Hi Everyone, In reading the post, it says: You should also, however, try and trace them at FreeBMD, which has many millions of birth, marriage and death records from the General Register Office for England & Wales online. This can be found at: http://freebmd.rootsweb.com/cgi/search.pl and does not require a subscription. The GRO records go back to July 1st 1837 and then you are back to the parish registers. My question is....If you have a common name, there is no way to know which family is truly yours without sending for the certificate? Correct? Thank you Debbie USA

Debbie, My view is that you can never really be 100%certain. How many Bill Smith possibilities in London with parents John & Mary? But we then try to qualify that using known data like ages, occupations, parents, siblings, residences etc. If the record passes all those tests we can be reasonably sure we have the right person. As others have said, it gets a little easier after 1910 when you have mother's maiden name, but prior to that you have to use a combination of FreeBMD and census records to isolate your family. It's not easy. How many people do you see with wrong certificates? And prior to 1841, you don't have census records and mother's name were often not mentioned on church baptisms. If you are having trouble with a specific case, post some details. Peter