English and Welsh family records
Civil registration for England and Wales started 1 July 1837 and compulsory registration began in 1874. These are known as the General Register Indexes (GRO), but were formerly known as the St Catherine’s House Indexes.
Research Central holds the Civil Registration indexes from July 1837- 2001.
Quarterly indexes from 1837 – 1983
You will need to check quarterly indexes from 1837-1983, as indexing is based on the date of registration and not on the date of the actual event. For example, someone could be born in December 1890 but not registered until January 1891. Therefore the reference will not occur until the first quarter (January - March) of 1891.
Annual indexes from 1984
The information given on the indexes is very limited: name, registration district, volume, page number.
The volume number is a geographic code.
Age at death is included in the index from 1866, and name of spouse is included in marriage indexes from 1912.
How to request a certificate for England or Wales
It is possible to get a certificate from the
General Register Office or Local Registry Office in England, or from a New Zealand based certificate service.
New Zealand based certificate services
It's important to know that requesting copies of documents will incur a fee.
Parish registers
Prior to civil registration (before July 1837), and even after to some extent, you will need to search parish registers.
We have some parish registers available in book or microfiche format at 4 ENG BDM (followed by the county abbreviation) or 4 WLS BDM (followed by the county abbreviation).
Some parish registers are on CD ROM, for example Phillimores Marriage Registers for some counties.
International Genealogical Index - from about 1500 to the end of the 19th Century.
Vital Records Index British Isles (CD Rom) contains 5 million births, christenings and marriages taken from a partial collection of records in the British Isles dating from 1538-1888.
Recommended reading