UK Divorce Records: A Few Search Tips

While divorce is a common occurrence in today’s world, divorce records in the UK were not required to be officially recorded until 1858. If you would like to obtain divorce records in the UK, you will need to request a search from the Central Index of Decrees Absolute, or the CIDA. In order to do this, you will be required to download a form from the Courts Service website and post it to the Principal Registry of the Family Division. Official records from prior to 1858 are not available, but you may be able to find secular documents by searching the British Library. Doing an online search may be easier and less time consuming that taking the above steps, so you might consider doing an online search for UK divorce records first.