British Armed Forces and Overseas Banns and Marriages
Did your ancestor get married while stationed abroad? Or did your ancestors get married while travelling abroad by sea? Search through thousands of records of British armed forces members and civilians who were married abroad and at sea. The collection has been compiled from records held by the General Register Office and The National Archives.
See description
Did your ancestor get married while stationed abroad? Or did your ancestors get married while travelling abroad by sea? Search through thousands of records of British armed forces members and civilians who were married abroad and at sea. The collection has been compiled from records held by the General Register Office and The National Archives.
Learn more about these records
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