Purchasing BMD Certificates

For England and Wales, you can order certificates from the General Register Office (GRO) using the GRO reference code from your FreeBMD search. See this page on FreeBMD for more information. You can also purchase certificates from the local Register Office for the event.

For the records of Scottish citizens, researchers must order via the National Records of Scotland. This is the same process for death, marriage, divorce, civil partnerships, census and old parish registers.

For the records of Northern Irish citizens, use the NI Direct website to order birth, adoption, marriage, civil partnership or death certificates.

Events that took place overseas

The GRO has records of births, marriages and deaths of some British citizens that have taken place abroad since the late 18th century. These include births, marriages or deaths registered by the armed forces recorded by British consulates or high commissions at sea, or on British oil or gas rigs, or aircraft. See our BMDs at Sea page for more information.

Stillbirth Registers

Please Note: Registers are not publicly indexed/digitised, and copies of certificates will only be given to relatives.

England & Wales

Stillbirths were registered from 1st July 1927. Contact the GRO by phone or in writing and they will send out an application pack.

General Register Office
PO Box 2
Southport
Merseyside

Tel: 0300 123 1837

Scotland

Stillbirths were registered from 1939. Information on ordering certificates can be found on the National Records of Scotland website.

Northern Ireland

Stillbirths were registered from 1961. Certificates must be ordered through the General Register Office of Northern Ireland. The order form can be downloaded here.

The Historic Stillbirth Register (£)

The Historic Stillbirth Register currently contains over 10,000 stillbirths transcribed from parish registers, and other sources, from many counties in England and Wales (1551-2005, but not exhaustive).