Genealogy Chat

Is there somewhere you can order marriage certificates for England...I know the names and years off 2 off the marriages, but the other two I don't???...... AGNES SMITH & GEORGE JENNINGS, 1908 at Sunderland..... HELEN SMITH & STANLEY COWELL 1914 Sunderland..........JANE (Jean) SMITH & JOCK KIRKTON ?....... ANNIE (Nance) SMITH & GEORGE BOULLIN? any help please!! Thank You. Sui

Hiya First you need the ref; Agnes Smith & George Jennings Sunderland Q of Dec 1908 10a 1101. Helen Smith & Stanley Cowell Sunderland Q of June 1913 (not 1914) 10a 1213. Back in a bit if i can find the others for you.

Go to FreeBMD http://www.freebmd(.)com (remove brackets) and enter the details of your ancestors. You will get a reference that you can use to order a certificate, on-line, from the GRO http://www.gro.gov(.)uk/gro/content/ (remove the brackets). It costs 7 pounds per certificate. The reference will read something like Lincoln September 1924 7a 778. PM me if you need any further help.

If you need to look up cert refs in future, there are two likely ways... Local Register Office (many have online sites - some with searchable databases - see www.ukbmd.org.uk - these sites can be really good.) GRO ref (the central index, compiled quarterly from the local indexes - this has its own site, as mentioned above) Local and central refs are not the same - but fees are. If you're trying to get the central copy, it's £7 with the ref, or £11.50 without it, so it's worth having a look first. FreeBMD has a searchable database. It's a volunteer transcription site. They've achieved a huge amount, but there are a few gaps, still, and there's very little yet after about 1910. The last year will be 1983. The results sometimes link to the GRO index image for you to check for yourself. Ancestry has a copy of the FreeBMD database (with a much faster search) but, being a copy, it may not always be the latest. Searchable free. The results usually link to the GRO index image for you to check for yourself. Ancestry also has the full GRO image-set searchable by first & last name on the page. There are some glitches and, at the moment, it's free - while it's in beta (i.e. test) mode. Presumably, once it's sorted, it'll not be free any more. They also have the GRO info (searchable) after 1983. Christine

Thank You ladies. Thank you for the ref no's for the first 2... I'll also take the advise you's have posted.. so I'm away to search for my other two (stingy me.. huh not paying £11.50 if I can pay £7..lol) Thanks again Sui :-))))))