:
- Birth
- Date and place of birth
- Name of child
- Name and occupation of father
- Name and maiden name or previous married name of mother
- Signature or mark
- Name and address of the informant (usually a parent)
- Marriage
- Date and place of marriage
- Names and ages of spouses and their places of residence
- Spouses' occupations and whether bachelor, spinster, widow or widower
- Names and occupations of their fathers
- Whether the marriage took place after banns or by marriage licence
- The signatures or marks of the spouses and two witnesses
- Death
- Name of the deceased and the date and place of death
- Cause of death (very unreliable on earlier certificates)
- The age or (from June 1969) the date of birth of the deceased
- The deceased's occupation
- The signature or mark and name and address of the informant.
Source: Herber, Mark 2004, Ancestral trails: the complete guide to British genealogy and family history, 2nd ed., Sutton, Stroud, pp. 45-47.
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Ordering certificates
To obtain a certificate you must provide all details given on the index entry, and the year (and quarter for St Catherine's House index entries up to 1983) in which the entry appeared.
Copies of certificates may be ordered directly from the General Register Office in the UK via post, fax or online. Visit the General Register Office website for more information, including a list of certificate fees.
Further information
Detailed information about the civil registration process, and tips to help locate missing entries can be found in:
Herber, Mark 2004, 'Chapter 5: Civil registration of birth, marriages and deaths' in Ancestral trails: the complete guide to British genealogy and family history, 2nd ed., Sutton, Stroud.
View catalogue entry >
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