can you trust the information on a marriage certificate

[DudleyWinchurch]

The marriage certificate is the same no matter where you order it from.

In theory that is true, but not always in practice. I'm sure I'm not the only person who has certificates that differ slightly in the GRO copies from the local office copies. The registers at the local offices were copied quarterly and sent to the GRO. Therefore, GRO certificates were rewritten an extra time, and as whoever copied them out was only human, there are bound to be errors. The local register copies are a step closer to the original than the GRO copies.

Vivien, did they marry in a church? If so, it would be worth tracking down the parish register. It should in theory contain the exact same information, but for marriages in churches, the PR is the original source of any info on a GRO marriage certificate.

So there is a chance a mistake was made during the copying process from the parish register to the local register to the GRO register.

Alexander

I have a curious case of sending for a cert and assuming it was wrong as father's first name was wrong.  Later looked up a church marriage record  for what I thought might be someone else in same family.  Got half-way through making notes then gave up as also wrong father's name and, only when I got home, realised I had two copies of same marriage but with different first names for groom. Now think that could be correct marriage but, someone having pointed out error in church register, civil copy was made with wrong name "corrected" but how to prove that?!!

[jc26red]

The death cert will not have any information about his parents.
See here as to what it will show http://home.clara.net/dixons/Certificates/deaths.htm

That is true for England, Wales and Ireland death certs.

Australian ones have parents names if known and I believe Canadian ones might have the father's name (father's name is listed on the Ancestry Ontario death index images so I'm guessing its also on the actual cert, whether thats applies to all states I don't know). I don't have any US certs to know what details are included.

But as the OP had ordered it from the GRO I was presuming that we ARE talking about an English one here 

The MARRIAGE cert was from the GRO, but the OP didn't say where she was going to get the death cert from 

[carol8353]

Touche ( I don't have an accent thingy to put over the E) 

[Gillg]

Carol

Try holding down the Alt key and entering the number 0233 - é 

For others try this website:

http://tlt.its.psu.edu/suggestions/international/bylanguage/french.html

Gillg

[carol8353]

Thanks Gill..................... 

[mkeeble]

I got a GRO marriage cert back two weeks ago for a line I was just trying to finish off and was surprised to see both the father's name wrong (Frank instead of John) and listing him as deceased.
After much reconsidering and the ordering of other certs, I have come to the conclusion he must have been trying to disown his childhood, since his father had been a well known drunk. Surprising since most people seem to own up to things on the official docs which don't come out anywhere else.
Luckily the death cert gives date of birth and also had his wife as informant.

[silvery]

The marriage certs from the GRO appear to be photocopies of originals.     

Famililiar with both my mother and grandmother's handwriting, the signatures on their GRO copied marriage certiicates are definitely theirs. 

Would it perhaps be that a copy was signed at the marriage especially for forwarding to the GRO, and that this is the copy that is copied (as it were) to send out now. 

[coombs]

My ancestor put an extra first name for his father on his 1856 marriage cert. His slightly older brother had that exact name. Their father was just George.

[davidft]

The marriage certs from the GRO appear to be photocopies of originals.     

Familiar with both my mother and grandmother's handwriting, the signatures on their GRO copied marriage certificates are definitely theirs. 

Would it perhaps be that a copy was signed at the marriage especially for forwarding to the GRO, and that this is the copy that is copied (as it were) to send out now. 

I believe that is wrong (but I stand to be corrected).

What the GRO certificates are is copies of the quarterly returns submitted to the GRO by the registrars. These are entries written out again and are not photocopies of the original register.

Indeed when i ordered one marriage certificate from the GRO they rang me up to say the copy they had was not signed and so they would check with the original held with the register ie firmly establishing that it was not a photocopy of the original

Whether a different system is in place for more modern certificates (eg within the last 20 years or so) I do not know