Search for your England or Welsh ancestor in this online index of civil registration of births in England & Wales from 1837 until 2006. Birth records are a key source for your family tree. Once you discover your ancestor, you can use the information found on the transcript to order your ancestor’s original birth record.
Search for your England or Welsh ancestor in this online index of civil registration of births in England & Wales from 1837 until 2006. Birth records are a key source for your family tree. Once you discover your ancestor, you can use the information found on the transcript to order your ancestor’s original birth record.
In each you record, you will find a transcript and for those records before 1984, you can also view the original index. The birth, marriage and death records from 1984 onwards were recorded in a computer database only so there is no original image for records post-1984. Each transcript will include
Name
Birth year
Birth quarter
Registration month
Mother’s last name
District
District number
County
Country
Entry number
Since 1 July 1837, civil registration of births has been a legal requirement of all citizens of England and Wales. In order to find your ancestor’s born before 1837, it is best to search the parish registers. Birth records are a key source to creating your family tree.
All the civil birth records on Findmypast are name-indexed, which makes finding your ancestors so much simpler. The old birth indexes were page-indexed rather than name-indexed, meaning that to find your ancestors you had to check through pages of records and see if your ancestor was somewhere on the image. The original documents are held by the General Register Office (GRO). By using the information found within this index, you can request the original document of your ancestor’s birth. You will need to register with the GRO site and pay a small fee. A link to the order form is provided in the Useful links section.
Note that Findmypast has augmented some records to include mothers' maiden names that may not appear on the original index image.
Remember to double check the birth quarter, district, and country to make sure you have the right person before you order the original document. However, in some cases you may need to order more than one before you find the right person.
The registration month will not always be the same as the individual’s birth month. For various reasons, a gap sometimes occurred between the time of birth of the time of registration of the birth.
Once you find your ancestor, search Findmypast’s extensive collection of parish records. Most parish records are organised by county.