Obtaining copies of birth, death or marriage certificates

The registration of births, marriages and deaths in England and Wales started in 1837 and legal adoptions have been registered since 1927.

Each local register office holds records of every birth, marriage and death which has taken place within their district and can provide copies of entries, in the form of a certificate, on request.

Alternatively, the General Register Office also hold a central index of all certificates and you can obtain copies from them.

They offer the facility to order certificates online (external link), this can be used to place orders using the GRO index reference and for certificates in the 20th Century where the exact details are known. See their section on Ways to apply (external link) for a range of other options.

If you require a certificate for a registration that has taken place in the last 18 months, however, you should contact the register office at which the details were recorded, or, in the case of a marriage, the register office, church or other religious building at which the details were recorded.  Contact the Cheshire Registration Service or visit their website (external link) for more information.  They also offer information for tracing family history at Genealogy & Historical Records (external link)

Working in co-operation with the Family History Society of Cheshire and the South Cheshire Family History Society Cheshire County Council has started to make its back Registration Indexes available over the Internet. It will be some time before all historic records are available. However, to see what progress has been made visit the Cheshire BMD Website (external link)

For further information about family trees, genealogy and how to trace your ancestors, visit our Family History Section.