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  • Marriage query

    These days it is becoming more popular for people to go abroad and marry. In these circumstances, would the marriage be registered once they are back in the UK, or do the couple just have a local marriage certificate?

    (I can see lots of difficulties in tracing families a few years down the line :D)
    Linda


    My avatar is my Grandmother Carolina Meulenhoff 1896 - 1955

  • #2
    Just the local one. :(
    Always looking for Goodwins in Berkshire.

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    • #3
      That could explain a lot. Thanks STG
      Linda


      My avatar is my Grandmother Carolina Meulenhoff 1896 - 1955

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      • #4
        Registrars are only allowed to register BDM events that take place in their own district - so they can't register a foreign marriage in the UK even if they are asked to.

        There is an exception to this for serving members of HM forces who marry abroad or for marriages conducted by a UK consular officer (where no local registration facilities exist).
        Retired professional researcher, and ex- deputy registrar, now based in Worcestershire. Happy to give any help or advice I can ( especially on matters of civil registration) - contact via PM or my website www.chalfontresearch.co.uk
        Follow me on Twittter @ChalfontR

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        • #5
          There is an exception to this for serving members of HM forces who marry abroad or for marriages conducted by a UK consular officer (where no local registration facilities exist).

          Yes I always thought this was the case but I have been unable to find a marriage Certificate of a marriage that took place in Malta around 1931 where the groom was in the Navy. The person in the Navy was Irish but the bride was English. I have a Wedding Photograph, but no certificate and I have written twice to Malta and have searched the Overseas Navy and Consulate Records without success.

          I also have one other marriage that took place abroad in the 1880's, but knowing where in France they married I was able to get hold of the marriage certificate from the relevant French City, and that marriage was not registered through the Consulate Records in this country either! The groom was Swedish and the Bride was English and the marriage produced two sons born in Italy, neither of whom were recorded with the Consular births! They were then educated in Sweden although the couple lived in the UK, and the two sons eventually emigrated to Canada to join the British Expeditionary Force, with one son being posted to the UK during the First World War. That son met and married a British girl in London, so I do have that marriage certificate!

          Life can get very complicated with Overseas Births Marriages and no doubt Deaths!!

          Janet
          Last edited by Janet; 14-12-13, 15:57.

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          • #6
            There was no requirement for British subjects marrying or having children overseas to notify the embassy/consular service locally - it was an option that some chose to do, some didn't (often I suspect, when they were about to travel back to the UK and the children needed passports).
            Retired professional researcher, and ex- deputy registrar, now based in Worcestershire. Happy to give any help or advice I can ( especially on matters of civil registration) - contact via PM or my website www.chalfontresearch.co.uk
            Follow me on Twittter @ChalfontR

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            • #7
              It also worth remembering that there was a period of time when UK nationality law deprived a British woman of her British nationality if she married someone who was not a British or Commonwealth citizen. I am not sure when it came into force but I do know it was repealed by the British Nationality Act of 1948.

              As an example, if a British woman married a Frenchman in say 1935, she automatically lost her British nationality (though hopefully she would have qualified for French nationality instead). From that point onwards, neither she nor any children born outside the UK would have been entitled to British passports. Consequently that couple were not very likely to want or be able to register their marriage or their children’s births with the local British Consul.

              (This slightly bizarre law meant that British women who had married Germans and Austrians were no longer British, and so when the 2nd world war started, they were treated as enemy aliens and required to register with the police. Some were even briefly interned.)
              Last edited by Elwyn; 14-12-13, 16:58.
              Elwyn

              I am based in Co. Antrim and undertake research in Northern Ireland. Please feel free to contact me for help or advice via PM.

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              • #8
                Thanks Elwyn and Anthony. That could well explain some of the problems I have had. I had forgotten about the deprivation of UK nationality when marrying a non commonwealth or non British citizen. In fact that explains a lot now that has dawned on me! Many thanks.

                Janet

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                • #9
                  Another interesting spin is a civil marriage abroad, followed later in the UK by a religious ceremony solemnising the marriage .
                  I was invited to a "wedding" at a RC church a few years ago. It turned out the couple had officially married overseas some months previously, in the home country of the non-EU groom, but wanted to be "married" in keeping with the rites of the RC faith. After a long to do (which included nuptial mass) the party went off into the vestry to sign, but no registrar was present when the happy couple signed the church register. (That was how I found out there had already been the overseas secular marriage, when I asked where was the registrar and was the marriage legal?)
                  So, as I understand it, for anyone researching in years to come, the parish marriage register will show some record of the event, whilst the GRO index won't.

                  Jay
                  Janet in Yorkshire



                  Genealogists never die - they just swap places in the family tree

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                  • #10
                    Moving sideways to birth registrations. My brother was born in Nigeria which was then a British colony. His birth was registered locally but apparently never made it to the UK Overseas birth records. My parents always were a bit lax when faced with officialdom.
                    Uncle John - Passed away March 2020

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