Search British armed forces and overseas banns and marriages

With each result, you will be provided with a transcript, and many of the results will include an image of the original record. The details found in each transcript will differ depending on the original record. The records from the General Register Office refer to an index, and the details provided will allow you to order an original certificate.

• Name
• Sex
• Age
• Birth year
• Banns year
• Marriage year
• Place
• County and country
• Organisation
• Spouse’s name
• Marital status
• Occupation
• Residence
• Spouse’s age
• Spouse’s marital status
• Spouse’s occupation
• Spouse’s residence
• Father’s name
• Father’s occupation
• Spouse’s father’s name
• Spouse’s father’s occupation
• Witnesses’ names
• Source
• Record type and year range
• Archive reference and archive

Findmypast has pulled together sources from the General Register Office (GRO) and The National Archives (TNA) to create this extensive collection of British armed forces members and civilians married overseas and at sea. A full list of sources is provided below.

The records related to the armed forces include registrations of British armed forces (including serving members who were not British nationals) posted overseas. This index also includes some regimental registers and chaplains' returns for army marriages that took place in the British Isles, for example, at barracks and garrisons.

If you have a relative or ancestor who was married overseas, but was still classed as a British citizen at the time of the marriage, then it is quite possible that the British Consul or the UK High Commission in the relevant jurisdiction would have been notified of the marriage, allowing you to find the record within the GRO's Consular indices.

The collection includes registers of the marriages of passengers between 1854 and 1890 compiled from ships' official logs of births, deaths, and marriages of passengers at sea by the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen and its predecessor. There are names of passengers travelling on both British-registered and foreign-registered ships.

Many of these records were available on Findmypast as separate record sets: British nationals married overseas 1818-2005, British nationals armed forces marriages 1796-2005, British overseas marriages, and Marriages at sea, 1854-1972. All the record sets have been pulled together along with new records from The National Archives to create this extensive collection.

The list is organised in alphabetical order by series and separated by the repository (General Register Office or The National Archives).

General Register Office

ARM2 - GRO Index Army Marriages (1881 to 1955)

ART1 - GRO Article 6/ Article 18 Marriages (Up to 1955)

ART2 - GRO Article 6/ Article 18 Marriages (1956 to 1965)

BRIT - GRO Army Marriages Within British Lines (1914 to 1925)

M1995onwards - GRO Marriages Abroad Indices (1995 to 2005)

MABR - GRO Marriages Abroad (1966 to 1994)

MCHA - GRO Chaplains Returns Marriages (1796 to 1880)

MCON - GRO Consular Marriages (1849 to 1965)

MINC - GRO Ionian Islands Chaplains Returns Marriages (1818 to 1864)

MINM - GRO Ionian Islands Military Registration Marriages (1818 to 1864)

MINV - GRO Ionian Islands Civil Registration Marriages (1818 to 1864)

MSRV - GRO Service Department Marriages (1956 to 1965)

MUK1 - GRO U.K. High Commission Marriages (Up to 1960)

MUK2 - GRO U.K. High Commission Marriages (1961 to 1965)

The National Archives

BT 334 - Marriages at sea 1891-1972

ADM 185/69 - Royal Marines Light Infantry marriage register

ADM 193/9 - Royal Marine Artillery Division, Portsmouth, marriage & baptism register

ADM 7/1 - Miscellaneous Navy birth, marriage & death certificates

BT 158/1-4, 9 - Registers of births, deaths & marriages of passengers at sea

FO 211/236 - Denmark Embassy, Consulate & Legation: marriage affidavits

FO 292/4 - Legation Dresden, Saxony: marriage register

FO 299/22 - Consulate Leipzig, Saxony: death register

FO 352/43C/11C - Marriages solemnised at the House of British Minister at Florence

FO 375/2 - Consulates Luanda & Sao Tome, Portuguese West Africa: marriage register

FO 375/3 - Consulates Luanda & Sao Tome, Portuguese West Africa: lex loci marriage register

FO 378/3 - Consulate Leningrad/St Petersburg: lex loci marriage register

FO 384/1 - Consulate Nantes, France: marriage register

FO 509/1-2 - Consulate Konigsberg, Germany: marriage register

FO 518/1-2 - Consulate Moscow, Russia: lex loci marriage register

FO 559/1 - Consulate Ponta Delgada, Portugal: Register of deaths, births, marriages & burials

FO 560/1 - Bushire, Iran: register of Births, Baptisms, Marriages & Deaths

FO 564/1-2 - Legation Peking, China: marriage notices

FO 564/3-6 - Legation Peking, China: marriage notices

FO 585/4 - Consulate Bremen & Bremerhaven, Germany: marriage notices

FO 585/5 - Consulate Bremen & Bremerhaven, Germany: lex loci marriage register

FO 604/3 - District of Dusseldorf Consulate: marriage register

FO 604/5 - District of Dusseldorf consulate: lex loci marriage register

FO 663/93-64 - Consulate Amoy, China: marriage register

FO 667/5 - Consulate Ichang, China: marriage register

FO 670/4 - Consulate Ningpo, China: marriage register

FO 672/3 - Consulate Shanghai, China: marriage register

FO 687/5 - Consulate Papeete, French Polynesia: birth, marriage & death register

FO 748/26 - Legation Stockholm, Sweden: marriages reported by local authorities

FO 767/6 - Consulate St Vincent, Cape Verde: Marriage notice book

FO 767/7 - Consulate St Vincent, Cape Verde: Marriage oath book

FO 83/1138 - Marriages at embassies & legations, Athens, Berlin, Berne, Bucharest, Bogeta, Brussels

