True Vs TrueHi

[Ken Boyce]

Hi
Would I be correct in making the following statement that

”The only real (true) copy of a Birth Marriage or Death Registry entry in England and Wales is one which is a facsimile of the original entry. All other so called copies are certified transcripts of the entry and depending upon where these certified transcripts are obtained could themselves have been taken from a (transcripted) copy of the original Register.

In the case of marriages transcripts made from the original entry are identified as being “certified to be a true copy of an entry in a register of marriages." Transcripts made from transcripts are indentified as being "certified to be a true copy of a certifed copy of an entry in a register of marrages" The former are supplied from the District Offices the latter Certificates are I believe the ones issued by the GRO/PRO and are transcrribed from copies not duplicates of the Marriage Registers"

Enlighten me if I’ve got it wrong!

Regards

[Pam Downes]

I have in front of me a marriage certificate ordered from the GRO and under the marriage details it says
'Certified to be a true copy of an entry in the certified copy of a register of Marriages in the Registration District of.......'

A birth certificate ordered from the GRO says
'Certified to be a true copy of an entry in the certified copy of a Register of Births in the District above mentioned'.
Death certificate says the same except for 'Register of Deaths' instead of 'Register of Births'.

A birth certificate obtained though the local Registrar's Office says
'Certified to be a true copy of an entry in a register in my custody.'

Haven't got copies of locally-issued marriage or death certs to hand.
Pam

[Ken Boyce]

Hi Pat - thanks for the reply

This reinforces my belief that whilst the GRO issued certified copies contain more information than do the GRO Indexes the surety is about the same for each since both have undergone the same number of transcriptions
This comes about because establishments licensed to perform marriages (including churches) must carry and complete duplicate copies of the registers at the ceremony but the procedure for making quarterly copies is by law by hand

On completion of a wedding ceremony the participates must enter the marriage details identically into each Register (differences have occurred). .At the end of the quarter in which the marriage took place, the incumbent in legal charge of the Registers must transcribe on to forms details of each marriage entered into the Register for that quarter. These copies are sent to the Superintendent Registrar of the Registration District. The Supt Registrar forwards them to the Registrar General who uses them to produce GRO Certificates. and Indexes

Presumably someone must certify the quarterly transcript during this process - most likely the holder of the two Registers

When the marriage registers are full, one copy is sent to the District Supt Registrar for safe-keeping. Until the Supt Registrar has the legal charge of a Register he/she cannot issue certified copies of an entry from that register. However the holder of the two partially completed registers can (must) presumably provide access

The second copy of the completed register I suspect is up for grabs at the whim of the legal custodian

A similar procedure is followed for Births and Deaths but I don’t think there are duplicate Registers

I’m unsure if the above holds true for the whole period from 1837 to 2004

I ‘ve only just noticed that the copy of my father’s birth cert which I always thought had been issued by Barnet has the double whammy in fine print at the bottom of the page so must be a GRO Copy

Regards

[arthurk]

Some interesting distinctions here - I hadn't noticed the subtly different wording! As far as church marriage registers go you are basically correct; on a couple of points that you mention...


Presumably someone must certify the quarterly transcript during this process - most likely the holder of the two Registers
Yes - for church marriage registers it has to be a clergyman, so normally the one who has custody of the registers, but in case of a vacancy etc, another clergyman, such as the rural dean, might do it.


The second copy of the completed register I suspect is up for grabs at the whim of the legal custodian
You make it sound like he can put it on eBay! As far as the Church of England is concerned, the incumbent has to look after it, though they are strongly encouraged to deposit completed registers in the diocesan record office - usually the same as the county archives - because they will be kept securely in a properly controlled environment.

Arthur

[waspexile]

Hi
Would I be correct in making the following statement that

”The only real (true) copy of a Birth Marriage or Death Registry entry in England and Wales is one which is a facsimile of the original entry. All other so called copies are certified transcripts of the entry and depending upon where these certified transcripts are obtained could themselves have been taken from a (transcripted) copy of the original Register.

In the case of marriages transcripts made from the original entry are identified as being “certified to be a true copy of an entry in a register of marriages." Transcripts made from transcripts are indentified as being "certified to be a true copy of a certifed copy of an entry in a register of marrages" The former are supplied from the District Offices the latter Certificates are I believe the ones issued by the GRO/PRO and are transcrribed from copies not duplicates of the Marriage Registers"


Enlighten me if I’ve got it wrong!

Regards

Just to add another note.... I have a death certificate from the GRO from 1900, which took a lot longer to arrive because it has been retyped with modern equipment, including a correction in the margin as their were 2 errors.
This still says it is "CERTIFIED to be a true copy of an entry in the certified copy of a Register of Deaths in the Distrct above mentioned"

I dont know wny it was retyped - maybe the original was too bad illegible to copy.

[Ken Boyce]

Re Retyping of 1900 Birth Cert

I think what you have is nothing more than the GRO sending you a certified typed copy of the entry contained in their transcripted copy of the District Register instead of sending you a certified handwritten copy – one small step in the modernization process.

Most certainly they have NOT retyped or rewritten the original 1900 entry or changed the entry in any way Also they do not "copy" in the sense of a photocopy (technical name Facsimili) they hand (or type in this case) write what they read on the page

In this case it would seem that the original transcribed copy sent to the GRO in 1900 by the local District Office was either found at sometime over the years to in error and was corrected or had to be revised within a short time after being transcribed because of a revision to the original District Registry entry
Real progress will be made when we can obtain a facsimile of the original entry as written warts and all

Regards