Genealogy Chat

Hi can anyone help me how to trace if someone has divorced and remarried?

Does anyone know anything about divorces by proxy?

Yours at dead end

inkypoo :-(

It depends when!

Try
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/records/looking-for-person/divorce.htm
"The survival rate of divorce case files is:

1858-1927: almost 100%
1928-1937: 80%
After 1937 : less than 0.2%

Before 1858, a full divorce required a private act of Parliament so the opportunity was only available to a few people."
............

Because of the difficulty and cost for the majority of people to arrange a divorce, the couple often co-habited with someone else and called themselves man and wife OR married bigamously. There was more of that going on than you might think
...........

Added - for Divorce in Scotland see
http://www.nas.gov.uk/guides/divorce.asp

Can't find anything in England/Scotland about divorce by proxy. Did it ever exist?

How recent?

In which country?

Where have you looked so far?

Following on from what DecTecTive said

I have one 1911 census where the first wife says she is married but is head of house, her husband (living with another family) says he has been married to another women for 10 years - the marriage is actually in the mid 1920's after wife no I died.

I have another where the husband says he is a widower, but his wife (no 2) lives away from him with their children and states she is married.

I've also had an interesting read of some divorce docs in the National archives.

If you Google "divorce by proxy" you'll find various things about it.
In the present day, it seems to be possible in certain foreign countries and US states, but isn't considered valid internationally. For instance, if you divorce by proxy in one of those countries/states, and then want to remarry in another country, it won't be considered legal, and you'd have to divorce again in a non-proxy way.

I can't see anything about it in a family history context.

Technically, any divorce where you don't actually appear in court in person (as in most present-day UK divorces) could be called a divorce by proxy - depends what you mean.

The two examples you give are most likely not involving divorces, but just separated couples, probably then living with new partners, and saying they were married, for appearance's sake. Divorce was rare, as it was considered shameful until comparatively recently - even into the 1950's - and was expensive, as DetEcTive says.

Wow! Thank you all for your replies. As you can tell I am relatively new to all of this so to have your help is a real bonus.

I will try all of your leads.

One "supposed" divorce happened in the 1970's so I assumed it would appear on the Marriage and Divorces records and as the person had married again (all these records can be traced) I assumed the divorce would show as well .....that is why I am so confused. As it occurred in this country in the 20th century I again assumed that you couldn't get married again if you were not divorced!!!

Can't get my head around the fact that two marriage records are there but in between there is no divorce record!!!!!!! I have only looked in the Marriage / Divorce records on GR.

Thank you once again for your help

For divorce records you need to look at the site whose link was given to you earlier

Look also at the statistics for the time-scale in which you are interested

The heading 'marriages and divorces' is something of a misnomer.

Quoting from NA link given earlier
Find the decree absolute to obtain legal proof of a divorce in England or Wales by requesting a search (£) of the Central Index of Decrees Absolute. To do so, download Form D440 from Her Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service website and post it to the Principal Registry of the Family Division.
(hyperlinks are given within the text)

For Scottish records the following link is given
http://nrscotland.gov.uk/research/family-history

You won't find the record on line.