Family Historian User Group

Were paper birth marriage death certificates issued right from the start of civil registration? I am particluarly intersted in Scotland but also doing English research as well.. have never come across any really old ones![nonsense]

ID:2057

01 July 1837 in England. Sometime in 1855 for Scotland

Thanks - I am aware of the official dates registration was introduced. I was just wondering if it was the norm for people say in the late 1800s to actually have possession of a paper certificate of the type we are used to now - or was it just a matter of it being registered and written up ... maybe our lot just threw them out![grin]

I have not seen many early ones, although I have several marriage certificates from my Mums side of the family, where the numbers or children were few, I would guess in larger families who ended up with the certificates would vary, and if you were not interested in the documents from a historic point of view they probably did get thrown out.

The oldest certificates I have were passed down by my grandmother. They are on very thin paper - I think it is called onion skin and there is what looks like a postage stamp in the bottom right corner.

I would think paper certificates were handed out right from the beginning otherwise people would not bother to register the births etc.

Irene B

The oldest original I have is a marriage certificate of my great grandparents dated 25/04/1896. I know that they are around long before this though

The oldest i have is a birth certifcate from Nov 1892. On the back it has a note saying that it 'is to be given on demand to the INFORMANT at the time of registering the Birth on payment of a fee not exceeding Three pence'. I then refers to section 30 of the 'Births and deaths Registration Act 1874'.

Richard