Often the process of locating a marriage record is not as difficult as that of locating birth or death records. One reason for this is that you have usually located the birth or christening records of a couple's children before you begin looking for the couple's marriage record. After locating the date of the first child's birth, you can then start looking for the marriage date of the parents, usually about a year before.

Again, the civil or parish marriage records should be searched first, if available. The following are additional records that may provide information relative to marriage records, to begin with, as birth or christening records of the children are being searched, you should be especially aware of any reference to the marriage of the parents. Fig. 19A is a copy taken from a parish birth record that gives the marriage date of the parents.

Christian Wietmaier Canvas weaver

Henrietta nee Groben from Stemmen

Friederika Char- lotta Henrietta

Married 25 May 1838

Died 25 May 1839

Fig. 19A

Another parish record seldom used is the confirmation record. Fig. 19B is an excellent example of how these records provide marriage information.

Printed sources also contain genealogies and give birth, marriage, and death information. Such sources are compiled primarily from the parish records but other secondary sources such as land, guild, census and tax records are also used. Two major printed scources are the Dorfsippenbucher (village lineage books), see Fig. 19C for an example, and the Deutsche Geschlechterbucher (German lineage books), see Fig. 19D for an extract of one.

	Birth	Birth
Name of Confirmed	Place	Date	Parent's Name
Joachim Friedrich			Christian, Friedrich
Spenker	Warnken-	1816	Spenker
(Married Oct. 27 1843)	hagen	Feb. 22	Day laborer at Bartelshagen

Fig. 19B

Guild records, if available and applicable, are another excellent source. Usually, the christening or birth and death records will indicate the ancestor's occupation. Fig. 19E is a copy from the brewer's and baker's build in Magdeburg, Saxony, Prussia, the first part of the record gives the marriage date of the parents followed by the names and birth dates of the children.

Fig. 19C

	* = Birth X = Marriage	+ = Death
VIII	a. + Karl Friedrich Eisenberg 17) *Nesselröden 25. 5. 1816, + Arnsbach 18. 5. 1886, Hauslehrer ebd., Pfarrer zu Landershausen und Hesserode, Kr. Melsungen; X Hesserode 16. 10. 1850 mit + Adelheid Oeste, * Fulda 1. 12. 1823, + Hersfelde 11/ 11/ 1887, T. d. + Johannes Oeste, Kurhess, Leutnant und Steuer= Kontrolleur zu Kassel, U.S. G. + Therese Thösser.
		Volume 54, page 194

Fig. 19D

The following are research problems and procedures relating to marriage records.

A problem which occurs frequently is where the christenings of the children take place in one parish and the marriage of the parents occurs in another parish. There are several possible reasons for this. Between the time a child is confirmed and the time he gets married, he is usually farmed or apprenticed out, often to farms or cities some distance from his own. In this way he learns a trade, earns his own upkeep and is not a burden on his family, the person that he ultimately marries will usually be someone from the place where he was farmed out, or someone who was also apprenticed out to that place but from somewhere entirely different. After getting married the couple will settle wherever they can either acquire land or practice a trade.

When looking for the marriage place, you should know that more often than not a couple was married in the parish where the bride was from. This parish should always be searched first when it is known that it is not the same parish as the husband's.

In searching for a marriage record you may come across an entry for an ancestor in which there will be three different dates given in the margin of the record and no date given in the column marked “date of marriage.” Such a situation will occur usually when searching the husband's parish and not the wife's. In both parishes the marriage banns or proclamations are published, usually for three consecutive Sundays; the marriage date, however, will probably only be given in the wife's parish. The marriage in the husband's parish may, however, indicate the place of marriage.