FO 83/1141 - Marriages at embassies & legations, Constantinople, Copenhagen, Darmstadt, Dresden, Florence, Hague, Lisbon, Madrid, Montevideo, Munich

FO 83/1144-1145 - Marriages at embassies & legations, Paris

FO 83/1147 - Marriages at embassies & legations, Pekin, Rio, Rome, St Petersburg, Stockholm, Stuttgart, Tokio, Vienna, Yokohama

FO 83/1492-1496 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/1498 - Marriages abroad, N-Z

FO 83/1582-1583 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/1645-1646 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/1705-1706 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/1765 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/1815-1816 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/1926-1827 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/1966-1967 - Marriages abroad

FO 83/2061-2062 - Marriages abroad

FO 866/14 - Legation & consulate, Port-au-Prince, Haiti: Registers of births, deaths & marriages

FO 866/21-22 - Legation & consulate, Port-au-Prince, Haiti: marriage register

FO 910/10-18 - Consulate Lausanne, Switzerland: lex loci marriage register

FO 910/7 - Consulate Lausanne, Switzerland: marriage register

FO 910/8-9 - Consulate Lausanne, Switzerland: lex loci marriage register

FO 923/2 - Various Consulates, Iran (formerly Persia): register of foreign marriages

FO 927/28 - British cemetery at Malaga, Spain

FO 97/453 - Marriages abroad

FO 97/488 - Marriages abroad

FO 97/490-491 - Marriages abroad

FO 97/495 - Marriages abroad

FO 97/498 - Marriages abroad

FO 97/500-501 - Marriages abroad

FO 97/504 - Marriages abroad

FO 97/563-564 - Marriages abroad

RG 32/37 - Miscellaneous Foreign Returns

RG 33/10 - Foreign Registers & returns: Burma

RG 33/114-115, 117-119 - Foreign Registers & returns: Italy

RG 33/12-18, 21-29 - Foreign Registers & returns: China

RG 33/120-121 - Foreign Registers & returns: Italy

RG 33/122 - Foreign Registers & returns: Japan

RG 33/124 - Foreign Registers & returns: Japan

RG 33/126-127 - Foreign Registers & returns: Japan

RG 33/129-130 - Foreign Registers & returns: Japan

RG 33/133-137 - Foreign Registers & Returns: Iraq

RG 33/142 - Foreign Registers & returns: Portugal

RG 33/143 - Foreign Registers & Returns: Lower Danube, Romania

RG 33/144-146, 148-152 - Foreign Registers & returns: Russia

RG 33/153 - Foreign Registers & returns: Sweden

RG 33/154 - Foreign Registers & returns: Constantinople, Turkey

RG 33/2-4, 6-9 - Foreign Registers & returns: Belgium

RG 33/33-34 - Foreign Registers & returns: China

RG 33/35 - Foreign Registers & returns: Denmark

RG 33/42-45, 48, 54-59 - Foreign Registers & returns: France

RG 33/61 - Foreign Registers & returns: France

RG 33/63 - Foreign Registers & returns: France

RG 33/65 - Foreign Registers & returns: France

RG 33/69 - Foreign Registers & returns: France

RG 33/73-77 - Foreign Registers & returns: France

RG 33/81 - Foreign Registers & returns: Germany

RG 33/82 - Foreign Registers & returns: Greece

RG 33/83 - Foreign Registers & returns: Holland

RG 33/85 - Foreign Registers & returns: Holland

RG 33/87 - Foreign Registers & returns: Holland

RG 33/89 - Foreign Registers & returns: Holland

RG 36/10 - Registers & returns of Births, Marriages & Deaths in the Protectorates of Africa & Asia

RG 36/2 - Registers & Returns of Births, Marriages & Deaths in the Protectorates of Africa & Asia. 1904-1910: part 2

RG 36/4 - Registers & Returns of Births, Marriages & Deaths in the Protectorates of Africa & Asia. 1911-1919: part 2

RG 36/6 - Registers & Returns of Births, Marriages & Deaths in the Protectorates of Africa & Asia. 1916-1920: part 2

RG 36/8 - Registers & Returns of Births, Marriages & Deaths in the Protectorates of Africa & Asia. 1921-1923: part 2

RG 36/9 - Registers & returns of Births, Marriages & Deaths in the Protectorates of Africa & Asia

SP 110/70 - British factory at Aleppo, chaplain's register of baptisms, marriages & burials

WO 156/106 - Limasol, Troodos & Polimedia, Cyprus: burials

WO 156/12 - All Saints Garrison Church, Aldershot, Hampshire: banns

WO 156/150 - St George's Garrison Church, Aldershot, Hampshire: marriage register vol 1a

WO 156/151 - St George's Garrison Church, Aldershot, Hampshire: marriage register vol 2a

WO 156/594-595 - Malta: baptisms & marriages

WO 32/8905 - Certificates of births, baptisms, marriages & deaths extracted from old personal papers, Bu-We

WO 32/8911 - Certificates of births & baptisms, extracted from old papers A-B

WO 32/8915 - Certificates of births & baptisms, extracted from old papers R-W

WO 69/63 - Register of Marriages & Baptisms, A Brigade, Royal Horse Artillery

WO 69/64 - Register of Marriages & Baptisms, A Brigade, Royal Horse Artillery

WO 69/65 - Register of Marriages & Baptisms, B Brigade, Royal Horse Artillery

WO 69/66 - Register of Marriages & Baptisms, K Battery B Brigade, Royal Horse Artillery

WO 69/70 - Register of Marriages & Baptisms, Royal Horse Artillery

WO 69/71 - Register of Marriages & Baptisms, C Brigade, Royal Horse Artillery

WO 69/73 - Register of Marriages & Baptisms, E Brigade, Royal Horse Artillery